Indoctrinators Strike

[orygunluvr]

So with this raise does that mean we parents won't have letters coming home from the district on what we have to contribute to class, monetarily and supply wise?

[oregon 67]

Teachers don't pay for anything we don't. Your pay was my pay before it was siphoned off. When was the last time a teacher thanked taxpayers?

Remember "they" are tax payers too. When you or I put in a dollar, they put back 9 cents from every dollar in wages (state income tax) and nothing from fringes.

Yes I know, that was my $.09 first though. 100% of their pay isn't generated by them.

Needed to insert sarcasm font. Money originates from the private sector. Government creates no money, only uses what it is provided. And that is never enough.

[gapper]

Run for the school board.

I shouldn't have to.

In other words, you are too lazy to take a seat at the table. It is much easier to sit and bitch at your keyboard.

[orygunluvr]

Construction trades you either produce or you sit and wait for big jobs.

OK, let's take your comparison a step further.

If on your construction job, 10 to 20% of your lumber shows up bent or broken, or not at all, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality?

If on your construction job the people that grew the trees eat up much of your time telling you how you should use those raw materials, and making excuses for sub-par raw materials, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality?

If a bunch of ex-attorneys with no experience in the building trades get elected to office and dictate what you will build and how you will build it, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality?

And finally, tell me, is the end result of your construction trade job as important and meaningful to the sustainability of our very civilization as a teachers?

I'll answer the last one for you; NO!! And any comparison of the value to society of a construction job, or most any private sector job, to that of a teachers is invalid. You simply can't make those comparisons with any sense of real meaning.

Without out those construction jobs teachers have nothing. Nowhere to work, nothing to get paid with. I think this last recession has proved that. If an employee at a lumber yard sexually harasses another that employee gets fired and loses all benefits. If a teacher does the same, or worse, to a child student they get transferred with full benefits and pay. Is a teachers job more valuable than a child's life?

[gapper]

Construction trades you either produce or you sit and wait for big jobs.

OK, let's take your comparison a step further.

If on your construction job, 10 to 20% of your lumber shows up bent or broken, or not at all, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality?

If on your construction job the people that grew the trees eat up much of your time telling you how you should use those raw materials, and making excuses for sub-par raw materials, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality?

If a bunch of ex-attorneys with no experience in the building trades get elected to office and dictate what you will build and how you will build it, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality?

And finally, tell me, is the end result of your construction trade job as important and meaningful to the sustainability of our very civilization as a teachers?

I'll answer the last one for you; NO!! And any comparison of the value to society of a construction job, or most any private sector job, to that of a teachers is invalid. You simply can't make those comparisons with any sense of real meaning.

Without out those construction jobs teachers have nothing. Nowhere to work, nothing to get paid with. I think this last recession has proved that. If an employee at a lumber yard sexually harasses another that employee gets fired and loses all benefits. If a teacher does the same, or worse, to a child student they get transferred with full benefits and pay. Is a teachers job more valuable than a child's life?

We're not playing dodge ball here, but you dodged the questions completely.
No one is arguing that we don't need construction jobs. Re-read the questions and try a make up test. You can do it.

BTW, I've personally been involved in firing teachers for inappropriate conduct with students. So your alleged personal anecdotal experience does not apply in all cases by any means. But, unlike you, I cared enough and was willing to put forth the effort to run for school board and really try to make a difference.
This internet banter though, I will admit, is a LOT easier than actually getting in the game. It's easy to sit in the dugout and bitch.

[orygunluvr]

Run for the school board.

I shouldn't have to.

In other words, you are too lazy to take a seat at the table. It is much easier to sit and bitch at your keyboard.

I prefer to help parents decipher the piles of bullshit heaped on them by the school board and teachers so they can have a better understanding and make better decisions for their children.

[cletus1]

I used BZ's numbers. 13 yr teacher 56k + masters bonus 1858 = 57858 / 2080 hrs for 40 hr week job to compare. Teachers make about 27.82 per hour. I believe that it is a salary and the minimum hours were stated by another poster. Salary in the private sector= how ever long it takes to get the job done.

Benefits used to equal about $11.00 hr more, but it's more than that now. Especially with a medical plan that can cost as much as $17,000.00.

So what. I'll assume your numbers are correct for the purpose of comparison. Many employees at the larger construction companies that do road paving make either prevailing wage or Davis Bacon wages when they work. They also collect maximum unemployment insurance benefits for the four months in the winter when they don't work.

The total compensation for these private sector workers is typically much more than a teacher earns and few of these road workers have a college degree. Your taxes pay for these roads too, but apparently these wages are OK because these people work in the private sector. Or perhaps you think they are overpaid too. Like I said, some of you conservative folks won't be happy till everyone earning wages connected to taxes makes less money.

Here is a sincere question: Why do many conservatives want people to make less and not more money? Come on now, from opposing raising the minimum wage to scaling back public employee compensation, you all seem to want to keep people from prospering. I always thought Americans for Prosperity was a hilarious name for that group of right wingers that wants to keep the American worker down.

BOLI and Davis Bacon are paid on a scale. The lady holding the sign makes less than the backhoe operator. BOLI and Davis Bacon also have a provision called "fringe" which right now is something around $12.25 hr. That only gets paid to employees that have no benefits otherwise. Prevailing wages and fringe are based on wages and economic factors of the region the work is taking place. I have never complained about paying prevailing wages. If I competitively bid I factor in the costs, like anyone else should. But I also have total control over who I hire and fire. If we need to give the current batch of teachers a raise, in order to get the best and the brightest, shouldn't we be able to fire the ones that aren't the best and brightest? What changes with a raise? Do they automatically become better at the job they were supposed to be qualified to do before the raise? Teachers have in service training days during the school year, which are paid days taken out of our kids time as well.

A teacher picked their profession just like I did. All we have ever heard is how underpaid and overworked they are and what a shit job it is. Why did they pick it then? Wouldn't we all love more money and less work? We employ and pay 100% of their salary and benefits yet we have no right to have any decisions in their governance? We are given second class citizen treatment by many when we try to get involved, bad teachers get the same protections as good teachers, and we are supposed to sit down and shut up? Screw that, if they can demand more from me I can demand more from them.

Clete, maybe one day I will sit with you and tell you how we ended up here, why we came here with a 42 page IEP from another state, why we sat for 12 hours with 11 district personnel, our attorney and our advocate, went through federal mediation, due process hearings, all when boy was just in 2nd grade. It ALL stemmed from the teacher and the protections the unions fight for. She wouldn't have p a month in the private sector, but when we moved on she just took up her issues with another kid in class. Every specialist the district could throw at us said the same thing, the teachers was the root issue.

You want me to support more? Give me a place at the table.

I will think about this a bit, but my initial thought is that whatever happened to you and your son can't possibly be typical. I am not in the right frame of mind to discuss it now.

[oregon 67]

Construction trades you either produce or you sit and wait for big jobs.

OK, let's take your comparison a step further.

If on your construction job, 10 to 20% of your lumber shows up bent or broken, or not at all, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality?

If on your construction job the people that grew the trees eat up much of your time telling you how you should use those raw materials, and making excuses for sub-par raw materials, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality? 1 and 2 we can argue all day about.

If a bunch of ex-attorneys with no experience in the building trades get elected to office and dictate what you will build and how you will build it, are you able to produce at maximum capacity and quality? It is obvious that you have not dealt with anyone in a planning department.

And finally, tell me, is the end result of your construction trade job as important and meaningful to the sustainability of our very civilization as a teachers?
Really. There is more to learning than simply being in a school. It is not for everyone. Not everyone needs to go to college. There are many wonderful caring teachers, there are also many just collecting a check.
We do live in Grants Pass I hope your cave is warm and dry. We troglodytes need to stick together.


Einstein clashed with authorities and resented the school's regimen and teaching method. He later wrote that the spirit of learning and creative thought were lost in strict rote learning. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein

I'll answer the last one for you; NO!! And any comparison of the value to society of a construction job, or most any private sector job, to that of a teachers is invalid. You simply can't make those comparisons with any sense of real meaning.

[Larry]

I haven't paid any attention to the strike, what's being asked for, what they're getting now, or what's being offered. I

Then your opinion is, ADMITTEDLY, based on zero information and equals bullcrap.

Go to the Unions own website, iteachmedford.org, and READ the proposals SIDE BY SIDE.

Then you can come back and SPECIFICALLY tell us exactly why they are striking.

[Willie Krash]

Simple question, how many taxpayers does it take to meet the salary and benefits of just 1 teacher?

This is an argument for Unions.

Back in the 50/60's and to some degree the 70's we built schools, public works projects, etc...The Duff treatment plant was built in 1968 (I believe, maybe '67).*
People made good wages and said yes we would build it. Now they say no I have no money. The corporation are super rich as are the rich, Don't be envious of their riches, save that for teachers.

* It ain't gonna look good with no middle class. It might be worth looking at what we built in the 30's and still benefit from and who put roadblocks up in the past 5 years to prevent repairing the infrastructure.

[csrowan]

I haven't paid any attention to the strike, what's being asked for, what they're getting now, or what's being offered. I

Then your opinion is, ADMITTEDLY, based on zero information and equals bullcrap.

Go to the Unions own website, iteachmedford.org, and READ the proposals SIDE BY SIDE.

Then you can come back and SPECIFICALLY tell us exactly why they are striking.

Well, if you'd bothered to read the thread, you'd understand the context of that quote. Instead of being about the strike, the thread quickly turned into a discussion of how much teachers actually work (or don't work), and how much time is spent at school, at home, and during the summer, on and off the clock, and sometimes on their own dollars. I had been putting in my two cents about it, and posted a graphic and link to a story about teachers working hours.

Then people started talking about my link in regards to the strike. And I explained that I didn't follow the strike. I was only clearing up the bullcrap about how much teachers do or don't work.

Of course, had you quoted me in full, instead of just my first sentence, that would be clear.

I haven't paid any attention to the strike, what's being asked for, what they're getting now, or what's being offered. I just want to clear up this misconception about "how little teachers work" and "how much time off" they have. It's bullcrap.

[gapper]

What is interesting to me in this thread, and I've experienced it elsewhere, is that those parents of special needs children generally (not always) are the loudest complainers and biggest critics. Never mind that special education children cost the tax payers more than any other group to educate, it is never enough for those parents of special ed kids.
In many countries their kids would have next to zero opportunity for education. In America we try to educate them all and those that benefit the most financially, seem to be those that cry the loudest.
Interesting, as I say.

[BeerMe]

Teachers work 53 hours per week, on average. That's 10 hours and 40 minutes a day.

The 7.5 hours in the classroom are just the starting point. On average, teachers are at school an additional 90 minutes beyond the school day for mentoring, providing after-school help for students, attending staff meetings and collaborating with peers. Teachers then spend another 95 minutes at home grading, preparing classroom activities, and doing other job-related tasks. The workday is even longer for teachers who advise extracurricular clubs and coach sports —11 hours and 20 minutes, on average.

http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer..._blog.html


And as for summers:

MYTH: Teachers have summers off.



FACT: Students have summers off. Teachers spend summers working second jobs, teaching summer school, and taking classes for certification renewal or to advance their careers.

Most full-time employees in the private sector receive training on company time at company expense, while many teachers spend the eight weeks of summer break earning college hours, at their own expense.

School begins in late August or early September, but teachers are back before the start of school and are busy stocking supplies, setting up their classrooms, and preparing for the year's curriculum.

http://www.nea.org/home/12661.htm

7.5 hours of classroom time? 8am - 3pm. That's 7 hours. They have lunch included in that time. Let's say 6.5. Far short of 7.5 of class time a day. And you're still only counting the days that they are in school.

Your addition of time for those coaching sports teams, that's not unpaid. Any coach gets a stipend, unless you are a volunteer parent. Trust me, the "teacher" coach is getting paid. The "teacher" assistant is getting paid. I know this for a FACT.

Again, CS, do you currently or have you ever had kids go through the school system? Or are you an expert from reading biased articles that support your ideology?

[cletus1]

Teachers work 53 hours per week, on average. That's 10 hours and 40 minutes a day.

The 7.5 hours in the classroom are just the starting point. On average, teachers are at school an additional 90 minutes beyond the school day for mentoring, providing after-school help for students, attending staff meetings and collaborating with peers. Teachers then spend another 95 minutes at home grading, preparing classroom activities, and doing other job-related tasks. The workday is even longer for teachers who advise extracurricular clubs and coach sports —11 hours and 20 minutes, on average.

http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer..._blog.html


And as for summers:

MYTH: Teachers have summers off.



FACT: Students have summers off. Teachers spend summers working second jobs, teaching summer school, and taking classes for certification renewal or to advance their careers.

Most full-time employees in the private sector receive training on company time at company expense, while many teachers spend the eight weeks of summer break earning college hours, at their own expense.

School begins in late August or early September, but teachers are back before the start of school and are busy stocking supplies, setting up their classrooms, and preparing for the year's curriculum.

http://www.nea.org/home/12661.htm

7.5 hours of classroom time? 8am - 3pm. That's 7 hours. They have lunch included in that time. Let's say 6.5. Far short of 7.5 of class time a day. And you're still only counting the days that they are in school.

Your addition of time for those coaching sports teams, that's not unpaid. Any coach gets a stipend, unless you are a volunteer parent. Trust me, the "teacher" coach is getting paid. The "teacher" assistant is getting paid. I know this for a FACT.

Again, CS, do you currently or have you ever had kids go through the school system? Or are you an expert from reading biased articles that support your ideology?

You know he doesn't have kids but you ask anyway. Having kids does not make anyone an expert on teachers. And you are pushing your own right wing anti public school teacher ideology yourself.

[csrowan]

You mean by actually listening to people who've been teachers? By reading stuff written by people who've studied teachers? By having been a student who was engaged in extracurricular activities, and who got to school early and stayed late, and saw multiple teachers on campus all the time?

Or maybe just reading the posts of the only person here who actually IS a teacher,?

[orygunluvr]

What is interesting to me in this thread, and I've experienced it elsewhere, is that those parents of special needs children generally (not always) are the loudest complainers and biggest critics. Never mind that special education children cost the tax payers more than any other group to educate, it is never enough for those parents of special ed kids.
In many countries their kids would have next to zero opportunity for education. In America we try to educate them all and those that benefit the most financially, seem to be those that cry the loudest.
Interesting, as I say.

Again you show how little you know about us and our children and the special education system in general.

[gapper]

What is interesting to me in this thread, and I've experienced it elsewhere, is that those parents of special needs children generally (not always) are the loudest complainers and biggest critics. Never mind that special education children cost the tax payers more than any other group to educate, it is never enough for those parents of special ed kids.
In many countries their kids would have next to zero opportunity for education. In America we try to educate them all and those that benefit the most financially, seem to be those that cry the loudest.
Interesting, as I say.

Again you show how little you know about us and our children and the special education system in general.

Prove it.

[orygunluvr]

What is interesting to me in this thread, and I've experienced it elsewhere, is that those parents of special needs children generally (not always) are the loudest complainers and biggest critics. Never mind that special education children cost the tax payers more than any other group to educate, it is never enough for those parents of special ed kids.
In many countries their kids would have next to zero opportunity for education. In America we try to educate them all and those that benefit the most financially, seem to be those that cry the loudest.
Interesting, as I say.

Again you show how little you know about us and our children and the special education system in general.

Prove it.

Blah blah blah you aren't really 14, are you?

[gapper]

What is interesting to me in this thread, and I've experienced it elsewhere, is that those parents of special needs children generally (not always) are the loudest complainers and biggest critics. Never mind that special education children cost the tax payers more than any other group to educate, it is never enough for those parents of special ed kids.
In many countries their kids would have next to zero opportunity for education. In America we try to educate them all and those that benefit the most financially, seem to be those that cry the loudest.
Interesting, as I say.

Again you show how little you know about us and our children and the special education system in general.

Prove it.

Better yet, rather than make this about me and an attempt to start yet another personal pissing match, disprove what I've submitted in terms of the cost of educating special needs children.

Here is but one source that backs my premise. And this is from one of your fellow right wing extremist gun lovers, should you think I am looking for liberal sources.
"We're told in Oregon that schools are bulging with 25 to 30 students per classroom. That means the average classroom has at least $250,000 worth of education resources available (25 students times $10,000 per student). The average classroom teacher makes just under $50,000 per year. Benefits add another 38% (source OSBA). That means a maximum of $69,000 is being spent on the person who does the teaching. Special education costs would take another $32,500 per classroom."...
http://www.eagleforum.org/educate/2006/apr06/10k.html

[BeerMe]

You know he doesn't have kids but you ask anyway. Having kids does not make anyone an expert on teachers. And you are pushing your own right wing anti public school teacher ideology yourself.

I'm Independent if it matters to you that much. I'm pro choice. Have a relationship with whomever you want. But don't ask me to pay your wage and have you get RIDICULOUS benefits that you WILL NOT get ANYWHERE else.

COL adjustments each year, fine. Adjustments for their level of education are OK too. But they also need to do their job.

They picket the substitutes, I'd be impressed if they picketed when they are given curriculum that they KNOW is bad.