Teachers are at the end of their rope.

[Mr.Coffee]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

When did anyone suggest that teachers didn’t appreciate or realize what they have?

Originally Posted by Wormius

Do you think any of what he described are worthwhile perks? First assuming the kids and parent are even at the same school, this perk is useful only until the kids are old enough to stay home by themselves. So it’s not like 12 years of saving money on daycare.


Having the same holiday schedule aligned to the most expensive travel seasons aren’t a perk either. After the kids have completed school, there isn’t even a benefit to having that time off. What are you going to do for 2 months? Take a seasonal job?

This is what kicked it all off. Maybe you haven’t been following along or actually reading what people have been saying.

[Wormius]

Did you read what CF was espousing as these tremendous perks?

[Mr.Coffee]

Well you were referring to the time off, weren’t you? Because that’s what the words you wrote say.

But anyway yeah, those are still awesome perks. Not getting fired? Not having to worry about job loss? Uhh yeah, pretty sweet actually. Or are we going to pretend that isn’t a good thing too? Retiring 5 years sooner than private sector peers?

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

This is what kicked it all off. Maybe you haven’t been following along or actually reading what people have been saying.

Is Wormius a teacher?

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

Well you were referring to the time off, weren’t you? Because that’s what the words you wrote say.

But anyway yeah, those are still awesome perks. Not getting fired? Not having to worry about job loss? Uhh yeah, pretty sweet actually. Or are we going to pretend that isn’t a good thing too? Retiring 5 years sooner than private sector peers?

Didn’t we just spend pages debunking the pension myth. It’s worth about 4K-5k in salary at most relative to private sector. Instead of saying getting to retire 5 years sooner at least just say a generous 9.89% employer match. When you retire as an individual is a choice based on your savings plans. We’ve done the salary survey here. Most make more than teachers None of us making more than 100k have an excuse to retire after teachers. That is a choice.

[Jason14h]

Originally Posted by GGG

Didn’t we just spend pages debunking the pension myth. It’s worth about 4K-5k in salary at most relative to private sector. Instead of saying getting to retire 5 years sooner at least just say a generous 9.89% employer match. When you retire as an individual is a choice based on your savings plans. We’ve done the salary survey here. Most make more than teachers None of us making more than 100k have an excuse to retire after teachers. That is a choice.

We’ll you keep stating that all private job pay 5-10% matching which just isn’t true.

I’m not even sure why you are saying it’s 4-5k . At max service it’s $10k a year in matching

That’s the benefit . Don’t underplay or overplay it . Just deal with facts

I have no issue with the amount , but don’t pretend it’s $5k because “everyone else gets 5%”

[Mr.Coffee]

Actually quite the contrary I think Slava did a good job of debunking your logic on that.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

Well you were referring to the time off, weren’t you? Because that’s what the words you wrote say.

But anyway yeah, those are still awesome perks. Not getting fired? Not having to worry about job loss? Uhh yeah, pretty sweet actually. Or are we going to pretend that isn’t a good thing too? Retiring 5 years sooner than private sector peers?

That’s fair. My first comment was more directed about some the perks not being worth going into teaching for. The latter more just ruminations over how having 2 months off when you can’t exactly find a very good side gig or inexpensive travel if that’s your thing.

No, not a teacher. Just a person that can see that the perks come with trade-offs.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Jason14h

We’ll you keep stating that all private job pay 5-10% matching which just isn’t true.

I’m not even sure why you are saying it’s 4-5k . At max service it’s $10k a year in matching

That’s the benefit . Don’t underplay or overplay it . Just deal with facts

I have no issue with the amount , but don’t pretend it’s $5k because “everyone else gets 5%”

It’s a benefit but it should be expressed in a dollar value rather than an amazing pension. I think people do not understand how much teachers save of their own money and the actual value of the government match.

I agree I should just refer to it as a 9.85% employer match and leave it at that.

[Mr.Coffee]

Anyway my honest opinion is I actually don’t think teachers are overpaid. They’re honestly probably about fairly paid. Just my opinion.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by BigNumbers

I wish we could start polls. I’d love to anonymously know if people think
A) Teachers are underpaid
B) Teachers are properly compensated
C) Teachers are overpaid


Personally I oscillate between B and C when you consider the 12 weeks vacation and employer-paid contributions to a DB pension.

Again, personally I think teachers are well and properly compensated.

However, referring to my post earlier on in the thread, they still have to deal with the same external economic forces as the rest of us as our purchasing power diminishes due to rising costs and inflation, and unlike most businesses teachers cant 'pass that cost along to the customer' unless Elementary Pizza Day becomes some sort of grim dystopian nightmare.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Barnet Flame

I went to catholic schools in Calgary and I’ve made pretty clear my views on Catholicism and how it systematically indoctrinates children. Limited empathy for others however, isn’t a feature I recognised within my time in that school system. If anything, learning and living in a way that was empathetic to others was a very strong feature of my time there. I had some incredible teachers in that system.

When I was in Calgary this year, I met up with a retired teacher - not mine but a mutual friend with others and it was just amazing listening to his stories and how his pupils remained in contact with him - one of the stories was mind blowing.

I agree there shouldn’t be duplication of administration/overheads and segregation, but I do think I was a student within the better school system - minus the indoctrination of course.

My recollections of Calgary Catholic school religious studies, was that it was pretty tame.

It tried to contextualize the Bible a bit, and had very broad strokes “be good to people, blessed are the cheese makers, other religions have valid beliefs” sort of messages.

We’d have assemblies that were led by Father Bob, who’s nearly the most secular priest I’ve ever seen. He was fundraiser, not a hellraiser.

Did they discourage sex before marriage? Yes. Is that the worst thing to do to adolescents? Eh. I dunno. Having a kid when you’re still a fetus yourself seems like a bad idea. The birth control stuff is weird, you’d think they’d want to at least cover their bases. But when they tried to tell us masturbation was a sin, every boy in the room went “then send me to hell”

Nobody didn’t think evolution was real, or that dinosaurs were a hoax, or that the universe was a millennia younger than 10 billion.

But god is just as real. There’s a reason a version of god shows up everywhere, because something about that is true. And it doesn’t mean there’s a magic genie, but it does mean there are some universals to the human experience that transcend space and time. And religious stories do a better job of articulating those metaphors than just about anything.

Don’t let #######s take God away from you / God and its nature are unknowable, and you should always beware of people who claim to know unknowable things.

Your sense of right and wrong, your conscience, your soul - that’s all real. Only a fool would argue otherwise. Some grubby old men in Rome don’t know what happens to your soul when you die, but you know deep down whether or not you deserve to burn.

Because me, I think we get the afterlife we think we deserve. You know the sort of life you led, and if you did something that deserves an eternal punishment (like actually deserves it, not failure to abide by some Cherry-picked passage from a 2,000 year old copy of the Silmarillion), God or whatever you want to call the cosmic force that binds the universe together will see that you receive it.

But if you spent your life trying to do the right thing, trying to be honest and honourable, and trying to be brave even when you weren’t, when the time comes to stare death in the face, maybe you see your dogs again and have your grandparents remember you.

Maybe.

[Barnet Flame]

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

I remember having one of the wrestling Harts as a substitute a few times. I don't recall which one now but it seemed really cool as a kid.

Uncle Nicky taught me religion in Grade 10.

You’ve got to be pretty old to know what I’m talking about.

[Barnet Flame]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

That seems a bit harsh. I mean, what happens when you're like - "I want a name nobody else has, I like 'Jackson' but want my own unique spelling" and then you realize that we already had babies in 2022 named:

Jacksen
Jax
Jaxen
Jaxon
Jaxsen
Jaxson
Jaxton
Jaxtyn
Jaxtyn-James
Jaxx
Jaxxon
Jaxxson
Jaxxyn
Jaxyn

And you despaired! But then you realized - wait! Nobody has used "Jax$en" yet! And the government shut you down.

It's hard out there when there are more babies named "Stetson" than "Stephen", more "Jaxon" than "Jason" to find something unique!

I’m starting to understand how Kylington came about.

[malcolmk14]

The pay is good. I’m pretty much capped out 9 years in - not a lot of room for upside unless I decide to go into administration. My wife has an engineering degree and makes almost twice as much as me and has plenty more room for advancement/upside in her career.

[Mr.Coffee]

Originally Posted by malcolmk14

The pay is good. I’m pretty much capped out 9 years in - not a lot of room for upside unless I decide to go into administration. My wife has an engineering degree and makes almost twice as much as me and has plenty more room for advancement/upside in her career.

But can get fired.

[Red Potato Standing By]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

But can get fired.

They can’t fire teachers? I am sure they can if there is a valid reason and they do it properly.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

My recollections of Calgary Catholic school religious studies, was that it was pretty tame.

It tried to contextualize the Bible a bit, and had very broad strokes “be good to people, blessed are the cheese makers, other religions have valid beliefs” sort of messages.

We’d have assemblies that were led by Father Bob, who’s nearly the most secular priest I’ve ever seen. He was fundraiser, not a hellraiser.

Did they discourage sex before marriage? Yes. Is that the worst thing to do to adolescents? Eh. I dunno. Having a kid when you’re still a fetus yourself seems like a bad idea. The birth control stuff is weird, you’d think they’d want to at least cover their bases. But when they tried to tell us masturbation was a sin, every boy in the room went “then send me to hell”

Nobody didn’t think evolution was real, or that dinosaurs were a hoax, or that the universe was a millennia younger than 10 billion.

But god is just as real. There’s a reason a version of god shows up everywhere, because something about that is true. And it doesn’t mean there’s a magic genie, but it does mean there are some universals to the human experience that transcend space and time. And religious stories do a better job of articulating those metaphors than just about anything.

Don’t let #######s take God away from you / God and its nature are unknowable, and you should always beware of people who claim to know unknowable things.

Your sense of right and wrong, your conscience, your soul - that’s all real. Only a fool would argue otherwise. Some grubby old men in Rome don’t know what happens to your soul when you die, but you know deep down whether or not you deserve to burn.

Because me, I think we get the afterlife we think we deserve. You know the sort of life you led, and if you did something that deserves an eternal punishment (like actually deserves it, not failure to abide by some Cherry-picked passage from a 2,000 year old copy of the Silmarillion), God or whatever you want to call the cosmic force that binds the universe together will see that you receive it.

But if you spent your life trying to do the right thing, trying to be honest and honourable, and trying to be brave even when you weren’t, when the time comes to stare death in the face, maybe you see your dogs again and have your grandparents remember you.

Maybe.

What "birth control stuff"? Do they tell you not to use it? And do you not see how telling adolescence they will go to hell and burn for it if they do something normal and natural? Presumably if they tell you masturbation is a sin, do they say the same about other same sex and alternate relationships? What do you think that does to people in class who may be confused about their sexuality, to be told it is evil and a sin? Why are my tax dollars paying for these "lessons"?

I'm not sure the point of the rest of your post and it's relevance.

[Mr.Coffee]

Originally Posted by Red Potato Standing By

They can’t fire teachers? I am sure they can if there is a valid reason and they do it properly.

[Red Potato Standing By]

That tells me nothing, you implied they can’t be fired,I could be wrong so correct me if I am. Just want to see where it says you can’t fire a teacher.