Posts: 3,035
Threads: 201
Joined: Aug 2006
Scott,
I really resent someone stating that teachers don't work. I arrive at school at 7:00 every morning and then work ALL day until I leave at between 4 and 6 every night. I eat my lunch at my desk with a room full of students who need extra help outside of class. Then I go home and do more grading and prep work, plus all the extra paperwork mandated by NCLB. I do more planning and grading on weekends; yesterday I took my first day off since school started in August. I also take take online classes to stay current in my subject area and to keep my license. Summers and "vacations" are spent planning curriculum, taking professional development trainings, and creating a professional portfolio required to keep my job. For the privilege of doing this I invested 6 years of my life and $38,000 to get two degrees, plus the opportunity costs of being unable to earn an income while in school.
I do this because I want to do something meaningful and long lasting with my life, because I can think of no more important job than preparing the next generation for a full and satisfying life by helping them acquire the critical thinking skills and work habits they will need, and then you say I don't have to produce daily? On what facts and observations do you base that assertion?
You may not have children in school, but the taxpayers of the community you grew up in paid for your education, even if they didn't have children, and now it is your turn to repay that investment by helping to educate the next generation. You might also want to remember that the students I teach today are going to soon be your employees, and when you are retired they will be working to help support you through their tax payments.
Wouldn't you prefer that the next generation of workers of Hawaii are skilled enough to earn good wages, or do you want them all to just be cheap manual labor? I think you are letting your anti union, anti government worker bias cloud your thinking. Just because it takes forever for you to get some permit doesn't mean that teachers don't have to produce. In fact, I can think of few other professions where the negative feedback is so instantaneous as walking into a classroom of teenagers unprepared, they eat you alive.
Carol
Carol
Every time you feel yourself getting pulled into other people's nonsense, repeat these words: Not my circus, not my monkeys.
Polish Proverb
Posts: 229
Threads: 5
Joined: Jan 2009
Greta, FYI, many of us have done quite well, made a success of our lives, achieved happiness & satisfaction by performing "duties in our spare time", without complaining about it. Including your sacred "lunch".
Scott, well said. So many feel that way, and are not spoken for.
Glen, I am one of many who always appreciate your ideas, brilliant writing and social graciousness. But in this case, I disagree.
I didn't interprest anything in the previous post that advocated to 'tear down governement workers', and I also noticed that you threw health care in there, along with some statements that so many don't have it. Then to go on and claim that some 'capitalists in Beijing", etc. want us to take health care away from those who have it, well. . . I think your rant has got the best of your senses.
I also don't know who you are referrring to, that proposed that the "solution is a race to the bottom".
When you make a comment that government is the solution, not the problem, . . . is just plain frightening.
On the overall topic, I think the OP's suggestion that all DOE teachers should not have tenure is an excellent start. No private organization would ever be forced to keep someone who is ineffective or has completely lost interest in their jobs, but apparently unionized teachers with tenure are exempt from this. Most public schools are also extremely top-heavy, which could be improved with competition, more charter schools, vouchers for private schools or other school choices.
Posts: 8,477
Threads: 1,033
Joined: May 2003
There is an interesting letter to the editor in the Tribune this morning regarding education in Hawaii. Written by Pier Sircello.
Here's the link: http://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/arti...ters04.txt
Mr Sircello points out that enrollment numbers have been flat since 1978 but budgets have risen from $267 million (1978) to $2.5 billion (2008) and non teaching positions have increased from 4,000 to 10,000.
I can't verify his facts but the parallels to all our state and local government budget growth and personnel growth seem on track.
Assume the best and ask questions.
Punaweb moderator
Posts: 229
Threads: 5
Joined: Jan 2009
Carol, I don't think Scott or anyone else has said that teachers don't work. On the other hand, yours is a profession (eh, trade?, since you are unionized) where income and benefits almost never decrease, and with tenure, it is nearly impossible to terminate a teacher. You said yourself that you chose that career because you wanted to do something meaningful and satisfying. If you have achieved that, you are fortunate. I guess many folks are doing jobs they don't particuarly enjoy just to survive, and they don't have the security and benefits that teachers have. It's strange because as a group, seems unionized teachers are one of the most vocal complainers about thier jobs when the overall satisfaction, benefits, and time off in summers seem to make it a pretty nice job. Again, not saying it's not hard work.
On the other hand, what right does someone have to suggest that the government forcibly take even more money from taxpayers to keep one sector insulated from widespread wage adjustments? Do we as taxpayers NOT have a right to say something?
Posts: 3,035
Threads: 201
Joined: Aug 2006
Ric,
What Scott said was this:
"I wonder what it would be like to have a job and not have to produce daily and make money for the company and still take home a paycheck? The teachers, County and State workers need to get on the same program as private workers. Did you know it takes more than 18 months to get a permit from the DOH to install a dry well? I would like to see that guy’s desk."
If you say someone doesn't have to produce daily to earn a paycheck, you are saying they don't have to work, and he lumped teachers in with the paper pushers he is really mad at.
For your information, teachers in Hawaii have had rollbacks of benefits, pay most of the tab for our health insurance, pay all the tab when we retire, have a relatively small pension compared to other states and the cost of living here, and as a public charter school teacher I DO NOT have tenure. If you read my post you would have noticed that we do not have "summers off." Teachers are paid as 10 month employees whose pay is averaged out over 24 paychecks, but we are required to take classes, plan curriculum, produce professional portfolios, and otherwise work during the summer. Just because the kids are off school doesn't mean the teachers aren't working, we just aren't getting paid for it.
I love my job, in fact it is more than a job, it is a calling. But it really offends me that people like Scott are saying that I am somehow scamming the tax payers by earning some sort of monster paycheck with gold plated benefits while doing very little work. Just because I am doing work I find satisfying doesn't mean I shouldn't receive pay and benefits commensurate with my education and responsibilities. Most jobs that require a Masters degree pay much more than a teacher's salary, and teachers in this country earn much less than those in other developed countries. In a sense we are already taking a pay cut to pursue this career. The number of teachers who leave the profession within their first 5 years is huge, and the number 1 reason is the lack of respect for the work they do, the ability to earn more in the private sector is number 2.
Hawaii is almost last in the country for having teachers qualified to teach in their content area, most new teachers have between $25,000 and $50,000 in debt when they finish their Masters, and the cost of living here is high. How can Hawaii hire and keep qualified teachers while reducing pay? If you want to look for a place to cut, why not look at all the DOE employees who don’t directly work with the students, why not look at eliminating expensive extras like sports and spin them off to the private sector where they belong, or do what other states did years ago and go to pay to play for extracurricular activities? And why not look at all the sweetheart deals given to insiders for the contracts on public works projects like the resurfacing of the Kea’au to Hilo road that had to be done over?
I’m done here, I have stacks of papers to grade, two tests to write, and 25 classes to plan for next week before I drive into school to make copies of the tests, since I no longer have a daily prep period due to the cuts to charter schools (we get half the funding per pupil than DOE schools.) Enjoy your weekend.
Carol
Carol
Every time you feel yourself getting pulled into other people's nonsense, repeat these words: Not my circus, not my monkeys.
Polish Proverb
Posts: 447
Threads: 27
Joined: Sep 2006
Funny. One would think more folks in the private sector would be able to see that not only is there a connection between the 17 furlough days and how they (or their employees/co-workers) are going to be inconvenienced/impacted....
.....but there is also going to be an absolutely huge/Huge/HUGE trickle-down/domino/avalanche effect here in Hawai'i, when 13,000+ teachers, plus thousands upon thousands of UHPA, HGEA and UPW workers start getting those reduced-by-a-ridiculous-amount paychecks....
(....which between the end of November when they kick in for the teachers at least, and the end of June, when they level off to -7.94%, will be somewhere in the neighborhood of an 11.34% cut).
Lingle, and her henchmen, and a goodly number of the state's hoodwinked taxpayers may be under the impression that millions of dollars are going to be saved by these furloughs...hallelujah!..but so what?...
....in actuality, that's millions upon millions of dollars that hardworking teachers and other service-oriented state workers won't be able to pour back into the private sector. It's people with reasonable paychecks who help keep people who want to stay in business in business!
If you're a shoe salesman, you can count on selling a helluva lot fewer shoes...even fewer than the past year. If you're a restaurant owner, you're going to be selling a helluva lot fewer meals...even fewer than the last year. If you're a contractor, you're going to be building a heckuva lot fewer of whatever the heck it is that you build....even fewer than the last year. And if you just opened your cute little dream business, with hopes of luring some local flush-with-cash customers ....dream on.
Seems to me that badmouthing one's current customers and myriad potential-customers may not be the wisest use of one's time and energies.
----malolo (...madly dashing off letters to ALL of the state's legislators, whether they represent her precise district or not)
Posts: 1,104
Threads: 71
Joined: Jan 2009
I remember several years back when someone went public (or maybe it was simply an article in the newspaper) about how top-heavy DOE was and they sent out a list of numbers to teachers. As I remember it, by DOE's categorical scheme, admin costs were about 10%. But when looking through the line items I came up with at least 40%.
So I have tried to find out the DOE numbers. I have searched long and hard for current detailed data regarding the Hawaii DOE's actual budget. I can usually dig up something close to what I'm looking for on the net, but this seems to be a black hole.
Why are the DOE budget details not _completely_ transparent? How does it happen that the public is not privy to such information? Aren't taxpayers footing the bill? Isn't this a "public program"?
(Granted the teacher's union, HSTA, is similarly opaque regarding where the dues actually go...)
Isn't there some sort of "sunshine law" regarding the money trail of democratic government in Hawaii? Anybody know of any pertinent links?
(I'm counting on Bob Orts to set me straight here.  )
Cheers,
Kirt
Posts: 1,104
Threads: 71
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 229
Threads: 5
Joined: Jan 2009
Carol, if you are a charter school teacher w/o tenure, then I don't think any of the criticisms here apply to you. You have my gratitude for your contribution and for being a part of the solution.
In regards to complaints about the pay scale, I'd argue that almost everone feels underpaid for what they do. Seems that for some reason, teachers are just more vocal about it as a group.
Posts: 255
Threads: 56
Joined: Aug 2006
When we had the elections a few years ago there was a canidate that went on the radio and said: That there were two DOE employees for every one student. His gripe was we should have the best schools not the worst. It seems like the DOE should have layoffs or furloughs not the HSTA.
|
