This teacher in North Carolina has an invitation for the
legislators cutting the schools’ budget and the pundits who applaud
them: Walk
in our shoes.
She writes: “I’d like to put out a call to
every politician who had a hand in passing NC’s new budget. To
every policy maker who thinks this is a good (or even just
acceptable) idea.
To every parent forsaking public education.
To every taxpayer lamenting the “waste” of money that our schools are
in their minds. I’d like to challenge you to walk a day in our
shoes.
“Walk the halls in the scuffed up loafers of the high school
teacher who has been required to write his own textbook, because
there’s no money to buy them. “Sit on the carpet in the polka
dotted flats of the 2nd grade teacher tasked with teaching 25
students all day with no teacher assistant. Oh, and did I mention
that 4 are gifted, 5 have disabilities, 8 speak English as a second
language, and 15 live in poverty?
“Follow a child with behavioral
problems down the hallway in the well-worn Keds of the special ed
teacher who fights for appropriate services for her students,
because the law says they are entitled to a “free and appropriate
public education,” but the people with the money just keep saying
they can’t fund what she needs.
“Conduct awhile in the shiny black
shoes of the band teacher purchasing sheet music and instrument
repairs with his own paycheck. “Clean the green slime off of the
Sperrys of the middle school teacher who has to stop his after
school science club because there are no funds for materials.
“Walk out the door at 6pm in the sandals of the third year teacher, still
bright-eyed and hopeful that her 55 hour week makes a difference.
Then, kick them off as she sits down for two hours of research and
paper-writing, diligently putting in the work to earn an advanced
degree that will no longer provide her any hope of increasing her
$32,000 salary.
“Please, come find us. Come walk in our shoes. See
what you’ve left us with, and let’s see if YOU can ensure that
every third grader can read, that every student graduates high
school college and career ready. Because we can’t. And we aren’t a
group of people that often admit there’s something we can’t do.
We can cause light bulbs to turn on inside little minds. We can inspire a
love of historical facts. We can make any math concept relevant to
real life. We can love a child who doesn’t know what that feels
like, and we can show them that they can learn.
But to do all of this without sufficient funds, sufficient staff, and, most of all,
sufficient appreciation and respect, is simply becoming too tall of
an order.
So you give it a try. Then let’s talk.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on Blog of an e-marketer by Main Uddin.
Reblogged this on Transparent Christina.
I would like to invite Andrew Cuomo to do the same here in NY where he has single-handedly eviscerated the budgets of small city schools. Very poignant piece, brilliant writing.
This is all sincerely and thoughtfully on target excepting the gripe about having to write their own textbooks. In some instances, that could be a good thing.
The disconnect of the legislators in this country and their ALEC-driven take-over needs to be corrected. Never give up; never surrender.
I seems to be all about the money. Nothing else.
And 167 million taxpayers could say the same thing. It seems to be all about their money, but they most likely have no idea what’s going on in this country. We need to get the word out.
Every person in any type of Office all across the country needs to read this!
I agree. The general public has no idea as to what an educator does.
Oh, gosh. Don’t like the job? Leave. Parents “forsake” public education when the public school doesn’t do a good job. Simple as. There are many good people out there losing their jobs, or having to make do with less. Why should education be any different?
I don’t see where “appreciation and respect” necessarily has to equal “more money.”
Teachers who are fighting through this LOVE their jobs and we need them to stay, not leave.
Let me get this straight: You wish that teachers are continually abused so they quit the profession if they can’t “suck it up?”
I’m sorry you are so terribly misinformed about education that you do not value credentialed professional educators and would rather see them maligned and mistreated.
Your attitude only proves you and your family should stay out of the public schools since you seem to think you know more about what teachers do than they do. I implore you: Homeschool your children. (Something tells me that you already do.)
I just clicked on the link to your blog, and THERE IT IS! Your rhetoric. Have a lot of time on your hands, don’t you?
This is nothing new. There is an undercurrent of resentment towards educators that comes from certain people. I have always wondered if they had a bad experience with a teacher themselves and are vicariously trying to “fix” it for their children to prevent them from the same “fate”. I agree with you, LG, if you don’t like what is available, then go homeschool your kids. A parent who is that critical is a pain in the rear to the teacher, anyway. We had a family who homeschooled all her kids in elementary school except the ones that needed special education. She then dumped her unprepared kids into the secondary schools. But, it was still the fault of the schools that her kids weren’t “prepared”. You can’t please some people, so why try? I became a teacher to help kids achieve their dreams some day, to give them basic foundational information and methods to learn and study effectively. I also wanted them to witness, feel, appreciate love, compassion, empathy, and friendship. I wanted them to avoid becoming bullies and big shots and to treat those with learning disabilities as friends. I wanted to teach them all the things that sitting in front of a computer cannot teach. It is evidenced by the actions of Bill Gates that he has been unduly influenced by computers and not influenced from connections with human beings. I am beginning to think we have many reformers in his same shoes. Our society is becoming a vast wasteland of shunned people. People who once gave their all, gave it their lives, their time, their health to children and education only to be devalued by those who won’t see the benefits to society.
There are too many people who are stuck on the wrong-minded track that teachers are: paid for vacation days, paid for the summers, paid for 6.5 hour days, paid too much, only do the work of a home daycare person, and don’t really provide a service. You can give them the figures in black and white and it doesn’t matter. We work a CONTRACT for anywhere from 185-200 days, depending on the district. Count the days. We aren’t paid for summers off. We aren’t paid for working overtime. We aren’t paid for doing extras like science fairs, fundraisers, art shows, band programs, etc. We aren’t paid for holidays. Go to your district website. Look at the calendar. It will tell you how many days the teachers are paid to work. The administration does not care if you put in 4 hours per night and most of your weekend getting prepared for the week ahead. The public also does not care if you ever have time to rest or for a personal life. It just doesn’t matter to either side. Not when push comes to shove.
Most teachers start each day anew, forgetting the days before in which they were shoved around, trying to give the kids their best and hoping the children will learn. We try to make learning fun and exciting and interesting. Testing mania has prevented that in many classrooms.
Teachers are generally caught between two major entities: misinformed public and uncaring administration/school board members. You can’t please either.
If I sound ticked off, I am. That post made me angry. Sorry.
Well said.
“If I sound ticked off, I am. That post made me angry. Sorry.” You are not the only one. Those with the most power play upon the ignorant audacity of some of the population, and the comment in question was the epitome of the misinformed hatred that permeates that faction of society.
I just wish some people would get a clue. It is interesting how some parents expect teachers to be at their beck and call, as if their child is the only one in the room. Yet, they resent the teachers making a middle class wage.
There is a district in SW Ohio, where, the student bookstore sells spiritwear, etc. The sign above the door is “Image is Everything”. There is another very wealthy district in the area that has a problem with students who will say to a teacher, “Why should we listen to someone like you? You can’t even afford to buy good clothes.” And, their teachers are paid better than the others in the whole 4 county area. But, they “look down” on the teachers as “servants”.
I think that would be as challenging as working in a tough urban environment. It’s just the way it is, I suppose. But, in my infantile beliefs, I am expecting too much of those dang “haves”.
Teaching used to be a pretty good, safe, career for people like me who enjoyed learning things and was pretty risk averse. But when the ranks became filled with people who didn’t like learning, it ruined it for the rest of us.
You are ignorant of what you are talking about. Many good teachers are leaving or not going in to the profession because they don’t like the working conditions of teachers. That is part of the problem. There are bad teachers out there, but most of them are hard workers and love their students and are asked to do way too much. It is people who have the attitude like yours that this article is trying to reach. I challenge you to really learn what you are talking about before you continue to criticize. Go on, wall in the steps of a teacher, or even just talk to one.
There’s nothing wrong with public school teachers as persons. I’ve actually never met an undedicated one (although competence and sweetness does vary), but the problem is that education carried out by the state turns good people into bureaucratic functionaries. Working in the government in roles that could well be provided by private institutions tends to produce cost over runs and low efficiency. This blog, of course, assumes that government provided education is essential to fundamental democratic values of the republic. I do not.
It’s not a matter of not liking the job. It’s that those talented young people who have a gift for teaching will have to abandon the possibility to teach because they cannot make a living. I taught for 33 years, and every time the state had to balance the budget, education was on the chopping block. Salaries were frozen and never were “caught up.” They helped to balance the budget on the back of education and other state workers. And yes, those schools that aren’t “doing a good job, may be struggling because of not being able to hire enough teachers, let alone the best teachers. This is a profession in which people get, sometimes 15 minutes to eat lunch and go to the bathroom during their lunch break. Lucky are those who manage to grab another teacher, custodian, or principal to watch their class while they get any other bathroom breaks. Teachers spend a lot of their own money to buy supplies for the class. They work 50, 60 or even more hours per week doing their job. Oh, and yes they DO get their summers off…for which they DON’T get paid, but many of whom spend a lot of time in workshops or creating things to use in their classrooms for the coming year. Respect??? Do you ever need a doctor, lawyer, policeman/woman, contractor, (the list could go on)? You can thank a teacher.
Easy to say when you’re not the one “wearing the shoes”. What does a “good job” look like in your eyes? Do you really want the education of your child left in the hands of educators who have to “make do with less”? So much for wanting the best for YOUR child! Teachers can’t please everybody-anybody! NC has the strictest licensing requirements, the most ridiculous testing standards for students, the most insultingly low pay-don’t worry, teachers WILL leave the profession and teaching will be left to parents. Then what a world of little geniuses we’ll have running our country!
Thank you so much for sharing my blog post! I am blown away by the support it has received.
http://eduscribble.wordpress.com
Not to belabor a point but when the middle class is losing ground on all fronts financially, and the top 1% is gaining exponentially on all fronts financially, it becomes obvious where the money must come to fund education as it should be.
Perhaps it is obvious to YOU, but not to me. EVEN if wealth accumulation by the top 1% is increasing by some sort of exponential curve (data please), there remain three questions:
1)how should education be funded “as it should be”? Cost estimate please.
2) how much money is available in the pockets of the top 1%? Wealth estimate please. Would the money of 2 cover the cost of 1?
3) What is the gap between 1 and 2? Where will they money to cover it come from? Uh, huh. The middle class.
Not to belabor a point, kavips, let’s get serious about our critical thinking here.
Thank you for your curiosity..
The answer to 1) or how education should be funded, … is that a district first determines what it’s needs must be to adequately staff, run and repair every school building in its territory. It then schedules a referendum, or series of referendums to reach the level voters will accept. The difference between what they finally get, and what their budget calls for, is met by the state. Ideally that should be put into every state’s Constitution. The state then determines how much new revenue it will have to outlay to to cover those costs. Once it assesses the amount, it raises its taxes on those making over a million each year, to fund that deficit. This is not large. Those with increased assessments, will still be paying a lower percentage than they did under Ronald Reagan, the great tax cutter. it is very easy to do and the money is available just ready for the taking.
The answer to 2) or how much money is in the pockets of the top 1%, can be best explained in this video…”Wealth Inequality in America.”
if you watched the video, the answer to Number 3 should be obvious to you.
Good luck with trying to convince anyone who defends the 1%. Even if you said 5% there would still objections. Discussions are always seemingly circular.
True, this thread was about teachers and I don’t want it going astray over economics. I never expected a challenge to what I thought was accepted common knowledge. However, I myself had to be converted from one way of thinking over to this way of thinking, so I’m partial to believing that perhaps others through no fault of their own, are still unaware of the economic realities that have settled upon America today. However the point of responding is never to change THEIR mind. It is to offer another alternative to what they said in public so other discerning readers can make up their own minds and themselves inch closer to finding the truth behind the argument.. Hence I feel the proper course of action is to always respond, because one never knows who else may be watching. 🙂
I did watch the video, and I like the “ideal” distribution better than what it currently is, but suppose the voters won’t vote to tax themselves at the level of educational needs, and the legislature won’t make up the difference, and then the question is HOW to get higher taxes on the 1% enacted. Nothing is obvious to me, that any of this funding has any chance whatsoever of becoming law. Theoretically the many should be able to outvote the 1% and legally take away their money. I’m thinking that income disparity is more of a symptom of a deeper problem than the cause of the education funding problem. Granted this is an education blog, but it seems to me that economics is inextricably a part of the discussion, and that what is common knowledge to yourself and among your friends is ultimately false. That’s why I asked for specific numbers: 1) the needs, 2) the resources available, 3)the gap. Some people have argued that if you took away everything from the top 1% it wouldn’t fill the gap. It seems as if it SHOULD, but I’m just wondering whether that is true if we looked at real numbers.
Let me just add that the only legal way for my city, the capital of its county, to pass an increased education millage was to make it part of a county-wide vote on an increased education millage. The issue passed overwhelmingly within the citIy, but failed in all the other 9 out-county school districts. Since then the Intermediate School District has been shy of putting a repeat proposal on the ballot. What then? How does one legally claw back some of the 40% wealth controlled by the 1%? Apparently even the middle class and lower middle class isn’t interested in raising taxes on themselves. One wonders why? I have heard the joke that TEA in TEA PARTY means “Taxed Enough Already.” What if by democratic vote the cussed electorate won’t go for the progressive solution? What if those cussed tea partiers see an attack on the wealth of the 1% as potentially an attack on their own wealth? What of “common knowledge” is left then?
Some very valid points. Embedded in your post, are a lot of “what if’s” and the answer to all of them is simple. If any of those “what if’s” come true, then we are left with the status quo. Which means we have no . improvement.
What I have set out is what has to happen. If people want it, it will. If more people don’t, it won’t.
The simplest legal method is to start with a raise of the tax rates on those making over $1 million a year.
It is a start. Then if it isn’t enough drop it down lower.
The real problem is these folks will not read this…their lives have no connection with the families we are working with. These problems will only become meaningful to them when the issues become bad enough to touch their families and friends. At that time, we can only hope that NC people will vote them out–however; in three more years, we might have dug a hole too big from which we can recover with any grace. We need the NEA to get some lobbyists to start infiltrating the governing bodies with the same tenacity as the NRA people do! Don’t think I am kidding….perhaps we need to start a mentoring program to shadow those folks to learn some pointers on how to “get OUR agenda across”!! WE know what needs to be done, and WE can talk about it, but until we get some real teeth backing our cause, education in NC will continue to slide back to the 1940s. We need to look for people who will genuinely fight the bullies…
Let me tell you…it isn’t about money or benefits. It is about disrespect. Some parents act as if the teacher has a real choice in this testing mania.
Our district has been in turbo-test mode ever since the mid 90s. It is ridiculous. We teachers worked ourselves into a frenzy, not because we were/are lazy or stupid. The morale in our building plummeted when the last principal was hired in 2006.
We have always been a district with solid scores and great teachers. Teachers willing to take pay freezes that became pay cuts because of increasing insurance costs and concessions eroding the salaries we had. Teachers willing to do many after school activities for no pay. Teachers willing to go to poorly designed professional development, only to be forced to teach ourselves to implement programs “yesterday”. Disrespect was/is all we get from that principal. And there is no support for teachers by the board or the superintendent’s office.
I know we aren’t in isolation. All this testing mania has done is to increase stress for everyone! There is a real kind of “competition” in the mind of our superintendent that we have to prove our small district is “just as good as the big boys”. That is NOT the priority of the teachers. Our priority is to do what we can for the kids.
With perpetual changes, some of which are good ideas, shoved in our faces, we have virtually been worked to death. It never stops. We are told to expect to give 150% not 100%. If there are motions toward fairness or toward student developmental readiness, we are told to shut our mouths and quit complaining and do our jobs.
The principal screams in people’s faces, humiliates them in front of teachers and parents, and stomps her foot in defiance of everyone except the 1% of brown-nosers on staff.
We had a big showdown with her the second year she was there. It did no good. No changes were made. She continues to do a poor job of evaluations, pumping some, slapping down the rest. She has driven the morale back in the toilet again and the superintendent seems to support her. He is just as cold and brutal himself.
As many as possible have retired or resigned, not because it was too hard, but due to the stress, unnecessary stress. And this isn’t even a failing school. It is Excellent with Distinction. But nothing anyone ever does is “enough”.
So it infuriates me when uninformed community members talk about lazy teachers, greedy teachers, stupid teachers. I would have trouble being in the same room as Chris Christy or our governor.
I just want to find a mountain top from which to scream.
not lazy to be sure, greedy is a wash, but “stupid” is a much larger and more interesting question. Not stupid about their job, but possibly innocent about the deleterious effects on a society of state controlled education. She who lives by the union dies by the union: viz. Randi Weingarten.
Harian, I believe you drank the Kool Aid. I don’t know what state you live in, but North Carolina DOES NOT HAVE A TEACHER’S UNION!!!!! I repeat, the NCAE is not a teacher’s union. We have no collective bargaining rights in the same way unions do.
And a good thing too. Public sector unions by their very nature introduce corruption into the legislative process. What is happening in NC is a backlash against the entire 100 year old progressive agenda.
Made me cry. I’m so lost after my 11 years in special ed. I can’t do this any longer. I’m always at work well into the evening (7 or 8 is not unusual for me to leave), and the job still isn’t done. I get hit, kicked, and bit at work but that’s not why I’m quitting. It’s the fact that despite the long hours, out of pocket expenses to feed kids, or the large special ed. caseload. It’s the administration of my district that I can’t work for any longer. Nasty and overpaid adults at the top seem to be the main issue in my district in Oregon. They do not properly staff these classrooms and instead blame teachers for their poor money management. My friends are also hating their jobs but feel trapped. Enough is enough! These kids deserve better, and without supporting their teachers the administration is essentially harming the kids they claim they support above us lowly teacher/slaves.
Exactly so. Take care. Too long hours lead to depression leads to having to quit and thus able to do nothing worthwhile for the kids. Even priests need quiet time. Saints hardly anyone is.
Here is an example of teachers getting respect in Ohio. (Not)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/02/28/a-video-that-shows-why-teachers-are-going-out-of-their-minds/?tid=sm_fb