North Carolina’s Republican-dominated State Senate hates teacher tenure. They hate it so much that they are willing to offer nearly $500 million in higher salaries if teachers are willing to abandon their tenure.
Bear in mind that tenure in K-12 education is not a guarantee of lifetime employment; it is a guarantee of due process rights. Also note that until recently, North Carolina was thought to have one of the best school systems in the South. The state has–or had, at last count–more National Board Certified Teachers than any other state in the nation.
Why Republicans hate tenure so passionately is a mystery. There is no reason to believe that principals are itching to fire teachers. North Carolina has had such a large exodus of teachers from the profession and the state that wise policymakers should be worried about holding on to teachers, many of whom are demoralized by years of legislative attacks on them.
Stuart Egan, a National Board Certified Teacher in North Carolina, wrote the following letter in response to this latest move by the State Senate:
“North Carolina’s GOP legislators certainly appear to have paid attention in English class: The motif of “making a deal with the devil” is a common theme in many works of fiction and in anything they write concerning teachers.
“Sen. Phil Berger is championing a bill that would create substantial pay raises for teachers who relinquish “career status” and longevity pay for “professional status.” The salaries of teachers who do not surrender career status would remain frozen in a stagnated schedule. Career status is often referred to as “tenure,” but that is a nebulous term. Career status does not mean teachers are untouchable. The General Assembly has spun this word to make it appear that teachers have the same “tenure” as college professors. Not true. We can still be dismissed for not performing our duties or upholding standards.
“The past 10 years in NC educational policy is enough to tell us where this is going. Under the ABC plan from years ago, teachers in schools that achieved certain growth expectations would get bonuses. That system ran out of money several years before it ended, but the requirements for teachers did not change. The monetary “incentive” simply was taken away.
“When the state budget began experiencing shortfalls, teacher salaries were frozen. Many of us are making the same salary we did years ago, but now we have more students and more classes as well as increases in the cost of living. Consequently, North Carolina has lost many of its best, brightest and potential career educators. Between a lack of financial security and the near-constant disdain in which legislators hold us, there is little reason to stay.
“When the General Assembly tried a few weeks ago to lure teachers into giving up their career status early in exchange for a monetary incentive, the courts struck it down as unconstitutional. But what many in the general public may not know is that the state did not have the funds to finance that incentive past the first year. It would have had to remove the monetary incentive three years early.
“This is exactly what will happen in the proposed legislation introduced this past week. The General Assembly already faces a shortfall for next year, and the salary increase for those who give up their right to due process will be removed because the money does not exist.
“To look at this latest deal another way, it would cause North Carolinians to lose advocates for the public school system. In a time when the state budget siphons off money for a voucher program to promote privatized education and decreases the average amount of money spent per pupil, you need to have teachers speak up for students and schools. Removing the right to due process leads to those same teachers being afraid to do so for fear of reprisal.
“Whether you call it career status or tenure, the concept helps keep public education in the hands of the public. It is so valuable to public schools that Sen. Berger and others are willing to pay more than $400 million to take it away. North Carolinians should take note and wonder why our legislators want teachers hamstrung by either low pay or worry about keeping a job more than they want our students to receive the best education possible to prepare them – and North Carolina – for a modern and innovative job market.
“This teacher will not sell his soul, no matter how attractive the devil tries to make the package. There is too much at stake – for teachers, for students and for North Carolina’s future.”
Stuart Egan, NBCT
West Forsyth High School
English Teacher, Career Status
After Stuart sent the letter above, he added this sad postscript:
Concerning the high teacher salary raises in NC tied to tenure forfeiture, I saw this in my local paper (Winston-Salem Journal) after I sent my previous letter. It seems that to fund these raises, Senator Berger pushed through a budget that “would cut financing for teacher assistants, classrooms teachers, administration and transportation to pay for teacher raises.” Therefore, the county school system would have to request from the county that loss of money to cover the positions lost. But the county commissioners cut the local school budget already. The result would be “the loss of more than 250 early grade teacher assistants and 28 classroom teachers, according to preliminary estimates from the district’s finance department.” That is devastating to the K-3, elementary level.
I have a child with special needs in kindergarten who happens to have Downs Syndrome. If his teacher does not have an assistant, then positive results will not be seen as quickly and effectively in his education. Interestingly enough, if I as a high school teacher (or his regular teacher in elementary school) take the salary increase and make a “deal with the devil,” I may have a direct impact on my own son’s education.
Public education should never be this cruelly ironic.
If this is happening in a place like Winston-Salem, imagine the effect on rural counties in North Carolina.
Republicans are the anti-education party.
Rahm Emanuel would beg to differ.
Just the anti-union party.
Harlan there are no teacher unions in North Carolina.
They are rooting for for-profit business by twisting the idea of conservativism. It’s a sellout.
“Under the ABC plan from years ago, teachers in schools that achieved certain growth expectations would get bonuses. That system ran out of money several years before it ended, but the requirements for teachers did not change. The monetary “incentive” simply was taken away.”
This is a piece on Facebook’s latest education venture. This is referring to Newark’s merit pay system:
“Experts say there is no funding in place to continue to subsidize the merit pay system once the Facebook cash is gone.”
So what happens then? No one gets a bonus? They hope they get state or local leaders who will make good on the promise?
http://ht.ly/xxrJD
Ha! Ha! Ha! That is a good one Chiara! Chris Christie is going to look in his budget for funding for merit pay for teachers? He is underfunding the pension and not meeting the school funding formula. The Essex County Executive, a Democrat, has his head so far up Christie’s —, he will never get it out.
“But with thousands of students now able to go to a school miles from home, Newark officials have scrambled to provide busing, a potentially great cost for a city facing a $93 million budget shortfall.”
I love how they didn’t consider geography in all the “choice!” fervor.
They’ll surmount geographical challenges by sheer force of will and bold leadership!
It looks like Facebook has the same “team” they had in Newark so I guess a whole bunch of people are going to be making 1000 dollars a day again, consulting. What the NYer piece on Newark refers to as “the tight-knit ed reform community”
That means they hire each other, exclusively. Polite language to say that 🙂
Demon-crats are doing the same thing. Obama–Demon-crat. Cory Booker, Newark, NJ, D, now NJ Senator, likely where he can and will do more harm.
This is a bipartisan effort from the wealthy. The 1%ers have bought most of the politicians at this point, and it is all about the end game.
The politicians make these sort of “deals” knowing they are not sustainable, or to get this perk they wrap in rhetoric to seem a good thing, is married to a trade off of a bad thing – in the instant story, drop your tenure and get more money, at the expense of firing aides, etc, and in the end run, there isn’t enough cash to finance the idea thoroughly to begin with. However, in the end, teachers have given up tenure, and there is no turning back.
It is no surprise teachers are leaving NC. They are leaving everywhere – but, what is the alternative? Go to private schools or charters?
Eventually, when the politicians have served their purposes, and completed gutted public education, the next step will be (as we are witnessing for instance, in Ohio) to further fund online schooling – for the 1%ers, its a win-win. Big tax dollars per student, with little investment in technology, filmed classes that can be recycled over and over, and if you get all the kids to work from home on a laptop, the brick and mortar schools, the real estate, now owned by the privatizers, can be turned into what – ? – homes – ? – apartments ? strip malls ? golf courses ? I don’t know the answer of what happens to the real estate ultimately, but this is all at the expense of the kids, quality education, jobs, etc.
Another part of this equation is that – is it not a war on women? Aren’t most elementary teachers women? I think its about 70% the traditional teacher. That is why it has been okay to keep those wages stagnant, since we are second class citizens who should be home making pies, cleaning house and having babies, according the to the Republicans, and the 1%ers who hate us. Right?
The United States is, sadly, going backwards.
Obama is a Democrat? I hadn’t noticed.
Thank me for enlightening you, and call me Captain Obvious. 🙂
Thanked. I hear Democrats exist, but I don’t remember what they look like or where they dwell.
Thank you Donna – that was a good synopsis.
You are right about dropping tenure; once it’s gone, it’s gone.
I see it as a war, not on women, not on education, but on socialism in the minds of the teaching cadre. The tea party movement doesn’t want its children indoctrinated by liberal theories of society in which individual initiative and personal freedom are submerged in collectivist thinking. THAT school teachers have done to themselves. Being anti-capitalist introduces many distortions into one’s thinking.
You are right, also, in that the only place to go will be into private schools and voucher schools, and you are also right that those will be diminished by on line schools.
I keep wondering what the general public attitude toward public education would be if teachers had not so firmly and consistently aligned themselves with unions, with the Democrat party (now taken over by far left radicalism), with government control, with big government, and the like. Public school union teachers effectively elected President Obama, twice, and we see how that radical ideology is morphing into the tyranny that was always implicit in it.
As long as you all are unable to repudiate Obama, you won’t get much sympathy. WE all have to scramble in fire at will jobs. You hold us in contempt. Fine. Let’s see how it feels to be in the unprotected situation of everyone else. When you preach against freedom you shoot yourselves in the foot.
I couldn’t agree with you more. We are observing the last days of public education as we know it. Most of our industry is in China, and they now can destroy and, at the same time, make millions of dollars on moving public education into the private sector. As the politicians get rid of teachers and transfer as much of that money to online schools and charter schools, we will go way back in time – segregated schools and children walking around who cannot read. Greed destroyed our economy and greed will finally destroy our schools. Common Core, Race to the Top, the new Teacher Evaluation System, VAM, are all part of the plan to destroy public education. Sadly, I think their plan is working just like they want it to. The Common Core is much harder which will lead to lower test scores, lower grades for school districts, lower teacher evaluations . . . .and then the governors will have plans in place to fire teachers and close schools – to allow the million dollar business of charter schools and online schools to grow. Anyone who cannot see this happening as we speak is in denial. Never before have I more clearly seen what is going on here.
I am an Ohio teacher near the end of her career. I am so saddened to see the horrible changes that John Kasich has brought to our Ohio schools. I am a Republican, and I will never vote for him again. I do not know how the younger teachers will survive the unfair changes to teacher evaluation and their overall jobs. Morale of Ohio teachers is at an all time low. To spend 100,000 dollars on a Bachelor’s degree in Education and then make such low wages with such little respect – is a poor decision in the present state of education in Ohio. Again, fewer people going into Ohio education is exactly what Kasich and the rich politicians want. They do not want people going into education. They are making the profession so unattractive, that no one in their right mind would want to be a part of it. Again, this is a sure way for charter and online schools to grow.
I know many educators who would NEVER allow their own children to become teachers. I am one of them. Sadly, with billionaires like Bill Gates behind this demise of public education, it is going to take something huge to stop this downward spiraling.
We moved for my husband’s job from NYC to Raleigh last year. We thought the lower cost of living would help us finally buy our 1st home. Our oldest son has special needs and the school and county aren’t doing enough to help him overcome his deficits. Then I continue to read and hear about things like this. My husband and I sincerely regret moving here. Yes the people here are nice but nice isn’t helping my son. He and all special needs kids need resources. The county is strapped!!
I have a question:
Last year I asked a city librarian if she could be easily fired. She said, “No, I’m a civil service employee and I have due process rights.” It is my impression that these city workers are granted job permanence after a six month period.
I’ve read somewhere that teachers have stronger due process rights than other public employees. Is this true? If so, how? Thanks.
Due process only provides an employee with representation at a hearing to determine whether or not he/she will be terminated. If the employer has cause, there is nothing your union representation can do for you. This just makes the employer have a reason (from negligence, sub-par performance, etc) to remove an employee. Teachers’ due process is no stronger or weaker than the due process of any other union employee. Your librarian was mistaken when she said she cannot be ‘easily’ fired. Anyone can be easily fired, the employer just has to do it the right way. There is no such thing as ‘job permanence’.
There is no job permanence for any public employee. Due process is the same for all as far as I know. “Easily fired” is a relative statement. Can public employees be fired without a reason? No. Can they be fired for a good reason? Yes. Those reasons are poor performance, insubordination, or immorality.
Teachers and, I’m assuming, other NC public employees can be fired without any reason during the first four years of their employment. Employers have four whole years to decide if a worker is worth holding on to.
When our representatives misrepresent due process as tenure and neglect to tell the people that due process only kicks in after four years, it is a sure sign that there is another agenda other than improving education going on.
Teachers have been vocal about the cuts to education and Republican legislators have responded by trying to make it harder for teachers’ political voice to be heard by stopping payroll deductions for NCAE dues (judge said it was illegal political payback and stopped it) and creating a state fund of up to a million dollars for lawyer fees if a teacher is sued (creating less of a need for NCAE insurance that does the same thing). Next they’ve denied us our modest step increases while our insurance costs have gone up. Now they are trying to take.away our due process rights with a bribe of immediate funds. That fast money won’t do an older worker any good if he gets let go for no reason shy of his years needed for retirement.
I’ll stop now!
I am so sorry to hear that. Is there a special needs school he could attend? Our city in Ohio has an awesome special needs school. As parents, we love our kids so much, and we want the very best for them. Education is in a crisis…from K-12 to even college. They have raised college costs so horribly that it is even hard for a middle class straight A student with outstanding scholarships to even make it financially. I wish you and your son the very, very best.
Tenure only promises a teacher due process rights. The tricky part about the teaching profession is that once a teacher loses his/her job, due to an unfair evaluation, he/she will never work again in public education. That is just the way it is. A 100,000 dollar Bachelor’s degree is down the drain. A regular public employee can find work again. A teacher very rarely can find employment again in another school system. Unions exist because of unfair treatment to teachers, such as age discrimination and just being disliked for some political reason. I have always been extremely well liked as a teacher by all of my bosses until this year when a new principal came in. He discriminated against me because I am now in my last years of teaching. My students love me and the parents love me. Everyone will turn 50, sooner or later. That is why unions exist – to protect teachers against unfair treatment. I’ve never experienced it until this year. It was a very upsetting experience. I dedicate countless hours to my students and my profession. We are in very troubling times in education. When tenure is eliminated, we will have the master/slave relationship. Sad, but very, very true….
Have any of those wanting to abolish tenure thought it through? Doing this would eliminate any potentially good teachers from ever wanting to choose that profession. Only compliant, subservient persons would teach, and they would be constantly in a state of fear of being fired at the end of the year for any, or even no, reason. There would be no job security, and authoritarian, control freak administrators would have a field day. All of us who have taught have encountered principals like this who mask their incompetence with grandiose attitudes of vast powers. Teachers would have no protections. Tenure just means you can’t be fired without procedure. Many in the non-education world don’t know this. How could ANY teacher love his job and want to do it for a life time under these conditions? But wait! Maybe that’s the whole idea!
“Only compliant, subservient persons would teach, and they would be constantly in a state of fear of being fired at the end of the year for any, or even no, reason.”
There you go – that’s the endgame.
What happened to all the teachers who “teach for the love of teaching”? I have dealt with two tenured teachers who had no business in the classroom they were hateful, ignorant and literally parents pulled their children from the school to avoid them. I was warned about their attitude before my daughter entered school… Both were fifth grade teachers. When she had those teachers I used the year as a teaching point letting her know that in her life she would have to deal with the same type of ignorant, lazy people in her life sometimes they might be your manager or a co-worker and she needed to have those coping skills.
People in the private sector have to worry about not only the whims of upper management, or a boss they don’t get along with, but also the natural swings in the economy and consumers. We don’t have any protection either and we understand that means we have to continue to do our job to the best of our ability.
While I understand why tenure was initially put in place, like many other policies put in place in the past it has run it’s course.
You are correct sir! Check out jamesdhogan.com from June 3rd. He explains it very well.
Reblogged this on jsheelmusic and commented:
I can cross off my list of states I would live in, North Carolina…
They say that education is the key to releasing freedom and self actualizing power in one’s life. So, if we bring in Teacher for America and assess the crap out of our kids… they have power over our children’s (the future) lives.
Ohio is in deep trouble too. As a veteran teacher, I am horrified of the changes they are making in our educational system. Honestly, I don’t know if the public school systems will be able to survive these horrific policies. I am relieved that my son will soon be out of the public school system, and I soon will be able to retire. I have no clue how the younger teachers will survive. No teacher will be able to reach retirement in the new teacher evaluation system. Tenure and a continuing contract means nothing in the new master/slave relationship where an immoral principal can write down anything, even when the teacher has good test scores. It’s all very sad.
It is an attack on society through the guise of education reform. Whether wittingly or not, those taking part are trying to totally, not renovate it, destroy what works and doesn’t work in education.
I have heard (speculation) the 500 million dollars will come from firing 2nd and 3rd grade assistants. Otherwise, I have not heard where they will come up with that money.
actually it’s not speculation; here it is:
To help pay for nearly $470 million in teacher raises, the proposed budget cuts $233 million from teaching assistants, the equivalent of 7,400 jobs. The state will no longer pay for teaching assistants in second- and third-grade classrooms, restricting funding for those jobs to kindergarten and first-grade classes.
Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2014/05/30/3899653/nc-senates-212-billion-proposal.html#storylink=cpy
We lost 2nd grade assistants at the end of last year and third grade before that. At my Title I school the test scores will surely reflect that but hey, we’ll just blame ineffective teachers.
Also keep in mind that the salary schedule is bogus as things are now because we have been frozen for six years. Teachers who started six years ago are still on step 1.
“…tenure in K-12 education is not a guarantee of lifetime employment; it is a guarantee of due process rights.”
Do our “Rights” come to us because we belong to a “Group”, or do they come to us
because we are individuals in the home of the “All Men are Equal” doctrine?
A guarantee of due process rights, would be a special status, considering the
Patriot Act, or activities of NSA or Homeland Security.
When instruments of Government are funded by tax revenues, and these revenues
decline due to Government policies and consumer demand, the tax funded entity
will be adjusted.
A culture of impunity, beyond that of others, outside the “Group” may be lost as
equilibrium is preserved…
NoBrick,
I have always believed the due process in public education has more to do with academic protection. . .
so if I’m Jewish teaching in the Bible belt, I don’t have some radical right wing person find a reason to want me gone just because I don’t hold the same belief system (and vice versa). I think it’s really more about protecting academic sanctity than about the actual teacher. Where being educated is not just an extension of what we learn at home, but the delivery of academic content agreed on by state leadership might be delivered by someone who has very little in common with me, other than that we’re both humans and both citizens of the same country, state and township. Only with these protections can we have a true education system, I think.
It’s not academic freedom because K-12 teachers don’t have it. It’s about preserving a public sector job as a property right that can’t be denied by the government without “due process” and preventing favoritism.
You are confusing REAL tenure in colleges and universities, both public and private, with “due process protections” with K-12. “Academic freedom” does NOT exist for K-12 teachers, as many who have been fired for speaking out can attest. Teachers really don’t have ANY protections and arguably fewer than private sector workers because of the way administrative law is so blatantly disregarded by school districts.
All teachers and other public employees who reach probation have–and that’s what I am referring to, so don’t anybody twist my words–is just another step in the termination process, and few take advantage of it because it is mostly a waste of time or they can’t afford to go without pay for months and months. They take resignations in lieu of dismissals. They take a severance package in exchange for a promise not to sue a school district and perhaps a “good evaluation.”
Well said. We are tasked with preserving academic sanctity no matter the current trend, system, or requests/demands by students, parents, other teachers, administrators, superintendents, business partners, or politicians to the contrary!
Do we need due process? Damn right we do.
Dan, You are so right. As a teacher, I have always appreciated my good principals and how well they treated me and supported me in the classroom. On my 30th year of teaching, a new principal came in and treated all of the older teachers like dirt. When tenure and due process are eliminated, there will no longer be career educators. A teacher will become a bad teacher overnight, and a teacher on about his/her 16th year of teaching will begin to get bad evaluations. Without tenure and due process, a teacher will no longer be able to get to retirement. The new teacher evaluation system promotes a master/slave relationship and is so subjective that a teacher can do very little about the final report. I dearly love my students and I love to teach, but sadly it is not enough anymore. To invest so much money in a Bachelors’s degree, receive low pay, and be bullied daily on your job by management – I would never recommend the career to my children or my students. It’s so sad to see how politicians have ruined my profession. So sad..
It’s considered a property right. Case law backs me up, so the trolls who come on here and try to lie about it don’t know what they are talking about.
I am surprised teachers still don’t know this. I knew this from the very first education course I took in college.
I think it’s both.
And we do have academic freedom in that we don’t teach what patents tell us to teach. We can choose who gets the solo. We can choose who has the speaking part, etc.
Parents
I am not confusing anything. Whatever the case law, I believe much of the impetus is for academic sanctity. So a parent can’t want you fired for decisions you exercise as a professional in an educational setting.
And as an educator and parent in a right to work state I find that a much more compelling reason to preserve due process than property rights. Teachers would be well suited to grasp onto that, no matter what they learned in their first year of education classes because right now even education classes are being held up as questionable by many. Do you live in NC? You don’t seem like you do.
All of your comments are right on the mark. Eliminating tenure is a part of the big plan. Making the profession of teaching look like a “nightmare career” is all a part of the big plan. The billionaires want teachers to go away. “They’ve got this..” They think they can educate our youth all online and in profitable charter schools. A teacher does not want to teach without job security. With the new teacher evaluation system, they have made the principal/teacher relationship one of master and slave. If you have a fair principal, the teacher will probably be fine. If you have an unfair principal, watch out! You are right. No one in their right minds will want to become a teacher….Sad…but, very, very true…..It is all a part of the BIG PLAN!
Sadly, I think their BIG PLAN is all on course. Their first step is to destroy the profession of teaching, so that no one will want to go into it. That is already happening at universities all over the United States. There are fewer candidates entering the teaching profession than ever before. It is just not worth the risk. Who wants to spend over 100,000 dollars on a degree in which you will be threatened to be fired every 3 years based on your student test scores and a subjective principal evaluation? You would have to be crazy. And, I almost forgot….start out at about 33.000 dollars per year…..you can’t even buy a home on that salary….You will also begin to see teachers become “bad teachers” overnight at about the 16th year of teaching…because they have become too expensive….Teachers will sadly have difficulty getting to retirement, because of severe age discrimination. What other career with a 100,000 dollar degree (or more) has that ugly of working conditions? Again,…all a part of the BIG PLAN!
Is it any wonder that “Frozen” is so popular right now? We’re living it. Frozen teacher salaries—everything our G.A. touches in NC turns to ice.
“Let it go! Let it go!”
“Do you want to build a snowman?”
I don’t get how a worker can have a raise tied to a political statement of giving up rights. It should be all or nothing.
Next do we have to sign something that says we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior to get a raise? Or that we don’t believe in evolution? Or that we don’t believe in abortion?
I don’t get how a General Assembly can tie a raise to a right given to a profession for individuals who give up the right?
“Alright. . .let’s divide up the room. Alls ya’ll who thinks teachers need these here special protections, ya’ll go over there and be happy with what ya got. The rest of you’uns, bein’ as how you got in lock step with us here leadership, we gonna reward ya with a fat pay check. Let’s here it for every man for himself! Yee-haw! “
hear it, rather.
How can you hate something when you don’t even know what it is?
Get rid of civil service or “due process” protections for other public employees, and then maybe they would have a point. Teachers don’t have “lifetime employment,” contrary to 24/7 lies.
They would never, ever go after occupations that are male-dominated, like police and firefighters.
I do believe you are right – interesting perspective.
Also, I don’t really think they hate tenure that much. I think they hate that nobody likes the 25% $500 idea so they are tap dancing harder with bigger guns.
I pity any teachers who fall for this scheme. In Ohio last week, Cleveland Public Schools non-renewed 70 limited contract teachers. Many of them were ranked “skilled” according to the new deformers own dang rubric. NO ONE is safe these days!!
Not only is this supposed pay raise financed by slashing other education funding, it only raises pay for certain years – after 20 years, pay stagnates. That makes it easy to push out senior teachers – who will have to give up due process rights to get any raises – meaning the state can avoid paying pensions. It is a terrible plan for any teacher who intends to be a career educator. Specifics are in this chart: http://www.forum.jamesdhogan.com/2014/06/a-clever-way-to-get-rid-of-teachers.html
Indubitably so, which is why public school teacher pensions should be fully vested in 401k type retirement plans, rather than have to depend on the solvency of the state. It might just make teachers a bit more sympathetic to capitalism if their retirements depended on the health of the economy. Thus defined contribution rather than defined benefit, which is what broke Detroit and may do so to Chicago and Illinois.
That means, their pensions would disappear real ‘quick,’ if the ENRONized schools/investors went out of business, and their top executives absconded with billion dollars of taxes thrown into risky corporate bonds.
One would have to direct the investments of one’s 401k prudently. That can be done. The notion of a defined benefit pension just may not be best for society as a whole.
NC has a top rated pension because it is managed conservatively. It won’t go broke as long as it stays on that path. Leaving individuals (novices) to the mercy of the stock market that is as manipulated as it was in the 1920s would be a huge mistake. Retirees would be completely dependent on the government for assistance during the next crash.
And please stop mischaracterizing teachers. There are no socialist boogeymen subverting the gods of capitalism hiding in the schools. That exists in your head only. Any school is no more or no less a representation of the people in the society. Just like anywhere else.
Education Deformers will not be satisfied until they have absolute authority to make whatever decisions they wish to make about the lives of others.
Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. If you remove due process, you are left with raw, unchecked power.
The rich politicians wish to end teaching as a life-long profession. How sad…Without tenure, teachers will become “bad teachers” overnight, and they will not be able to reach their retirement pension. My estimation is that about the 17th year of teaching, corrupt principals will be trying to fire teachers to save money. The new teacher evaluation system has made a
master/slave relationship between principal and teacher. If you have a fair principal, the teacher’s evaluation will probably turn out okay. However, if you have an unfair principal (who may be new on staff and does not know you), you will find you have become a bad teacher overnight – due to age discrimination and/or the principal simply not liking you. Without the union, there will be nothing the teacher can do about unfair treatment. A 120,000 dollars bachelor’s degree will be down the drain, and the teacher will not be able to find work in another school district. Ultimately, if there are not changes in the recent absurd legislation, there will be a teacher shortage. No one in their right mind will start out making 33,000 dollars per year, have the threat of being fired every 3 years due to test scores and a subjective principal evaluation, and ultimately have the lowest self esteem due to very low teacher morale.
I dearly love my students, but I am so sad to say that it is just not enough anymore. I am hated, despised, and the rich politicians want my continuing contract and my low salary. My nephew is in his very first year as an ultrasound technologist with an associates degree. He is making more money than me. I am in my 28th year of teaching. It’s pitiful what the rich politicians have done to the teaching profession.
You might even be better off in a private school. I tend to think that government protected jobs will always be open to abuse. The VA Hospital system is another example. The EPA another. SNAFU is a word from WW II.
Bottom line….they want to privatize education. Public schools will be gone all together. I’m heading back for a new masters degree and have begun prepping for plan b. I love teaching but the GA has ruined it for me. I’m more than a number, a bribe, a back room deal, a crony and a pawn in the latest and “best” ideas in education. God help all of us.
Why they’re doing it: IF THEY TAKE AWAY TENURE, THEY CAN FIRE THE VETERAN TEACHERS BEFORE THEY COLLECT THEIR RETIREMENT. http://www.forum.jamesdhogan.com/2014/06/a-clever-way-to-get-rid-of-teachers.html?m=1
Let me start by saying that I am not a teacher or an employee in the public sector, however, I am an organizer for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (union for electricians) and I want to encourage all of you not to give in!
Teachers, if all of you stand together and unite, your voices will be heard. There may not be an AFT (American Federation of Teachers) chapter or local union in NC right now, but that does not mean you don’t have the right for representation. The AFT will assist you in negotiating a deal with the state that every NC teacher can benefit from.
History teachers, you should know all about this – what happened during the 20s and 30s when factory workers were forced to work 16 hours a day for six or seven days a week for little to no pay? They formed a union! When they all stood together, they were awarded higher pay, and the eight-hour day and 40-hour week became standard across the country.
As union membership increased across the country so did prosperity in the middle class. But ever since union membership began to fall in the 50s, the share of wealth among the middle class has fallen to what it has become today.
All of that to say, this is not a battle you’ll win unless you put aside the politics and fight for the same cause. It’s time to make a stand and unite together so all of your voices can be heard as one! There is strength in numbers!