Many of the elementary teachers (general ed) in our district are being paid close to $80k! We are not in NYC or California, we're in the Midwest. Considering the amount of vacation time and time off each year, I find this to be an outrageous amount of money. If people actually did a good job and were highly skilled and trained, I wouldn't have a problem with it. But that's not really what we're experiencing. I get the feeling teachers who are on top of the longevity scale know that it would take A LOT for them to lose their jobs. So after a while they relax a little too much. They DO have difficult jobs--I would not want to manage a room of 26 unruly children, many with disorders/special needs. But I have a problem even getting teachers to communicate with me or address my concerns. Everyone talks about how teachers are not paid enough, and if we would only pay more, our kids would get a better education. I think that we should pay GOOD teachers more, not the ones who have been around for 20 years and are tired and sick of it, and continue to do the job so they can collect their pension. The question is--how do we figure out who the good teachers are?