On Offense For Experienced Teachers

PBS , using that quiet intellectual tone listeners are so comfortable hearing ran a story on the unfairness of teachers union to new, qualified teachers and the devastation wrought to students .
The gist of this argument is this: Unions protect bad teachers, allow "new" competent teachers to be fired first and leave districts with "highly paid  less than qualified" teachers.

The truth of the matter is this: School districts would like nothing more than to bust unions. If you believe school districts are performing poorly, imagine the education your children will receive from low paying first or second year teachers.Compare it to accepting the lowest bidder to perform heart surgery. You want to hire the youngest, "most up to date" new heart surgeon to cut you or a family member open?
Be my guest.

The myths behind the "union as stone waller" argument are these:

1. Many incompetent teachers are allowed to teach because the union protects them.
False:
Like many businesses a process does exist to fire a teacher. The employer must write the employee a warning notice specifically directing the teacher's performance, citing the contract expectations.
This process does not address suchs activities as leaving students unattended, using force, neglecting students, not providing the educational curriculum expected by the district, driving students in personal vehicles, etc. Many of these are immediate firing offenses. No contract protects the irresponsible or dangerous teacher from termination.
So the myth teachers can't be dismissed is is just that. Incompetent teachers can and are dismissed . Ask any teacher, if an administrator wants you gone, they will find a way.
2. "New teachers" are cheaper and better.
What a joke. Every teacher knows it takes at least two years to know your curriculum well enough to be proficient.
Research shows  that every class with a first year teacher puts your child back a year in learning.
Most first year teachers are just hoping to get through the year without being noticed. Good first year teachers will admit their ignorance and ask master teachers for help. They will inhale all the good teaching around them, remembering the best classroom management practices and pursue opportunities to watch master teachers in action.
Those first year teachers, smug in their beliefs the education just completed makes them experts are the dangerous ones parents should hope are in another classroom. I have seen a third grade cadre of experienced teachers assist a failed fourth year NCLB school to success. In three years test scores climbed and two years in a row the school met AYP for the first time (ever). A new principal came in, hired new staff three years ago encouraging many of the master teachers to go elsewhere so young teachers could be hired. The school has failed three years in a row. If the new teachers are well trained and continue to learn, perhaps the school will see results in another year or so. What a loss for the students.
I was a first year teacher, I remember feeling totally overwhelmed, staying at work until 9pm most nights, working weekends, feeling like a beggar, asking if I could sit in classrooms, ideas for lesson extensions, ways to differentiate my lessons, and a million other questions. Some teachers were gracious and helpful, others mean and petty. Like any large business, one can appreciate those willing to help. It is a commitment of mine and I am forever grateful .
New and young are not always better. Yes, a young heart surgeon may have learned all the latest techniques-but his lack of experience would sure make me nervous. A teacher's experience is critical to the success of your child.

3. Teachers with experience are not as up to date as new teachers.
False. Teachers are not only strongly encouraged to obtain a Master's Degree once they begin teaching, they are required by the employing district, the state and the federal government to complete a substantial amount of training hours in order to renew their licenses.. Not only are they required to complete these hours, they are also required to pay for the training . This can amount to thousands of dollars.
In my district, once a Masters degree is obtained, the pay scale is set up to reward continued schooling. The levels of expertise look something like this:
BA/BA+16. BA+32, MA, MA+16, MA+32, PhD.
After having reached MA+32, I am still required to obtain further education to maintain my license. In fact, teachers are now encouraged to attend another program for those with MA+32, an additional 16 college credits, which provides an additional 3,000 per year.
At a time of potential layoffs, and salary freezes, this program remains intact. No one, but those in the 16 college credit program, receive raises. The program will cost me 3100.00 this year.
I suppose I could have gone on and worked for a PhD but I love teaching children. I love learning new methods and approaches to teaching. I just want to be an effective teacher. I have no desire to be an administrator or a University professor. Sometimes I think the educational requirements are overinflated
but if these classes make me a more effective teacher, I'll do it.
4. Longevity is too expensive.
You get what you pay for. Wouldn't you rather have a teacher, well paid, knowledgeable and experienced teaching your children? Most teachers stay in teaching because they love it. It is a passion. The committment has everything to do with the learning success of students. If you had any idea of how much money teachers personally spend decorating classrooms, purchasing learning materials, keeping snacks for hungry children, kleenex for those sent to school with runny noses and paper towels which will do the job, brown paper bags for projects, notebooks so each child has a journal, extra markers and coloring pencils because the district does not provide them, craft stuff for parent presents, additional learning games, flash cards, puzzles and games, a library usually consisting of 300 or more books because the district does not provide classroom libraries, and all of it is a labor of love. Teachers who love teaching don't care what it cost to teach children. But they do need to make a living to support their own families.
5. Teachers get paid to do nothing
Yeah? Our contract is for a specific number of teaching days. We do not get paid for holidays, those weeks off in the summer, spring break or Christmas break. We get paid for the days we teach. We ask that our salary be spread over 12 months because we need to eat during those times. We aren't getting paid for those times.
Ironically teachers will spend a good part of their "time off" preparing for the next semester, or the next school year, or scouring stores, Goodwill, Salvation army, Walmart and any other store offering specials on school supplies, books, furniture, games and whatever else is needed for the next school year.

Next time you hear the myth of the teacher who cannot be fired, the myth of the teacher who does nothing but babysit, or the myth of the teacher who walks out of the building each day at 3:00 with nothing to do, hopefully you remember teachers are not the enemy. In fact, good teachers are precious and consider your children to be precious as well.

Liberty Gone Awry

There must be some philosopher who discovered every action, with time, becomes a parody of itself.
Our nations' intertwining use of the words "liberty" and democracy" are as farcical as the myriad of "God Bless America" advertisements taken out by major corporations after 9-11.
Sincerity becomes an advertising player, as are words used to describe precious American concepts.
When Beatles songs sell advertising  the Baby Boomers have made their last stand.

Tragically, Humans think

Humans are animals who have the misfortune to think they are superior to other life on earth (or anywhere else for that matter)
The unfortunate aspect is not that we are human but that we think-
-our problem is just because we know how to think
it doesn't mean we do it well.
The blessing ? because we all know how to think
thinking poorly is done en masse
and only a few aberrations in the food chain notice
and they are considered anomalies and must be destroyed
Darwin's finest theory at work keeping human survival right up there with the pigeons and the cockroaches.

Oil Spill Won't Hurt National Economy: Report

Oil Spill Won't Hurt National Economy: Report

Gee that sure is a relief, eh?

Men, What does she really look like underneath all that...

Aging men don't realize they aren't a pretty sight. Those stooped shoulders, the belt under the belly, the thinning hair.
Nice for men that they in their superiority from day one and it never wavers-right up to the walker, wheel chair and Attends.
Woman don't fare so well either. Oh, Helen Gurley Brown and Joan Rivers thought they could fool the world with those onion skinned face jobs and oozing of Botox, enough to paralyze the face and look like something out of one of R.L. Stein's scary stories. The Pumpkin Heads or something like that.
Woman are so indoctrinated with hiding and secrets, from infancy, they won't show you the real stuff-mostly because they don't recognize it.
God forbid, men would see them as less than perfect-whatever perfect is supposed to be nowadays.
Women hide stuff -obvious stuff, we have make up and face creams , foundations, concealers(can you believe we buy "concealers", we have hair extensions, breast enhancing bras with water or gel,  ass girdles, stomach girdles, even false toenails (did you know that?)
We can grow, replace or add to our eyelashes, tattoo eyeliner and eyebrows, make chipmunk cheeks with plastic filler, pull our back teeth to make our faces look thinner, hide fat on our back with full length spandex, and even wear leg make up if we are too lazy to get an artificial tan.
We use perfumes on our skins, in our vaginas, our ears, our hands and behind knees and elbows.
We have special creams for face, hands, feet, and even knees and toes.
We spray our vaginal areas with "deodorizers", shave the hair and do cutsie things like leave a heart shape.

Guys have no clue who they are really with-they really don't.
If Nature gave us   Pheromones to attract one another,  women have killed them  a thousand  times over. No wonder they complain about guys who use soap and water and scentless deodorant-they wouldn't recognize a sweat gland if it called to them.

Immigration Anger? Losing the bigger picture..

We do have a serious problem with illegal immigration. I know. I work in a public school system where my elementary school kids cannot always remember the name by which they were enrolled. They don't have addresses or phone numbers, (which constantly change by the way) because parents don't want to be found. Families move around the city frequently to avoid detection. Many live with legal relatives or friends-two or three families may live together, sleeping in shifts, waiting in the Kmart parking lot for an employer looking for cheap labor.


We can't have it both ways. Large employers hire illegal immigrants because the deal is good. Immigrants are hard workers, the pay it worth fourfold in Mexico, the employer pays no taxes, social security and below minimum wage. Many times laborers are cheated in the agreement, but employers know they can't do anything about it.
Employers need to feel the consequences of hiring illegal immigrants. Ignorance is no excuse. Neither is the greed employers harbor when hiring illegals.  Americans need to ask themselves-"At what point do we acknowledge the need for fair and equitable treatment for workers, a fair profit for employers, and a just employment system?
At the present time the greed in our country is so rampant and blatant, citizens have a right to be angry.
But they seem to be killing the wrong messenger.
Illegal immigration isn't the biggest problem we have right now.
It is our willingness to forfeit our own freedoms to address a problem which could be easily dealt with.
George Bush made the invasion of our privacy quite palatable to us. We still haven't made a peep about the fact we can be arrested under the guise of terrorist, placed in confinement, refused the right to be told of our
crimes, refused a trial, and held indefinitely. In addition, our phone calls, emails and any other correspondence can be monitored without our knowledge at any time.
US citizens, forget the wired and bugged White House of the Nixon Administration. History is not exactly a priority of standardized testing, so we seem doomed to repeat our mistakes.
The McCarthy era spread the same paranoia, anger, and ignorance as the Rush Limbaughs of the present day craziness.
When an entire state legislator votes to required a birth certificate prior to placement on a ballot, all based on the bizarro birth certificate fairy tale concocted by crazy media, we are out of control.
These are frightning times for Americans. Misdirected anger , fueled mostly by ignorance, is leading us down a cliff, lemming like, and the obviousness of it is seen by the entire world, except for those it will impact the most-us.
Profiling of any sort leads to the era of "armbands"-shall we continue to lead to our destiny?-Hitlerish choices, to segregate and isolate our nation?
The simplistic philosophy, "You don't have anything to worry about if you haven't done anything wrong" is a great and deadly fallacy.
Not all Hispanics have carmel colored skin and dark hair.
It could be you-picked up because you don't carry your social security card, or "proof" of citizenship by some disgruntled cop, locked up, unjustly, until you can prove your citizenship.
Of course, you don't believe it. 
Therein lies the frightning prospect of making laws which oppress rather than fixing a problem.
I wish I could understand better how perfectly reasonable people , some of whom I love dearly, fueled by fear and anger, are willing to give up the liberty and freedoms we all hold so dearly just to feel like they have a modicum of control. 
Vengeance does not steer well, my comrades.It moves full boar ahead into any obstacle, ignoring the helpless and the innocent. 
Anger is a dangerous engine to drive any decision. 
Think about that. When was the last time you made an excellent decision in the midst of rage?

Time, Useless Time

Oh if it were so! Large, falling chunks of time, spilling into the spaces of humanity, wasted.
Even smaller, tiny slivers of time, tinkling in richness of feeling and sound, drift quietly, ignored . The boisterous clamoring of wasted time invites us, seduces us to pay attention-like spoiled petulant children, feet stomping, wailing, gimmee-gimmee-I want, can't help but look at the wreckage -kind of time..
Adding the hours-thousands, no perhaps millions of people hours added together, feeding off the carcass of wasted time.
Perhaps it isn't wasted. Perhaps time is meant to be wasted on nothingness-like twinkies-empty on the inside with a scant touch of sugar to fool the mind.

Sweet time, time rushing into eternity, time lost only by regrets yet treasured and rewarded with sweet moments,
that time lives as well,
lightly,
honeyed moments
quietly,
without fanfare,
without media
feathered by thoughtfulness
tasted in awareness.