Reviews for Teachers?

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by Slava

Right, I'm not a teacher, but my wife was. She bailed when it was apparent that I was working way less than her and making way more money. So I definitely have sympathy for teachers and their plight. Its just hard for me to see what teachers are doing in elementary in particular because my wife taught higher grades where there was prep, extra-curricular activities and marking. She worked like a slave.



The budgetary stuff drove me crazy when my wife taught as well. We'd spend a significant amount of money on all kinds of things that almost anyone would agree should be provided.

I know that I'm not going to come across as I mean this, but I find it hard to believe that there is a ton of prep-work for elementary school, particularly in those early years (early years of school, not early years of teaching where they have to design everything from scratch and its clearly very time consuming and demanding). I get that there is time and energy spent for some planning and organization, but teachers have time during the day for that in some prep periods, and then realistically, an hour or two a day should make that doable. I do agree that for higher grade levels its much more difficult and onerous, but honestly speaking, how much prep time can there be for having kids do simple addition math worksheets or simple reading/writing exercises?

Children aged 13-18 are relatively self sufficient and independent.

Looking after a group of thirty 7 year olds 7 hours a day 5 days a week is exhausting, which more or less the same level of prep required. Maybe less, depending on the subject.

Having worked with elementary and highschool, give me highschool ####heads over elementary pisspants all day, every day, any day.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by ae118

Being a student for 12 years means you probably have a pretty good idea of what being a student is all about. It doesn't mean you know a damn thing about teaching.

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Of course it does. Do you think it's veiled in secrecy or something? When you are a student you are in the same room as the teacher for 75% or more of their day.

[ae118]

Originally Posted by Sliver

Of course it does. Do you think it's veiled in secrecy or something? When you are a student you are in the same room as the teacher for 75% or more of their day.

I'd say 99% of the teachers I know quickly become keenly aware that students and parents have little understanding of what is actually involved in a teacher's job. Much more than standing at the front of the class.




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[Daradon]

The summer holiday reasoning a lot of people have is so far off base I don't even know where to start.

Teachers are paid for what they do, just like any other profession. The holidays are there for the kids, not the teachers. It's not like someone up and said, 'hey, we should give these people a bunch of extra time off', that's just what the job is.

All sorts of jobs have perks and challenges that go with the job. One of the perks of teaching is that you get extra time off, but that isn't an excuse to pay them less. The job is what it is. Besides the reasoning would be the same if you did pay them less.

Say you cut their salaries by 25% (rounding here, as an example) because they work 25% less hours (again a misnomer, but to go with the example) than the rest of 'normal society'. The next year they'd still have 100% of their new salary and people would still complain they're getting 25% too much because their hours are still 25% less. It never ends.

The job is what it is. It comes with some extra time off, get over it. Some people decide to become a teacher because of that, some it doesn't factor in at all. But it is a perk of the job and all jobs have perks of one kind or another. The argument is ludicrous and makes no sense.

Lastly, there are so many other jobs that are just like this. IE you work only at certain times but have balanced yearly pay. Why do teachers get singled out? Why doesn't anyone complain that firefighters get paid when they aren't fighting fires?

[TurdFerguson]

Originally Posted by Slava

I know that I'm not going to come across as I mean this, but I find it hard to believe that there is a ton of prep-work for elementary school, particularly in those early years (early years of school, not early years of teaching where they have to design everything from scratch and its clearly very time consuming and demanding). I get that there is time and energy spent for some planning and organization, but teachers have time during the day for that in some prep periods, and then realistically, an hour or two a day should make that doable. I do agree that for higher grade levels its much more difficult and onerous, but honestly speaking, how much prep time can there be for having kids do simple addition math worksheets or simple reading/writing exercises?

I think you may be looking at the relative complexity of the subject matter without considering the abilities of the audience (student). I would argue that teaching a 5 year old addition is as difficult as teaching a 15 year old trig. Having never done either, this is pure speculation. That said, I wouldn't call the majority of my wife's "prep" time mentally strenuous (lots of activity prep not report/assignment reading) but its a lot of time either way.

Ultimately though, i think teachers, at any level, could probably deliver the core curriculum by working within the provided time but I think in most cases that means they are welching on a lot of the core principles that drove them to want to teach in the first place and as a result they get drawn into working much longer hours trying to deliver there lessons in the best way they can and be of the best service to the kids.

[CubicleGeek]

Originally Posted by Daradon

The job is what it is. It comes with some extra time off, get over it.

The extra time off comment isn't even necessarily true in a lot of cases - a 4 week vacation and 2nd Fridays (which equates to about an additional 5 weeks) is pretty standard for a lot of places in Calgary. And being able to take 4 weeks of it any time is far better than having to take all your vacation for the fixed two months every year.

[Daradon]

Originally Posted by CubicleGeek

The extra time off comment isn't even necessarily true in a lot of cases - a 4 week vacation and 2nd Fridays (which equates to about an additional 5 weeks) is pretty standard for a lot of places in Calgary. And being able to take 4 weeks of it any time is far better than having to take all your vacation for the fixed two months every year.

Oh agreed, I just didn't want to get into that whole can of worms. Just showing that, even if you take the flawed argument for what it is at face value, it still makes no sense.

[Russic]

Originally Posted by Slava

I want to agree with you, but having kids in elementary school is making me jaded perhaps. School runs from 8:25 to 3:15. So that's 6:40 a day. I realise there is a some prep involved, but lets be honest here. None of these teachers has to re-learn much that they're teaching, and the marking is incredibly basic. I say that in direct contrast to say a high school teacher where the marking is both complex and time-consuming, and they have to teach topics that are much more complex than say basic reading or math.

I also recognize that this is a bit of a tangent, but why are we only having instruction for that 6 hours a day and 3 1/2 on Fridays? To me that is a ridiculously short workday. It's really no wonder that teachers were always complaining how far behind the curriculum we were in school.

Firstly I'm going to go ahead and sarcastically thank you for opening the Sliver floodgates, allowing us all to bathe in the unique wisdom that can only be attained by getting a high school diploma.

In my opinion your error is that you're only looking at the part that involves your kids during the day, while dealing with kids is becoming a smaller and smaller part of the job. Meetings (at least at my wife's school) are often being held before school and during the afternoons of those short Fridays. Edit: I see from your other post that you were talking more about elementary school, which is something I'm unfamiliar with. I've already written all this out though, so let's continue...

The comment was also made by somebody that the parking lots are empty in the afternoon. My wife's would be absent as well, because she takes her work home to see our kids. Once they go down for the evening she puts in a few more hours per night. This time is often spent marking, prepping for the next day, or answering emails or even text messages from students or parents.

While it would seem that teaching the same thing over and over should get faster, there are several issues. The good teachers are often manipulating their lesson plans and improving upon them year-to-year, or new information/resources are being released that should be implemented. Then there's the problem of teachers not actually teaching the same things. My wife has been in the job for about 7 years and has only taught the same subject to the same grade a handful of times. Every year budget issues end up causing many teachers to teach something they've never had experience with. Even when she does end up teaching something familiar, the curriculum can change which throws a bit of a wrench into the whole thing.

Then some decide to take on a sports team. Every year my wife promises me she won't coach a basketball team and every year the principal says "well, I guess we'll just cancel the team then", so she caves. And it's not just coaching... you have to babysit the kids after practice when the jackass parents decide to take an extra 30 minutes to come get them.

It's important to point out that I don't think teachers get a raw deal in Alberta. They get paid very fairly for the work they do in my opinion.

While I feel the idea of teacher reviews is fine in theory I don't see how it can be implemented given all the other responsibilities teachers are given. The CBE is INCREDIBLY good at wasting money, and this would just be one more thing for them to screw up.

[automaton 3]

My neighbour is a Principal. He tells me the process to get rid of bad teachers is so onerous that it almost never happens. Instead they try to move them on to another school.

Surely there is some room for improvement.

[Russic]

Originally Posted by automaton 3

My neighbour is a Principal. He tells me the process to get rid of bad teachers is so onerous that it almost never happens. Instead they try to move them on to another school.

Surely there is some room for improvement.

Absolutely. That's the story with unions wherever you go, and this particular union is a prickly one. It's also why I don't see this suggestion getting very far off the ground.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by Russic

Firstly I'm going to go ahead and sarcastically thank you for opening the Sliver floodgates, allowing us all to bathe in the unique wisdom that can only be attained by getting a high school diploma.

What's that supposed to mean? I have a degree, FYI, although I don't see how my level of education has anything to do with the topic.

[Daradon]

Originally Posted by automaton 3

My neighbour is a Principal. He tells me the process to get rid of bad teachers is so onerous that it almost never happens. Instead they try to move them on to another school.

Surely there is some room for improvement.

Originally Posted by Russic

Absolutely. That's the story with unions wherever you go, and this particular union is a prickly one. It's also why I don't see this suggestion getting very far off the ground.

Ehhh, I think it's an unfair generalizations for unions. There are bad people at every job. We've all known them. Also lazy people at every job. I don't think there is really more lazy people in union jobs than non union jobs, and if there is, I'd love to see the stats.

I'll agree there are some bad teachers, and they give the good ones a bad name. I'd also go with the idea that it is probably harder to get rid of a bad employee in a union job than an non union one.

However, that doesn't mean there is a higher percentage of them. There are lots of reasons a person who is lazy in their job is able to keep it or be overlooked in non-union jobs. Also, in those jobs, there is always the possibility they lose their job in one company in the sector, and just get one somewhere else in the sector, a possibility that doesn't exist nearly as much in a union job. IE, once you burn that bridge not a lot of other bridges.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by Ashartus

I don't think she's in the minority - my wife is an elementary teacher and regularly works ~60 hour weeks and it seems pretty common with other teachers I know. The marking and prep actually seems to be a relatively small part of it; a lot of time is spent on things like individualized plans for students, administrative reports, organizing field trips and external programs, dealing with parents, etc. During report card season she's usually still working when I go to bed. Getting 6-7 weeks off in the summer (teachers are back a week or two before students) and 2 weeks at Christmas is nice, though in some respects I'm not sure I'd trade the extra time off for the ability to choose when I take my holidays.

I always chuckle at this argument. If I were to choose 100 days off a year, I'd probably pick about 60 days around the nicest two months of the year, maybe add 18 around Christmas as it's nice to spend that time with family, then I'd throw in another 10 days around Easter so I could sneak away for a winter/spring getaway. Those days would also be nice because that's when my kids would have off, which is great for family time and lowers childcare costs for families where both parents work. Teachers may not get to choose all of their days off, but they do get the best days off in the calendar so it's hard to have too much sympathy for them on that front.

[Derek Sutton]

For us on the "outside" the amount of holidays a teacher gets always trumps all. And teachers and their Kin will have thousands of excuses as to why the job is so diffilcult and demanding. My good friend teaches middle school science and admits that he has got it made.

I have spent years coaching hockey and baseball, and years in management. One thing I've elarned is that it is 10x easier working with and teaching kids then it is to work with and teach adults. I also can't believe the know it all attitude so many teachers have, they are worse then Roughnecks when it come s to tryin gto teach them something. I'm sorry, I do not feel bad for teachers, some are working 10 hour days, but that has become the norm for a lot of us.

[CubicleGeek]

Originally Posted by Sliver

Teachers may not get to choose all of their days off, but they do get the best days off in the calendar so it's hard to have too much sympathy for them on that front.

I guess it depends on your stage in life and your priorities as an individual. I have a couple of friends that are teachers and they sure miss out on a lot of group trips that are usually planned around getting away from Calgary during the misery that is Jan-Mar or during low season discounts which coincides with school being in session. If your entire vacation scheduled is predicated around your children, being a teacher does make things pretty ideal.

I'd take my 4 weeks + flex any day over the teacher schedule even if I'm losing out on a week or two.

[Daradon]

Originally Posted by Derek Sutton

For us on the "outside" the amount of holidays a teacher gets always trumps all. And teachers and their Kin will have thousands of excuses as to why the job is so diffilcult and demanding. My good friend teaches middle school science and admits that he has got it made.

I have spent years coaching hockey and baseball, and years in management. One thing I've elarned is that it is 10x easier working with and teaching kids then it is to work with and teach adults. I also can't believe the know it all attitude so many teachers have, they are worse then Roughnecks when it come s to tryin gto teach them something. I'm sorry, I do not feel bad for teachers, some are working 10 hour days, but that has become the norm for a lot of us.

Holy hyperbole Batman!

[jeep991]

Originally Posted by Sliver

I always chuckle at this argument. If I were to choose 100 days off a year, I'd probably pick about 60 days around the nicest two months of the year, maybe add 18 around Christmas as it's nice to spend that time with family, then I'd throw in another 10 days around Easter so I could sneak away for a winter/spring getaway. Those days would also be nice because that's when my kids would have off, which is great for family time and lowers childcare costs for families where both parents work. Teachers may not get to choose all of their days off, but they do get the best days off in the calendar so it's hard to have too much sympathy for them on that front.

Then do it, become a teacher if it sounds so awesome (and be the best darn teacher you can be) or accept the fact that in the teaching profession, teachers get 100 days off. That is just what happens. Just like people in other professions might get bonuses or free meals or discounts off merchandise.

The teachers are not teaching in class during the summer because school is not in session during the summer. That is just how it is. If the year round schools become the norm will teachers be working in the summers. Yes. Blame the education system or whoever decided on the fall - spring schedule. Don't blame teachers for working when they are supposed to work.

I have no love for the education system but the way people bitch and complain about teachers is maddening.

[Daradon]

^^^ Exactly, people think the system is so skewed, but they obviously don't want to do it. Not worth their time.

They just wanna complain. If it was really such a sweet gig, more people would do it, including a bunch of the people complaining.

[malcolmk14]

I'm also a teacher - and I see a lot of both types of teachers. There are some who work 7 hours a day and hardly do any planning, recycling old lessons and materials and doing the same things year-after-year. There are also those who work 10-11 hours a day (at school) and spend their evenings doing extra-curricular activities and even more planning and work at home. Sure, the time off in the summer is great, but any good teacher is making up for those hours and then some during the school year.

Elementary is WAY more work than secondary, no question about it.

Teachers have 199 or 200 operational days in a school year.

My girlfriend, who is an engineer at a medium sized oil & gas company in Calgary, works 209 days this year. She gets 3 weeks holidays and two Fridays off a month. Oh, and she doesn't get hugs at the end of the day.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by Daradon

They just wanna complain. If it was really such a sweet gig, more people would do it, including a bunch of the people complaining.

I'm told graduates of teacher colleges in Ontario can't find any jobs there.

http://www.torontosun.com/2014/02/21...rio-are-scarce

http://www.macleans.ca/work/jobs/two...ull-time-work/

http://blogs.windsorstar.com/2014/03...en-job-market/

The Ontario College of Teachers found the 2012 graduating class reported an unemployed rate of 38 per cent with another 34 per cent underemployed.

Since 2006, first-year graduates securing full employment has dropped from 70 per cent to 28 per cent in 2013.