Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Judge-teacher job protection violates constitution

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-teacher-protections-ruling-20140610-story.html
I am in California, in a high performing school district (API scores). I have moved my child to a private school - I pay for the PS (property tax and special school related taxes) and the private education for my child. Most of my problems with the schools in my district stem from the attitude of the teachers - especially towards gifted kids. I met teachers who were very well educated, tenured and "entrenched in the system" who were insensitive, unmotivated, unenergetic, full of excuses, lazy and struggling to do their jobs let alone differentiate based on a child's needs.
Many teachers who move on to 6 figure salaries and get pensioned off at that salary rate and have excellent health benefits, vacation time and perks and work for 10 months in a year have gotten used to having a comfortable lifestyle regardless of whether they perform or not.

I am so glad that someone with clout took it upon themselves to challenge a system that promotes "grossly ineffective" teachers (very true in my experience) and is fighting for placing children's interest in the forefront.

I'm in California. I could not agree more, and yes, we pay property tax on top of private school fees. The private schools aren't generally a LOT better in terms of teacher quality, but they stay in session longer and the school day is about an hour longer. This difference makes time for art, music, field trips, and all kind of other things that were typical of the public school I attended in the 1970s and 1980s.

The ironic thing is that I meet a lot of kids of public school teachers in the private schools ("I know what those schools are like! I work there!). Three of them have said this to me (and the private school has <100 kids). I really don't know what to make of that.

There is some ridiculous teacher behavior here and nothing is ever done. No one gets reprimanded, and there are never consequences for even the most outrageous behavior. If teachers here worked year-round like everyone else, their salary would be six figures. We are not in NYC or some other place with outrageous cost of living, it's pretty average. I got reprimanded at a job once because there was a rubber band on the floor and I didn't pick it up. If I had failed to reply to emails or phone calls or treated the customers rudely, I would have been gone in an instant. It's really frustrating that the standards that apply to everyone else don't seem to apply to teachers and it's the kids and families who have to pay. The kids only have one shot at an education, there are no do-overs. That being said, there are some really good teachers who clearly care about their jobs and spend extra hours and a lot of money out of their own pocket. Those teachers deserve a high salary but I wouldn't say that they make up a very high percentage.

That is a new one to me - it is indeed ironic that even the people working in CA public schools do not trust their schools to do right by their kids. Everyone seems to agree that public schools need to improve. They also agree that there are too many tenured teachers who are "chronically ineffective". The lawsuit was looking to highlight how toxic the unionization of tenured teachers was and instead they managed to convince the judge that children's rights were being violated.

Blackcat, if we were to write a job description of a typical tenured PS teacher in my school district, it would look like this - able to walk off the job at 3:45 pm, work for 9-10 months in a year, work in a high performing district where the parents ensure that their kids perform, get a 6 figure salary, retire and reap a pension based on the final salary in 6 figures, lobby union to allocate monster share of budget to pension fund and then ask parents for $$$ for classroom supplies, not be held responsible for slacking, "don't care" attitude to customers, lazy, constantly asking for free labor from parents, watching netflix movies with kids as a "treat", taking time off constantly, not having to teach on furlough days, not much going on during "early dismissal days" either, no need to differentiate instruction for gifted kids because there is no GATE program, write detailed notes to parents when unchallenged kids act out in frustration, write even more detailed notes in the progress report cards on how the bored kids behave, if all this is too tiring, then go back and take more vacation time off.

PS: my friend teaches 1st grade in an underprivileged community in Ventura county - she fights every day to bring learning and growth and a better life for the kids in her class whose first language is not english. She spends her time going to evening college to learn their language so that she can be a better teacher to them. She also pays for classroom supplies out of her pocket and goes in on weekends to set up her classroom projects and leads afterschool group activities etc. These teachers are exceptions. I hardly see any such teacher in my school district.

Sorry, I'm skeptical. Do they not grade papers, or plan lessons?

I asked one of my teacher friends about lesson plans. Her response, "They are pretty much given to me at this point. Plus, it isn't like a lot has changed about the Civil War from last year."

She is also a big fan of "Pass your paper to the person in front of you" style of grading of papers.

I'm sorry there are so many in CA that feel this way. I know in Iowa where I live, while a teacher can't be immediately dismissed unless it involves inappropriate contact with a student, there is a reasonable process to address ineffective teachers, the bigger problem is the vast majority of administration doesn't keep records, do reviews, or do any of the steps that process requires.

Most teachers do a good deal if not most of their planning, correspondence both written and verbal, grading, professional development, and reporting either before or after school hours. Few have any idea how much time is spent after school hours addressing school issues.

I'm not saying that the situation in CA is a good one or even reasonable, I'm simply saying that far too many across the country are far to quick to critically jump on teachers without having reasonable knowledge of what the position entails and how overwhelming the job can be. I think right now in our local school district, this is in Iowa mind you, about 50% of teachers choose not to continue in the career after the third year. That's pretty telling.

Being a classroom teacher is definitely not a job I would want to do. I imagine it can be very difficult, esp. with all the behavior issues and special needs students seen in classrooms. I think some people are cut out for it and others aren't. The ones who aren't either quit, or stick around and do their job grudgingly.

My kids had some teachers who were paid around $75k (elementary teachers). I strongly believe that the only reason they are sticking around is because they will take a substantial pay cut at any other job, and lose their pensions. Meanwhile the district is talking about RAISING salaries even more, claiming that they need to compete with surrounding districts and if they don't, the good teachers will leave or it will be impossible to attract anyone good. I don't really think I buy this. Are teachers really in that short supply? I would rather have a teacher who is still enthusiastic with 2 years experience who has the most recent training in methods (maybe gifted education!), than someone who is burnt out with 20 years experience, and higher demands for pay.

From my experience, I will seldom if ever want a "new" teacher instructing my children. They simply don't have yet what it takes to differentiate, they aren't flexible enough, they're not confident enough, and they simply don't have the library of experience it takes to deal effectively with a GT student. Perhaps others have different experiences with newer teachers, our track record though shows clearly this to be the case.