Things are getting rather out of hand, I think...
 

LESS THAN ZERO TOLERANCE: Sharon Huff got a call that her son, Marcus, 7,
had said a "bad word" at his Lafayette, La., school. When he got home,
a note from his teacher at Ernest Gallet Elementary informed her Marcus
had used the word "gay" to describe his mother, who is a lesbian.
Marcus was sentenced to in-school suspension and forced to write "I
will never use the word 'gay' in school again" for an hour. He was also
made to write a "behavior contract" about what he did wrong. "I sed bad
wurds," he wrote, and in the future he should "cep my mouf shut." After
a public outroar, school Superintendent James Easton declared "An
apology is not due" to Marcus or his mother. (Washington Post) ...No
apology for punishing him for telling the truth, and no apology for not
teaching him how to write.

Damn, next they'll be punishing students who describe their randy female canine pets as bitches. Assuming they don't have a conniption at "randy", that is.

Why can't we have a zero tolerance policy on stupidity in the teacher's union?

On the other hand, its reassuring to know that there is a school district with even more and bigger retards in it than in the District of Columbia's

"I sed bad wurds," he wrote, and in the future he should "cep my mouf shut."

Maybe I'm wrong about this, but I think there is a bigger problem when a seven year old is writing this badly.

Yes well, you're probably right, but some elementary school language arts programs emphasize fluency over accuracy of spelling in the early years.

Well, I'll give them a break just this one time. It is Louisiana, after all.

I second that comment.

Also, I think this particular news item is a year or more old.

Does the school wish the child to use more appropriate terms such as "queer" or "faggot" in keeping with Southern tradition?

It's only two months or so old.

      Yeah, I think this was discussed in the Gay marrige thread last month, but that thread is way to long for my lazy ass to go through to double check. The school does suck in this case.       Simple answer, if they did that they wouldn't have enough teachers. Class rooms are packed to tight as it is. You can't fire the incompetant teachers without breaking rules on class size. Nor can you find new, better people to work as teachers for the low pay and less respect.

Simple answer, if they did that they wouldn't have enough teachers. Class rooms are packed to tight as it is. You can't fire the incompetant teachers without breaking rules on class size. Nor can you find new, better people to work as teachers for the low pay and less respect.

QED

My old English 101 teacher would run out of red ink correcting the grammar and punctuation of that quote.

Brian

Pay for school teachers, especially grade school level, is abysmal. In any other profession, a college graduate working 50-60 hour weeks would be paid much more.

There are two problems. One is that most of the money for K-12 schools comes from the local level. Many (most?) people see school taxes as the only ones they have direct control over. If they vote down the school tax, that's at least one tax they can make sure doesn't go up.

The other problem is the perception that teachers work short hours and only part of the year. My wife is a third grade teacher and I can tell you she puts in a lot of time in class preparation, grading and so forth. Also, it's true that teachers get the summer off, but that doesn't mean what it used to either. School goes from the last week in August to the second week in June around here. Given, that she starts prepping for the next year around the beginning of August, that's only six weeks off for the summer.

Given the amount of time she puts in during the school year, it ends up being more than a full time job.

When the country starts paying a decent wage for that kind of dedication, you'll stop seeing dipshits teaching and running the schools.

I think the adminitrators are a bigger problem than teachers. The teachers I know, who I grant you are older and probably make more money, tell me the aministrators are the ones driving good teachers out. :(

Well, I can tell you that I definitely would not be a teacher in a public school. I know several teachers, and they have a dangerous job...kids these days are bringing weapons to school, cursing out teachers, etc. and the parents often don't do anything about it. They expect the teachers to discipline their children. What they don't realize, or rather, don't want to accept, is that it's not the job of the teacher to do such a thing. Teachers are there to TEACH. The parents are the ones who are supposed to socialize their kids and discipline them so they WON'T be little heathens in the classroom.

Also, not all schools in Louisiana are abysmal. I LIVE in Louisiana, and the newer schools are much better. For the most part, all of the schools I attended throughout my life were the better public schools, with the exception of Valley Park Middle in Baton Rouge, which was a cesspool of punks and gangsta wannabes. Very scary place. The teachers didn't hesitate to throw whatever was close at hand at a misbehaving student. They got pretty accurate, too, and the kids didn't screw with them. But as I said, most of the schools were very academically oriented. I think the problem with most schools, no matter where they are, is the fact that they're SPORTS oriented. In other words, athletes could get away with not being able to spell their own names, as long as they could play well. Not so at my high school. Our coaches were all teachers, and if you didn't pass your classes, you didn't play. Louisiana IS getting better.

Feel free to email them here. :)

webmaster@lft.k12.la.us

The quintessential American author, Sam Clemens said it best (and I say it a lot myself):
"Everything in moderation, including moderation."

[quote]Originally posted by dar512

Pay for school teachers, especially grade school level, is abysmal. In any other profession, a college graduate working 50-60 hour weeks would be paid much more.


Not likely. (BTW, Even if they do work 50-60 hour a weeks, it's only for 3/4 year). You want low pay for high education, try masters-level therapist.


There are two problems. One is that most of the money for K-12 schools comes from the local level. Many (most?) people see school taxes as the only ones they have direct control over. If they vote down the school tax, that's at least one tax they can make sure doesn't go up.


School taxes are sky high and they keep raising them. The teachers in Perk Valley are like the second-highest paid in the state (after Council Rock, which went on strike for even MORE pay despite that). Pay isn't the problem. The problem is a system which fails to reward good performance and fails to discourage poor performance.

      I dunno, Russ. I'd say pay is certainly part of the problem in that nobody is going to go into the field if money is important to them. This in turn gives you a much smaller pool of people to draw from. Keeping this in mind how do you get rid of the incompetent teachers when you can't fill their job position?
      This is a nation wide condition. There is some variation due to specific location, but it's pretty well recognized as being a general problem.
      More importantly, that's got to be a tough job. You vs. 20+ kids? Screw that. Even more so when those "kids" are nearly full grown and have a history of violent behavior. Teacher don't get enough respect for the work they do.

RADAR has the answer to low paid teachers.....i dare you to ask him

      I've gone round with Radar before. He suggests he'd kill me. Definatley showed interest in beating me up. It was cute.
      Actually, I'd like to see more of the results of privatized schooling. Be curious to see how it turns out.

As a person who went to private school, I'm always interested in why people think privatizing schools would work. There are several reasons why they do:

They have a MUCH lower teacher to student ratio. there were never more than 15 kids to a teacher, and that was a LARGE class.

The parents and school 'community' are MUCH more involved. There are families that are literally on their fourth generation of students. Old students come back and teach, even if only for a couple of years. Kids go to football games and pep rallies.

The school has the option of making the child leave if they don't perform. Most of the kids that I went to school with were there because they wanted to be there. Yeah they bitched about it, but we all took entrance exams and all made the choice to continue going there because we liked going to school there.

So what we have is a multple-fold problem: underpaid, overworked teachers that can only care for so long until they are literally drowned by the horrible conditions created by socio-economics; kids that don't want to be in school because they can't see any reason that it is going to help them out; parents who don't have time to worry about what their kids are doing (or not doing) at school because they have to work three jobs to keep a roof over them and food on the table.
To fix the schools, you have to fix all of these problems and more. If we look back at the fifties (The Wonder Years, if you will), a huge percentage of the population was actively involved in making sure their kids had a better life than they did and had the resources (money AND time) to do it.
/rant

With the exception of Kindergarten, most public school classes average closer to 30 kids. It should be 15.

Hey! welcome back headsplicer!

headsplice: Are we talking private schools, or privatized schools? There's a big difference.

Also when you say, "a huge percentage of the population was actively involved in making sure their kids had a better life than they did," your meaning is that this is not true today... are you suggesting there's some kind of generational difference between the adults of today and those in the 50s?

You didn't read my earlier post. These days it's more like 10 & 1/2 months.

Starting salary for Masters level for public grade school teachers in the area are in the low 30's. And that's in an affluent suburb of Chicago.

For Catholic schools it's the mid 20s.

Ok, now you share.

I know two masters level grade school teachers around here that are making over $65k.

How many years experience? oh and where's here?

Teachers in the City of Philadelphia start off in the low $30s, IIRC.

30 years in Delaware County. If you note my previous post, I said the teachers I know were older and probably make more money. Then again, teachers should be passing on more than they learned in college, so they may be worth more.:)

That would be Delaware County, PA, part of the Philadelphia metro area.

(Damn Bruce...like the man is supposed to know where the fuck Delaware County is. :) )

Thanks Syc.

Sure they're worth more, if they're still learning new teaching skills and making kids excited about learning.

Let's assume they're good at what they do. What would a person with a Masters in business make after 30 years experience? I bet it's a lot more than 65k.

my friend's wife teaches 2nd grade in the west chester, pa( westtown schools?) area and makes 50K....i think she's been there about 3 yrs....she just got her masters, btw.

Minneapolis Public Schools- one of the highest paying districts in the state- 3-5yrs experience, masters level jumps in the payscale at mid 30K. Outer districts its upper 20s. A master teacher, 20+ years experience, advanced degree (masters, phd) will top out at around 50K they can go higher by entering administration.

One thing that's always bothered me is that Kindergarten, 1st -3rd grade teachers generally get less "respect" and professional regard than teachers of secondary levels- this within the ed world. Success there makes or breaks. And dont get me started on Pre-k, daycare teachers. Good ones at that level are more valuable than gold. We dont invest nearly enough.

Naw, they'd be canned so the company could get some kid right out of college with the latest poop, for less money.:)
Sorry to shortchange you on the location. I figured everybody knew I'm part of the Philly area bunch.
Or Syc was being a stickler.:haha: