Get Schooled

By jim d

November 18, 2008 7:46 AM | Link to this

Giving up tenure for a year? Wow, watch the a$$ kissing start.!! This one will be fun to watch.

Let’s be brutally honest though. This is simply a plan to increase teachers salaries and few if any would get canned. Where would they find replacement teachers? I don’t understand why the unions would oppose such a measure. I mean they might lose 1 tenth of a % of teachers but gain a tremendous amount of money.

By Jeff

November 18, 2008 8:22 AM | Link to this

jim:

I don’t know the realities in the classroom in the DC area, but remember: In GA, teachers do NOT have tenure of any form.

By bearcasey

November 18, 2008 8:29 AM | Link to this

Oh my God! If you can’t see the hole in this plan… you are blind, deaf and dumb… maybe you could be a pinball wizard as the WHO said 30 years ago.

Principals simply are not competent to make such decisions. It’s impossible! I’m retired now so it doesn’t really matter, but my last principal (a good one) at Northview high school, Peter Zevakos, was previously a band director! How is he going to know a great AP US history teacher when he sees one? Osmosis? While I was studying the historiography of Jacksonian Democracy, he was studying how tuba players should perform. Just won’t work.

By jim d

November 18, 2008 8:58 AM | Link to this

JEFF,

REALLY??

For some reason I thought with the passage of HB 1187 AKA, A+ Education Reform Act of 2000 tenure ceased to exist only for teachers hired in Georgia after July 1, 2000.

By Lee

November 18, 2008 9:03 AM | Link to this

Interesting…

• School systems with unions and tenure can’t fire bad teachers, so they propose to bankrupt the system in order to get rid of the bad apples.

• “The money to increase salaries would come from foundations.” What, pray tell, is going to happen when that source dries up and you have already established the new pay scale? Do you think that they will decrease salaries? Yeah, right. Taxpayers, BOHICA (Bend Over, Here It Comes Again).

• I never have understood the rationale why professionals would want to be unionized.

• Having experienced the Year From Hell, i.e., having a child in a classroom with an incompetent teacher, there’s no way I would ever agree to tenure. And actually, principals need to do a better job of performance management and getting rid of the bad apples.

Finally, to paraphrase Bear, even good principals are basically incompetent. (Sorry, couldn’t resist…)

By Tony

November 18, 2008 9:36 AM | Link to this

Teachers in Georgia had the rights for fair dismissal reinstated. This is commonly referred to as tenure. It requires a school system to have just cause to dismiss a teacher that has been with a system for three or more years. The teacher has a right to a hearing. That’s all.

By Joy in Teaching

November 18, 2008 10:24 AM | Link to this

I’m not really sure why we are referencing D.C.’s teacher problems here in Georgia for this discussion.

Yes, D.C. has some serious problems with schools and part of that is due to some really bad teachers. However, they are unionized there and we aren’t here.

Isn’t that comparing two completely different situations?

The right for FAIR dismissal as Tony pointed out is just as important to teachers as it is to those work in other professions.

On one hand, it protects teachers from overly zealous principals who are out to “get them” for some reason. On the other hand, it does help to remove SOME of those teachers who need to seek other professions for their own sake and for the sake of students everwhere. Is it a perfect system? Nope. But until a better system is put in place, we have to work within the perameters we are given to remove unfit educacators from our schools.

By Principal Teacher

November 18, 2008 10:48 AM | Link to this

Teachers had the fair dismissal rights reinstated. Administrators did not. They are basically on probationary status their whole career unless they are had teacher tenure before 1995. The problem with this is that when a principal without ‘tenure’ does actually try and do the job of getting rid of a tenured teacher many times they can become the one who winds up looking for a new job. Especially if that teacher is ‘connected’ somehow. I’ve seen it happen several times. The politics are simply too dense and treacherous with no way of managing from a secure employment position for the principal. This is why many otherwise competent enough principals don’t waste their time on the process. Until this imbalance is corrected one way or the other we will never be able to weed out many of the teachers that may need to go. Unfortunatly the kids lose out as a result. Only in education!

By TheBlogger

November 18, 2008 10:53 AM | Link to this

In an honest world, teacher tenure is not needed.

However, the world is not honest. Administrators take actions and make decisions on other things than professional reasons. Adminstrators may use personal feelings and such. This is why tenure is needed. If a teacher has proven to be a good teacher, if they follow the rules, why isn’t tenure okay? A proven teacher is a valuable resource and should have the freedom to express themselves without fear of retalliation from the administration.

Realize that a tenured teacher can still be fired. Even a tenured teacher can be fired if they don’t do their job. Tenure doesn’t protect against that sort of thing. It is a false statement to say that tenured teachers that are bad teachers cannot get fired under any circumstances.

I question the motivation for offering this “carrot” of increased salary to give up tenure. Why would they do this? What is their motivation? If I taught in DC, I would be very concerned about this offer.

By jim d

November 18, 2008 11:56 AM | Link to this

Blogger,

Good point, this could be an effort to “bust the union”

By Meme

November 18, 2008 12:11 PM | Link to this

Laura,

What teachers’ union are you talking about?

By jim d

November 18, 2008 12:37 PM | Link to this

Ah ha,

seems there maybe a bit of a rift happening between the school system and the “Washington Teachers Union”

I’d guess that would be motivation enough to attempt to get teachers in a position to have to make a choice of being in the union or having a job. Teachers beware!

By TheBlogger

November 18, 2008 12:38 PM | Link to this

jim d Good grief. No where in my post or even in this topic at all is there a mention of any type of “union.” Why do you bring this up at all?

The State of GA had legal teacher tenure years ago with no union. Unions and teacher tenure are mutually exclusive topics.

By V for Vendetta

November 18, 2008 12:49 PM | Link to this

Weird situation. Here are my thoughts on the salary part of the equation:

Yes, as a teacher I do sometimes feel undervalued. I feel that I’m good at what I do, but I am not compensated accordingly for my education, professionalism, and years of experience. That having been said, I’ve always thought that the simplest way to increase both the salary and quality of an education system is in pursuing of advanced degrees.

If we decrease the step increase for experience, and increase the salary based on education level, more teachers would be motivated to seek Masters, Specialist, and even Doctorate level education, thereby improving the quality of their teaching. The best thing a teacher can do is continue to learn. Is this a perfect system? No, of course not. Is it a BETTER system. Yes!

If a doctor spends more than eight years of his life in school, performs a valuable service to society, and is compensated well for it, then why aren’t teachers? A doctor spends hours upon hours of time outside the office researching, writing articles, or simply being “on call.” A teacher spends an equal amount of time grading papers, volunteering for extracurricular duties, and planning for the weeks to come. I would also be less opposed to being “on call” (a subject we’ve blogged about before) if I were getting compensated as much as a doctor.

The fact that some would say it’s insane to pay a teacher as much as a doctor shows just how short sighted and complacent we’ve become. I understand that I’ve provided no way for this to work in a government run, tax-supported system, but then again, many of you are constantly yammering on about school choice … .

If I knew that I could work my tail off for the next four to five years, earn my doctorate, and be making over $100k a year, I’d be all for school choice, too.

My other suggestion would be for the county/state/whoever to PAY for teachers to go back to school (as many private businesses do for their employees). But I think that plan is even LESS likely!

:-)

By jim d

November 18, 2008 3:19 PM | Link to this

Well Mr./Ms. Blogger,

how bout these comments from Laura’s topic?

“about a proposal challenging teacher tenure in Washington D.C. public schools”

“teachers’ union is fighting her proposal”

And the million dollar question was “What do you think of the chancellor’s proposal”

then you questioned MOTIVATION for DC schools to try to make this stuff fly to which I answered to bust the union, that being, of course, the very same union that Laura mentioned first.

Got it?

By jim d

November 18, 2008 3:28 PM | Link to this

V,

So it is about the money (LOL), just kidding.

The thing is though in a free market educational system, teachers would be able to pimp themselves out to the highest bidder. The better the teacher —the higher the demand—and the higher the price. Certainly sounds like a win-win to me. Students get better equipped teachers and teachers get better salaries. Golly gee, who wouldn’t want that?

By Prevent teacher abuse

November 18, 2008 7:23 PM | Link to this

As bad as some teachers are, why is there NEVER any talk about weak administrators? Why is there NEVER any talk about abusive administrators? Why is there NEVER any talk about teaching CONDITIONS?

When we start having an HONEST conversation about teaching CONDITIONS, then, and ONLY then, do we need to have a conversation about tenure.

The same SPINELESS educrats who want to talk about teachers are the same ones who want to say NOTHING about the verbal abuse, disrespect, and yes even PHYSICAL ASSAULTS that occur in classrooms all across the country, each and every day.

And you think teachers don’t want to talk about tenure, when the silence is DEAFENING on teacher conditions, administrative retaliation, and student abuse?

You d@mn right they don’t!

By Lee

November 18, 2008 8:53 PM | Link to this

Oh lordy,

Jim D, it’s ALWAYS about the money….

“…I’ve always thought that the simplest way to increase both the salary and quality of an education system is in pursuing of advanced degrees.”

Yes, we need more Phd’s to teach 1st graders 2+2=4. I’ve always thought that paying millions for advanced degrees that often have nothing to do with actual classroom instruction is a complete waste of taxpayer money. Nevermind that it wasn’t too long ago, as recent as the ’60s, a good percentage of elementary teachers in this state didn’t have a college education - and they seemed to manage very well.

Or, put another way, the more education I received, the less impressed I became with the educated. Years ago, when the eldest was a senior in college, she called home complaining about one of her professors. I told her, “Yep, you know you’re ready to graduate college when you begin realizing how full of sh1t some of those professors really are.”

“As bad as some teachers are, why is there NEVER any talk about weak administrators?”

Because our kids are with teachers 6-7 hours per day, five days per week. A principal is someone they pass in the hall. Law of averages…

By V for Vendetta

November 18, 2008 11:12 PM | Link to this

Lee,

Yes, we need more Phd’s to teach 1st graders 2+2=4.

That’s a pretty ignorant statement, don’t you think? Gaining advanced degrees in a particular subject or field does not necessarily correlate with the difficulty of the subject matter or grade level taught but rather the theory, practice, and execution of various teaching and learning techniques. In addition, the vast amount of research and study required to obtain such degrees ensures that a teacher is staying at the forefront of educational theory and practice. I don’t know about you, but I would take the learned expert over the undergrad any day of the week.

However, that might not be the case for you or your kids, since you seem to be the type of parent who caters to every complaint your child might raise in regards to her education. Heaven forbid your child be exposed to opinions different from her own. That might cause an open minded viewpoint, and we wouldn’t want that to happen, would we?

By Lee

November 19, 2008 9:50 AM | Link to this

No V, you stated that you value the number of degrees one has over experience. I have a different opinion.

BTW, when you preach about being open minded, you might want to be more tolerant of those who disagree with you.

By V for Vendetta

November 19, 2008 10:52 AM | Link to this

I would offer that there’s some truth to that way of thinking. There are quite a few teachers out there with a wealth of experience who are stuck in the past, teaching in the same manner they were taught in a half century ago. I think working towards advanced degrees keeps teachers, both young and old, at the cutting edge of the practice.

Do you want an employee who still does all of his work on an Apple II? No, you want someone well versed in modern applications, email, and the like. Age and experience is largely irrelevant.

I would consider myself pretty open minded, but I tend to pay more respect to those who offer more than just anecdotal evidence and/or links to mindless studies and statistical “facts.” Common sense ranks pretty high, too.

By Florence Mitchell

November 19, 2008 11:58 AM | Link to this

Tenure allows a teacheer to have a fair hearing before dismissal. Administrators should document the effort that are implemented to help poor performing teachers. Adminsitraotrs need to make every effort to provide the need materials and supplies to be effective in the classroom. Just dismissing teachers will not help student peerformance, innovations to teaching and supervision are lock and key to improving student performance.