A Break From Politics...

While the Indiana Legislature is poised on the brink of the destruction of the state's teaching profession...and the US DOE continues it's all out attack on teachers...I have something else I want to write about.

First, if you're from Indiana, go HERE and tell your legislators not to destroy the teaching profession in our state...

Second, here are some blogs and articles I considered writing about:

• Teaching without classroom teachers...Which reminded me of Isaac Asimov's short story from 1951, The Fun They Had...
• Why Bloomberg Picked Cathie Black...
• Diane Ravitch: Testing remains the problem...

Read them...become enraged or motivated...and then use your voice.

Now...to today's topic...teachers and all they do.

I read Mrs. Mimi's blogpost today, Blood, Sweat, Tears and Many, Many, MANY Dots and was impressed by the list of things that teachers do.

I remember all those things...and more...that took up my time every day. The little things...sorting books, putting up bulletin boards, picking up pencils off the floor, cleaning off the chalk board tray, a million other little tasks every day on top of planning, teaching, grading, phoning parents, collaborating with colleagues and recess duty (If I tried to include everything there wouldn't be room for anything else).

Mrs. Mimi made a comment in her entry today...

People [meaning non-teachers] can sympathize with the behavioral issues. They can sympathize with the hours of grading papers. They can try and understand how unappreciated teachers are. They can feel for our early wake up times.

First of all, I understand that many jobs have their little tasks that threaten to overshadow the important things that people do...and the old adage "walk a mile in my shoes" is completely true. No one knows what another person's day is like unless they've experienced it. I rant about politicians and political appointees not having any idea what it's like in a classroom (yes, you, Secretary Duncan), but I understand that I am in the same position with regards to others' work.

That's why it's so important for teachers to support each other. Who knows better than another teacher what you go through every day? Who knows better than another teacher the stress of trying to actually teach while being interrupted, pressured, twisted and thrown about. Again, from Mrs. Mimi...

But I don't think any non-teacher will truly understand how much time and energy teachers spend organizing, cleaning, lifting, moving, hanging, stapling, taping, cutting, running, bending, wiping and basically doing anything and everything that needs to be done. Whether it feels professional, in our job description or even clean. We just roll up our sleeves and get it done.

Here's to the teachers who try to teach their children while being pummeled by the outside world.

Here's to the teachers who KNOW that what they're being asked to do is NOT in the best interest of their students so they work twice as hard to actually teach, as well as getting all the crap done that the administration (or state DOE, or US DOE, or whoever is bashing teachers today) requires.

Here's to the teachers who, despite all the pain, stress, disrespect, and insults from those who haven't a clue, still get up every day and greet the children in their care with smiles, patience and professionalism because they love what they do.

Make it a point to tell a teacher something supportive every day...That in itself might be all it takes to turn American education around...

Education Is Not a Business

Diane Ravitch posted this trailer for a documentary currently in production. It's 8 minutes long...worth watching.

Education is Not a Business

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Klein Shows his True Nature: Hypocrite

Don't miss this great article, Pensions for teachers vs. chancellors, by Valerie Strauss. Blatant hypocrisy! Here's a teaser...

It seems fair to note that after making a public stink about the awfulness of pensions for public school teachers, former New York City schools chancellor Joel Klein has himself accepted a $34,000 pension check.

Klein recently penned an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal titled “Why Teacher Pensions Won’t Work,” in which he equates the pension system for New York City’s public teachers to a Ponzi scheme.

But apparently, he doesn’t feel the same way about pensions for former chancellors.

The New York Daily News reported that shortly before that op-ed was published, Klein “walked into the city's teacher pension office to collect his own annual windfall,” which was a pension check for $34,000.

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Inside Job

Waiting for Superman has gotten a lot of publicity from millionaires and billionaires who stand to gain (for their investments in charter schools). Inside Job, however, a documentary about the current economic crisis, is one I hadn't heard of yet.

Kevin Welner wrote about it at the Huffington Post.

It offers an explanation of how the current economic crisis came about, describing the securitization of mortgages; the extraordinary leveraging of assets; the regulatory capture by Wall Street leading to minimal enforcement of federal regulations -- a deregulation intended to spur innovation; and the fraud, greed, hubris and general belief among hedge fund titans and others in the financial services world that they are infallible. The film also points out the growing and now extreme inequality of wealth distribution in the United States.

I knew that the "rich were getting richer" but I didn't realize the extent of it until I followed the link to this one statistic...

The top 1 percent of American earners took in 23.5 percent of the nation's pretax income in 2007 -- up from less than 9 percent in 1976

Welner looks at Inside Job, compares it to Waiting for Superman, and comes to the conclusion that the former does a better job of explaining the "school crisis." Again, from his article at Huffington...

Rather than addressing these poverty issues, Superman serves up innovation through privatization and deregulation. We're shown charter schools that give hope to these families. But what we're not told is that the extra resources and opportunities found in these charters are funded in large part with donations from Wall Street hedge fund millionaires and billionaires. Problems of structural inequality and intergenerational poverty are pushed aside in favor of a 'solution' grounded in the belief that deregulation will prompt innovation, all the while guided by the infallible judgment of Wall Street tycoons.

The money to be made from charter schools is a lure that the rich can't ignore. America's public schools are paying the price.

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