In response to a letter from someone who said that teachers have cushy jobs and should stop whining, this teacher wrote as follows:
Many ignorant Americans think as you do about teachers and the teaching profession.
I taught in both sectors–private and public and worked longer, harder hours in teaching than most people in the US work unless they work two jobs.
After earning my BA, in the private sector I was paid a monthly salary, worked an average 12 hours a day sometimes six days a week but I did get days off and that two week paid vacation you mention was about all I got as a teacher–three weeks, two before the New Year and one in the Spring but I had to take work home to catch up. During the school year, even when half of the more than 200 students I taught in five/six classes turned in work, I’d spend hours correcting one half hour student assignment and new assignments were being turned in almost daily. My work weeks as a public school teacher were never less than 60 hours and often reached 80 or 100 because of the stacks of student work that I took home to correct and record in the grade book. On weekends, I corrected half a day Saturday and half a day Sunday. On weeknights when I arrived home before seven PM, I corrected until ten or later and sometimes fell asleep at the kitchen table.
Then there was the three years I worked days Monday to Friday teaching and nights and weekends as a maître d because my teaching pay was too low to pay the bills. I knew two teachers that taught history all day and students how to drive in the late afternoons, early evenings and weekends. Those years I survived on two or three hours sleep a day.
As a teacher, during the summers, there was no paycheck. The contract for most teachers is for ten months a year—not twelve and we are only paid during those ten months.
Most teachers had to save during the year or work another job during the summer. I often taught summer school. However, some summers, I installed sprinkler systems for homeowners. I knew one teacher that worked in a pickle factory in the summer. Another teacher worked at Disneyland each summer because he was good at crowd control.
When I taught summer school, the pay was much less because summers were not covered under our contract so we were paid by the hour and I earned maybe a third of what I earned during the school year for the same number of hours worked.
In the private sector when I worked in middle management for a large truck company, no one ever threatened to kill me but as a teacher I taught gang bangers that had killed rival gangsters in turf wars and I was threatened every year. I saw drive buy shooting from my classroom doorway. Sometimes some parent would show up or call on the phone and yell at me because his or her kid earned an F. It didn’t matter that I tried to call the parents at work, at home (several times) and sent home warning letters that the parents often claimed they never saw. For every contact attempt, we had to fill out paperwork to prove we were doing our job. For example: make twenty calls in one day and fill out twenty forms.
I’m a former US Marine and I fought in Vietnam. I’ve been shot at with bullets, mortars and rockets and that was easier than teaching in America’s public schools. At last in combat, I had support from my fellow Marines and I carried a weapon to defend myself.
I retired from teaching after thirty years and if for some reason, the teacher’s retirement fund, that I paid 8% of my salary to for thirty years, went broke and I had to go back to work, I’d rather fight in Afghanistan than go back into the classroom and have to deal with kids that don’t want to learn and ignorant parents that think it is the teacher’s fault when his or her child will not read, study, do homework or behave in class so the teacher can teach.
Oh, lest I forget, when I retired, I took a forty-five percent pay cut—after thirty years—and most teachers do not retire with health care if he or she retires before age 65 as I did. Most have to wait to qualify for Medicare before they are covered again or pay for a very expensive COBRA health plan that may eat up a third or half of whatever the monthly retirement payment is. I was fortunate. Because I had a combat related disability, I was qualified for the VA medical system.
After I went into teaching, the hours increased. There were days I’d arrive at the high school where I taught when the front gate was unlocked at six in the morning and at 11 PM seventeen hours later, a custodian would come to the door and tell us we had to leave, the alarms were being turned on.
What I want to do is take people that think as you do and make them teach in the average American classroom fifth grade to ninth and see how long any of them would survive before they went screaming back to the private sector where work is usually much easier. About 50% of new teachers leave the profession in the first three to five years and never return to education. I know of one new teacher that didn’t even last one day. On his first day, with two classes left to teach, he walked into the principal’s office at lunch and tossed his room keys on the desk and said he was quitting because the students would not treat him with respect and cooperate while he was teaching.
I worked more than ten years in the private sector. I stared working 30 hour weeks washing dishes at age 15. I attended high school days. At nineteen, after I graduated from high school, I joined the US Marines. A few years later I was honorably discharged from the Marines and went to college on the GI Bill while working part time nights and weekends. From college, I went to work in the private sector.
I went into teaching at age 30 in 1975. My job was to maintain control and teach. It was up to the students to learn. If a kid doesn’t understand something, he is supposed to ask questions. Most students don’t ask questions. In the same classroom, I had students that learned nothing because that was his or her choice, and others that earned good grades because they read, worked and studied and then went on to Cal Tech, Stanford, Berkeley, USC, UCLA, etc. Same teacher. Different students. Different parents. The average American student has 42 or more teachers K -12 but only has one father and mother if he or she is fortunate to have both parents.
Excellent response!
I have been a public school teacher for 16 years and taught as a graduate teaching assistant before that. If I was paid for the hours I word instead of the hours I spend with children I would be rich. But the pay me for 6 1.2 hours of a 9 or 10 hour day. THen we are required to stand duty, write lesson plans, attend staff meetings, attend trainings, have parent conferences, write education plans, behavior plans, average grades keep our rooms neat and organized.
I love what I do and didn’t go into this expecting to get rich but I didn’t go into this expecting to have to teach someone elses children how to behave in public, how to treat other children, how to play well in the sand box, I wasn’t warned about middle school drama and the bullying, the teasing, the sucking face on school grounds. I wasn’t warned about being called names, getting cussed at, having to buy my own materials, losing my prep time to go to meetings, giving up lunch to supervise outside because there isn’t enough people to watch the students during that 30 min. I wasn’t prepared for non educators to tell me how to do my job. I don’t tell politicians how to lie, cheat, and manipulate us so they shouldn’t tell me how to teach children to be honest contributing citizens of society. No one told us about the endless testing and how children are tested to death and dont’ care about the test anymore and I wasn’t taught how to deal with a govenor that wants to violate the law and create a rule that says my students test scores reflect my ability to teach and can affect my job. If that is the case then give the kids a test they can read. Or better yet follow the agreement you made when asking for an NCLB waver and agreeing that the legislature has to approve it ours did not. so now what.
No one prepared me to meet parents who have no desire to help with homework who have no bu into their childs education that is the teachers job. No one told me that I was teaching students that only come to school once a week or twice a week and it would be my fault that they don’t learn. No one told us that sex offenders at 12, students who are personality disordered, children who are mentally retarded and students who are gifted would all be sitting in the same classroom and it was my responsibility to make sure they were all meeting the standards tested at the end of the year. Yes I challenge any one to shadow me for a week I especially challenge the politicians that want to tell me how to do my job to come to my school and teach my class for a week.
I read your post over coffee this morning sir, and have to say a huge thanks for telling it so openly, honestly, and succinctly. Bravo to you and a digital handshake to you for so much service in an industry that values its teachers so little. My situation was nearly identical, save for the fact that I am a female, never served in the military, and I quit after a decade. I poured my whole life into my career, sacrificed my children to a degree for my students, but believed I was doing something not many people could do. Teaching truly is a highly specialized talent. As a mother of six, I thank you for working so hard for your students, whoever they were. As a former educator, I commiserate.
http://www.athleticbusiness.com/articles/article.aspx?articleid=2892&zoneid=28
“Bojko’s claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress was also straightforward. Finding Lima’s conduct extreme and outrageous, the court noted that Lima clearly engaged in such conduct to inflict emotional distress on Bojko. In fact, Lima admitted she enjoyed the fact that the false allegations caused Bojko distress and that she found it “hysterical” to send the defamatory e-mails to as many people as possible.”
“Having ruled against Lima on every count, the court awarded Bojko $88,374 for her economic damages (her loss of coaching income and her therapist bills), the emotional distress caused by Lima’s conduct and punitive damages.”
http://www.nhregister.com/articles/2009/06/26/news/doc4a43a21de4608769070241.txt
Judge: swimmer’s mom must pay coach for libel
Published: Friday, June 26, 2009
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HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — A Connecticut woman has been ordered to pay $88,000 to her daughter’s former swim team coach for what a judge called a libelous e-mail campaign that repeatedly used the word “pedophile.”
Hartford Superior Court Judge Julia Aurigemma says Laurie Lima admitted she had no evidence the former coach of the East Hartford High School girls swim team was a pedophile.
The judge wrote that Lima’s campaign against Mary Anne Bojko that began in November 2007 was “malicious, outrageous, and evil.” Bojko sued, and a two-day trial was held in April.
Bojko says she did nothing wrong.
Lima wrote in one e-mail that Bojko was “one step away” from being a pedophile because the coach had told the girls to keep swim team matters secret.
And this is why I know read blogs instead of the press. I sent a few emails…a few then after the lawsuit was filed I opened a blog…that blog is what is referenced throughout the lawsuit and in the press.
I run my own background checks now!
Defendant (Last, First) Birth Year Court Docket No. Disposition Sentenced
BOJKO MARY ANNE 1965 Manchester GA 12 H12M-MV10-0416786-S Guilty 6/4/2010
BOJKO MARY ANNE 1965 Manchester GA 12 H12M-MV07-0406086-S Guilty 10/30/2007
BOJKO MARY ANNE 1965 Norwich GA 21 K21N-MV08-0147921-S Guilty 10/31/2008
Is anyone else uncomfortable with the direction this thread is heading re: Bojko v. Lima?
I think the original response has been deleted. I suppose more will be.
“How I Raised Successful Children in a Turbulent World 1990-2012”
I would never dream to tell other people that their jobs are easy because I have not worked their jobs. I would challenge anyone who thinks teachers have it easy to spend a week shadowing a teacher. Then tell me how easy our jobs are. To those of you who will tell us to stop whining because we have jobs, remember we are only responding to those who tell us our jobs are cushy. Is their a teacher on this blog who would like to state that his/her job is easy? I’d like to hear from you, too: I may need to change districts and/or grade levels!
I have no complaints about my salary, as I taught in one of the highest paid districts in Pennsylvania, but I have been retired for several years now and only when I stopped teaching did I realize how much of my time and energy was taken up over my entire adult lifetime. It is a career only for the truly manic. I can think of nothing more absurd than calling it a “cushy” job. Not enough room here for details. If you need to be told, just ask the nearest teacher.
I am currently a HS teacher and have been for 9 years. Before this I was an engineer in the defense and semiconductor and electronics industries for 13 years.
I work much harder and longer as a teacher than I ever did as an engineer. Without a doubt. No contest. Not even close. Period.
These are dark times for the teaching profession. Private interests are smelling the $$ in education. The wolves are circling…
My story is nearly identical to BCLamore’s, just longer. Engineer in the private sector for 10 years, currently in my 18th year of teaching HS chemistry.
The statement, “I work much harder and longer as a teacher than I ever did as an engineer. Without a doubt. No contest. Not even close. Period.” matches my sentiments exactly. When I first started teaching, I naively assumed that my engineering and management savvy would allow me to streamline the workflow and cut the job down to a regular 8 hour work day. Boy, was I in for a surprise!
And my first teaching salary was not even half of my last engineering salary.
I don’t complain to people about how low my salary is or how hard my job is. I chose this profession and I knew what I was getting into (at least the pay part.) But when people start talking about how greedy and lazy and underworked and overpaid I am, I feel the urge to set them straight.
Excellent post and very close to home. I got more support from my “team” in the military then my so called “team” at my school. In some ways they are not to blame since it is obvious no one has ever taught them what it means to be a real team. Parents attack for any perceived insult or unfairness. They want do-overs for everything, claim they didn’t see the assignments or get the parent announcements so their child can’t be help responsible. Kids will blow off work and then demand bonus work and have a fit when I remind them I don’t give bonus. My days are long and mentally and emotionally exhausting. I can’t believe that the days triaging casualties was more satisfying and more rewarding then this. I have some great kids that keep me going but I rarely get to challenge them because I am busy with kids who have been raised to be rude, disrespectful and feel entitled to everything. I only see my principal when I am in trouble with parents, often, when I am observed or at staff meetings once a month.
Thank you to the writer for sharing so openly and honestly. I will print and read this often.
Probably what most people who are not teachers see of teachers are the times we are with our classes? Perhaps, some non-teachers imagine that all we need to do is open our teaching guides, and there we go. The principal will take care of those students with might be unruly, and our teaching continues. These people might not realize the preparation that is needed to teach, or the time spent in meetings, writing IEPs and other reports, organizing, planning, training, and grading. Even with all of the erroneous ideas that I have encountered about teaching, I have met few people who think that teaching is a cushy job. It seems that those who insist on thinking that teachers are overpaid and have it easy, are not interested finding out more.
Now you need to run a post written by the spouse of a teacher.
What the Public Needs to Know about Teaching
As a first-time commenter, I need to preface with how grateful I feel for Diane’s tireless advocacy (and blogging) and the spirited debate it inspires.
Now, what I think the public needs to know about teaching. I began my first full-time teaching job this fall. I soon realized that teachers work harder than anyone outside the profession, or without direct ties to someone in the profession, can appreciate. The majority of the teacher’s workday occurs before or after the students arrive in the classroom. For the first two months, I spent nearly every waking hour rearranging my classroom to be at least somewhat kid-friendly. Now, I plan constantly, muddling through and adapting cumbersome and, frankly, developmentally inappropriate canned curriculum. In addition to that, I try to keep parents in the loop, calling and writing notes and newsletters. Most days, I rack up between twelve and thirteen hours. I also work Sunday afternoons, planning for the week to come.
And let me be clear: I am not a great teacher. I am not remotely adequate. This is my first year, my first classroom, and I struggle almost daily. Furthermore, I receive very little support. The people tasked with providing support to teachers and students in the district constantly fall through on promises. I initially became frustrated with them before realizing that they faced the same professional challenges I do: everyone in the district is spread thin and overwhelmed.
To make a bad situation worse, the national dialogue dominated by the so-called “reformers” seems determined to remove the only mechanisms of support available while blaming me for not working hard enough. Let me tell you, me working hard enough is not the problem. Nor are my credentials. I went to a fancy school with name recognition that makes people do a double take after I tell them I teach kindergarten. But here is the truth. The students in my class do not care what school I went to. They need more, and I need more. We both need more support staff, smaller class sizes, developmentally appropriate curriculum, organized outreach to families, learning materials, playtime, recess longer than 10 minutes, snacks subsidized by someone other than the teacher, while I’m at it, let’s add preschool to my wish list…
…not to mention a well-rested teacher. I cannot wait for the day when someone with influence realizes that what is good for teachers is ALSO good for students and vice versa.
Teachers are not martyrs. The profession should not be one of continual sacrifice and exhaustion. I hope conditions improve, for our students’ sake.