Productivity Meetings
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@Rhywden said:
At least over here in Germany some more herp derp.
He never said less pay for teachers is the solution, nor should it be a real proposition. He was saying that teachers are, like the rest of us, money motivated (and sometimes union) whores. However unlike the rest of us who admit we're in it (whatever "it" may be) for the money, they attempt to put on the "do it for the children" veil.
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@Rhywden said:
At least over here in Germany you have to have a University's degree (Master, not bachelor!) and then another 1 and a half year of training on the job. So, that's one reason why "less money" would not exactly result in more teachers.
You completely missed his point, possibly because you don't have all powerful teachers unions there.
@Rhywden said:
However, the question of "let's pay them less money so we can hire more teachers" cannot even be raised - because in several subjects, there are NO teachers for hire!
For example, a friend of mine teaching physics and mathematics was able to choose between 12 schools who all desperately wanted to hire her. And those 12 schools were the ones she talked to - she could have taken another 20 into consideration!
So, riddle me this: How exactly is less pay supposed to conjure teachers into existence when there's already too few teachers available in general?I know several people who have become teachers in the last decade or so, all over the country, in various subjects. I've never heard about a shortage of teachers anywhere. It's almost always the opposite here, largely because once you start, you never stop until you retire. In many schools, merely working there for as little as 3 years gets you tenure. And so people who hate the job but love the benefits, or maybe just have no other option that is nearly so good, stay there for 40 years. In doing so, they not only do shitty jobs, but prevent anyone else from coming in who might do a better job.
His point is that any attempt to reform the schools is met with withering opposition from very powerful, very rich and very connected teachers unions. Said unions always say that they're doing things "for the children," but their actions are always "for the teachers." More pay, more benefits, less responsibility, less accountability. And pretty much any attempt to change anything is painted as something that's going to ruin a generation of children, as if nearly everything the unions stand for isn't working in that direction already.
In many places, political candidates cannot get elected without being approved by the local teachers unions. So you get a self licking ice cream cone where the unions promote candidates sympathetic to their "bargaining," and the politicians get a job. Meanwhile, the taxpayers pay more and more for worse and worse.
@Rhywden said:
And the riots in Britain are rooted in an entirely different environment. Laying blame for that solely on teachers is another example for "A->B"-thinking.
I don't think anyone is primarily blaming teachers, except that the school systems certainly don't seem to counter the welfare / entitlement mentality. The teachers are just part of the Leviathan. And again, from a US perspective, it's not just due to their direct interaction with students in the classroom, but the activities that they subsidize through their union dues.
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Regarding the unions: the simplest way of putting it is-- it's a mixed bag. There's area's they might be too powerful, but in other areas employees would be severely abused without them.
@boomzilla said:
More pay, more benefits, less responsibility, less accountability.
Sort of, no, no and hahahahahahahaha.
I'll use the Ontario public high school teacher's union, since that is what I'm most familiar with. Any pay raises in the past decade or so have been barely above cost of living increases. And those were only begrudged to the teachers because up until a few years ago, there were ZERO increases. Not even cost of living. Pay raises, not so much.
What benefits? All the benefits my wife receives are paid for out of her pay check. There aren't any freebies. There are no bonuses, no extra time off, no free cruises. So I'm not sure what you're getting at there.
As for the last two, if anything the "entitlement, sue-happy" generation has put far, far more responsibility and accountability on teachers. There's always an omnipresent threat of lawsuits for fucking anything. And you can bet the admin (who aren't part of the union) will do everything in their power to deflect a lawsuit away from the board or the school, and who cares if it lands on a teacher? And this is for stupid, dumbass stuff-- like if someone missed buying a ticket to a concert because they didn't log onto the ticket buying site in time, so they decide that the site not constantly showing them the time is the fault and missing the concert is emotional distress, and decide to sue the company who runs the ticket buying site, and the owner of the company deflect the lawsuit onto you, the programmer-- and leaves you hanging with all the stress, court cost, etc. Betcha wished you had a union at the point.
Hell, a teacher can be sued if they witness a student in a bar getting drunk, and later that student has an accident, because the teacher should be looking after Johnny Snowflake 24/7.
@boomzilla said:
Said unions always say that they're doing things "for the children," but their actions are always "for the teachers."
Always? I'm going to have to cite you for sweeping generalizations. I'll refer you to the case of Blakeyrat vs. The Universe.
That being said, two points:
1) Teacher's unions are, by definition, in it for the teachers. Hence the name
2) If anyone, no matter who, says they are doing something "for the benefit of the children", you can smoke test the idea by just asking them "how, exactly, does this help the children". That should weed out most of the bullshit. Though, personal experience, that phrase is thrown around by admin far more than the union these days.
@boomzilla said:
In many places, political candidates cannot get elected without being approved by the local teachers unions.
If only that were true, my country wouldn't be presided over by a bunch of Maple Tea Baggers. And the mid-90s wouldn't have seen certain changes that have permanently damaged the curriculum to the detriment of students. (Long story short with an example: they eliminated an entire university-prep grade, futzed around with learning goals-- all in the name of saving money-- and in the end we still have high school students going into University who can't do basic calculus)
@WTF Seriously? said:
Riots blah blah
{sigh}
Or it could be gangbangers who wanted to steal shit?
That being said, the UK school system if fifteen other kinds of fucked up. The entire system is designed that once you start to fall behind, you literally can never catch back up-- at least not without special help and attention, and there is no funding for that. If you get a chance to watch the BBC series "Dream School", I highly reccomend it.
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@tharpa said:
It would be even more impressive if that was an hourly comparison, rather than a yearly one.
Really? My brother just started teaching full time, and makes slightly more than half of what I made right out of college. I mean, I get that they have the entire summer off, but that doesn't mean they make a lot of money. Nobody is saying that counselors make a lot of money, either, so simply saying "teachers make more than counselors, so that means they're not low-paid" is a non-sequitor.
It always steams me when people and sit-coms trot out the old wive's tale that teachers are low-paid. I used to be a counselor, had similar education to teachers, and I was low-paid. I would have loved to receive teacher's pay. I would have loved even more to have received teacher's pay for teacher's hours. Bankers drool when they think of teachers' hours.
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@Rhywden said:
At least over here in Germany
This explains alot. The situation in the states is... different. Imagine a situation where, for decades, teacher's unions have made teachers unfireable and unaccountable, yet they are paid much, much more than the average student they are educating will ever make. That right there is a failure. Then, have this go on for so long, that the literacy rate in your country's iconic industrial city falls to 53%. Pretty soon, even the teachers won't be able to read, but they'll still loudly demand the respect of Mother Theresa, the pay of a lawyer, and the work year of a Frenchman.
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Your brother probably has a defined benefit pension plan that will continue his salary from the date he retires at the age of 55 to his death, plus a spousal benefit.
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@hoodaticus said:
It's not moronic at all. Teachers are glorified baby sitters. Nothing will change my mind on this until Detroit's literacy rate exceeds at least 60%.
If you believe that literacy is the teacher's responsibility, you're already hopelessly lost. That responsibility lies with the parents. If a kid doesn't enter school already knowing how to read, they're already badly disadvantaged and there's only so much a teacher can do.
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@boomzilla said:
I know several people who have become teachers in the last decade or so, all over the country, in various subjects. I've never heard about a shortage of teachers anywhere. It's almost always the opposite here, largely because once you start, you never stop until you retire. In many schools, merely working there for as little as 3 years gets you tenure. And so people who hate the job but love the benefits, or maybe just have no other option that is nearly so good, stay there for 40 years. In doing so, they not only do shitty jobs, but prevent anyone else from coming in who might do a better job.My dear, we actually have many things in common. Tenure, constant ridicule of teachers and we also do have unions... unless you now want to tell me that you know the German school system better than I do.
One result of this constant ridicule is that you get fewer teachers in the areas where you can also get a better paying job with less abuse more easily. Physics or Mathematics, for example.
Which, as a result, means that anyone who finishes university will get hired, regardless of his abilities.In essence, moronic attitudes like yours where you simply blame each and everyone, heap on the abuse and denigrate people who like doing what they do - do you honestly think that this will change anything for the better? Do you honestly think that griping about something will magically conjure the "better quality" fairies from the sky?
@hoodaticus said:
Again, you're actually doing the very thing you are whining about: Making teaching so unattractive that only morons will do it. Good job right there.
It's actually an attitude I've come to expect of many people: Whine about something and then wonder, why the whining does not make things better.@Rhywden said:
At least over here in Germany
This explains alot. The situation in the states is... different. Imagine a situation where, for decades, teacher's unions have made teachers unfireable and unaccountable, yet they are paid much, much more than the average student they are educating will ever make. That right there is a failure. Then, have this go on for so long, that the literacy rate in your country's iconic industrial city falls to 53%. Pretty soon, even the teachers won't be able to read, but they'll still loudly demand the respect of Mother Theresa, the pay of a lawyer, and the work year of a Frenchman.Sorry, our teachers are unfireable, unions or not. And our teachers also earn a lot. We still have a dearth of teachers. Do you want to try again?
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@boomzilla said:
In many places, political candidates cannot get elected without being approved by the local teachers unions. So you get a self licking ice cream cone where the unions promote candidates sympathetic to their "bargaining," and the politicians get a job. Meanwhile, the taxpayers pay more and more for worse and worse.
California, bra!
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@Mason Wheeler said:
If you believe that literacy is the teacher's responsibility, you're already hopelessly lost.
If teachers are so pointless, I say we fire them all right now. Debt crisis: solved.
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@Lorne Kates said:
Regarding the unions: the simplest way of putting it is-- it's a mixed bag. There's area's they might be too powerful, but in other areas employees would be severely abused without them.
That's certainly been true in the past, but in the US, unions are TRWTF. And public sector unions are always a serious WTF. Even robber barons like FDR and George Meaney thought they were wrong. In addition to the travesty of the public school systems here, also witness the unions trying to stop Boeing from opening a new plant in South Carolina.
@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:More pay, more benefits, less responsibility, less accountability.
I'll use the Ontario public high school teacher's union, since that is what I'm most familiar with.
Being Canada, you're in a completely different situation since you guys have been way more fiscally responsible than we have here in the US.
@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:
Said unions always say that they're doing things "for the children," but their actions are always "for the teachers."
Always? I'm going to have to cite you for sweeping generalizations. I'll refer you to the case of Blakeyrat vs. The Universe.
I'd be ecstatic if you could offer a counterexample. I don't know of any. They at least tie whatever they're going on about into overall quality and integrity of the system or whatever, and how we'll raise a generation of illiterates if they can't collectively "bargain" with the schmucks they got elected so that the taxpayers can pay more for less.
@Lorne Kates said:
2) If anyone, no matter who, says they are doing something "for the benefit of the children", you can smoke test the idea by just asking them "how, exactly, does this help the children". That should weed out most of the bullshit. Though, personal experience, that phrase is thrown around by admin far more than the union these days.
Yes, anyone claiming that some policy is for the children needs to be examined carefully, though when school reformers say that fighting the teachers unions (NB: not the same thing as the actual teachers!) they're usually correct.
@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:
In many places, political candidates cannot get elected without being approved by the local teachers unions.
If only that were true, my country wouldn't be presided over by a bunch of Maple Tea Baggers. And the mid-90s wouldn't have seen certain changes that have permanently damaged the curriculum to the detriment of students. (Long story short with an example: they eliminated an entire university-prep grade, futzed around with learning goals-- all in the name of saving money-- and in the end we still have high school students going into University who can't do basic calculus)That's nothing, we have University students who can't do basic reading! I'm not sure what a "Maple Tea Bagger" is, but if this is any indication of your understanding of the current American "Tea Partiers", then I can guess that you guys probably also cut out economics, too.
@Lorne Kates said:
@WTF Seriously? said:
Riots blah blah
Or it could be gangbangers who wanted to steal shit?I think that basically explains most of it, but then there's the "interesting" case of top grammar school student caught with stolen loot, too.
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@hoodaticus said:
@Mason Wheeler said:
If you believe that literacy is the teacher's responsibility, you're already hopelessly lost.
If teachers are so pointless, I say we fire them all right now. Debt crisis: solved.First, I never said teachers are pointless. I said that literacy is fundamental enough that it needs to be in place before the kid is old enough to enter school. There's a heck of a leap of logic between those two statements.
Second, you do realize that even cutting the salary of all government employees to $0 would not put any perceptible dent in the deficit, don't you?
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@Rhywden said:
My dear, we actually have many things in common. Tenure, constant ridicule of teachers and we also do have unions... unless you now want to tell me that you know the German school system better than I do.
Constant ridicule? We don't have that at all. Teachers are regularly upheld as modern day saints. And if you think I'm ridiculing them, you aren't paying attention.
@Rhywden said:
In essence, moronic attitudes like yours where you simply blame each and everyone, heap on the abuse and denigrate people who like doing what they do - do you honestly think that this will change anything for the better? Do you honestly think that griping about something will magically conjure the "better quality" fairies from the sky?
Are you trying to prove that reading skills in Germany are not important? Because most of what you're responding to is stuff you've only imagined I wrote.
@Rhywden said:
Again, you're actually doing the very thing you are whining about: Making teaching so unattractive that only morons will do it. Good job right there.
Really? Please explain how I've done this. I've described how the current system has incentives that amount to that, but I'm pretty sure that if anything I'm advocating against that. Is it opposite day in Germany, or what?
@Rhywden said:
It's actually an attitude I've come to expect of many people: Whine about something and then wonder, why the whining does not make things better.
I can't imagine how one would decide this about people this thread. How do you know what people do? You can't even figure out what any of us actually say about the topic, let alone what we think about it.
@Rhywden said:
Sorry, our teachers are unfireable, unions or not. And our teachers also earn a lot. We still have a dearth of teachers. Do you want to try again?
Then your problems are somehow different than ours. I suspect part of it is probably the fact that we try to shove everyone through college, including billions of dollars to subsidize them. We have a glut of college graduates, and many of them weren't really college grade material anyways, so I guess they figure that teaching is a good fall back. Not to say that there aren't smart or dedicated teachers (see, I have to say this, or you'll imagine I said the opposite).
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@Mason Wheeler said:
I said that literacy is fundamental enough that it needs to be in place before the kid is old enough to enter school.
I agree with you on this, but teachers and an education system that allows students to matriculate (let alone graduate from high school) without learning are also a major WTF.
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Okay, now I'm asking myself why I even bothered to talk to an obvious troll. It's like wrestling with a pig - you'll be dirty and the pig won't mind.
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@hoodaticus said:
Your brother probably has a defined benefit pension plan that will continue his salary from the date he retires at the age of 55 to his death, plus a spousal benefit.
In the UK, this is true. With the teacher (and this applies to other public-sector workers) contributing 3% of their salary, and thegovernmentnon-public-sector tax-payers picking up the other 25%+. This is to change soon, going forward, in that the retirement age and contributions will be on a par with the rest of the country (most of us in the real world can only dream of retiring at 55, and either have to contribute a damn-sight more than 3% to make up for the typical employer's contribution of <10% or face the prospect of poverty in retirement/work until you're 90.)
Not soon enough though. Naturally thepublic-sector workersunions are up in arms about this.
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@Mason Wheeler said:
@hoodaticus said:
It's not moronic at all. Teachers are glorified baby sitters. Nothing will change my mind on this until Detroit's literacy rate exceeds at least 60%.
If you believe that literacy is the teacher's responsibility, you're already hopelessly lost. That responsibility lies with the parents. If a kid doesn't enter school already knowing how to read, they're already badly disadvantaged and there's only so much a teacher can do.
BULL Shit. I have heard this time and again and it always annoys me. TEACHING is the responsibility of TEACHERS, who are specially trained to TEACH. I am a computer programmer, and I am not trained in the skills to teach a child to read. THAT'S WHAT I PAY TEACHERS FOR! Reading with my child when he was that age was a major struggle - partly because he wasn't actually being taught to read at school, but mostly because I'm not trained for that.
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@Rhywden said:
Okay, now I'm asking myself why I even bothered to talk to an obvious troll. It's like wrestling with a pig - you'll be dirty and the pig won't mind.
Your comprehension is truly a wonder to us all.
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@hoodaticus said:
Possibly, but my job includes up to a 10% bonus, +401k matching + great healthcare benefits (only cost us about $300 to have a baby). I'm not in any rush to take his salary.Your brother probably has a defined benefit pension plan that will continue his salary from the date he retires at the age of 55 to his death, plus a spousal benefit.
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@Sutherlands said:
Possibly, but my job includes up to a 10% bonus, +401k matching + great healthcare benefits (only cost us about $300 to have a baby). I'm not in any rush to take his salary.
Tell me that when you retire 10 years after he does and have the same disposable income. And don't forget - he gets a mini-retirment every year he works.What good is money if all you have time to do is earn it?
I - I think I might become a teacher and start voting Democrat. Besides, [i]those little ignorant bastards have it coming[/i].
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@frits said:
Those who can, do teachers.
And thus does frits bring all parties to consensus.
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@hoodaticus said:
I think either you're underestimating the difference in pay, or you're overestimating the benefits of a teacher.@Sutherlands said:
Possibly, but my job includes up to a 10% bonus, +401k matching + great healthcare benefits (only cost us about $300 to have a baby). I'm not in any rush to take his salary.
Tell me that when you retire 10 years after he does and have the same disposable income. And don't forget - he gets a mini-retirment every year he works.What good is money if all you have time to do is earn it?
I - I think I might become a teacher and start voting Democrat. Besides, those little ignorant bastards have it coming.
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@jasmine2501 said:
@Mason Wheeler said:
@hoodaticus said:
It's not moronic at all. Teachers are glorified baby sitters. Nothing will change my mind on this until Detroit's literacy rate exceeds at least 60%.
If you believe that literacy is the teacher's responsibility, you're already hopelessly lost. That responsibility lies with the parents. If a kid doesn't enter school already knowing how to read, they're already badly disadvantaged and there's only so much a teacher can do.
BULL Shit. I have heard this time and again and it always annoys me. TEACHING is the responsibility of TEACHERS, who are specially trained to TEACH. I am a computer programmer, and I am not trained in the skills to teach a child to read. THAT'S WHAT I PAY TEACHERS FOR! Reading with my child when he was that age was a major struggle - partly because he wasn't actually being taught to read at school, but mostly because I'm not trained for that.
Are you saying that the education of your child is something that is 100% the responsibility of teachers, or just learning to read?
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@Sutherlands said:
I think either you're underestimating the difference in pay, or you're overestimating the benefits of a teacher.
I read things like this: http://www.ehow.com/facts_6931126_average-california-teacher_s-salary.html
which say that the highest paid high school teachers make above 80k. Before benefits.
And then I read that most high school graduates can't do algebra, with shockingly large fractions who cannot read their diplomas, and I wonder why I don't become a government baby sitter, too.
I find it hard to appreciate teaching as a profession when decades of their unonized care have sent Detroit 47% of the way back to pre-history, to the time before writing, with the rest of the country to follow. The legal profession would never leave a client undefended, medicine would never leave a critical patient untreated, but the teaching profession seemingly could care less about leaving their pupils illiterate and with therefore no hope of curing their abject ignorance.
And we should subsidize and reward this behavior with the respect due an angel. WTF?
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@RTapeLoadingError said:
Are you saying that the education of your child is something that is 100% the responsibility of teachers, or just learning to read?
A child's total welfare is ultimately the parents' and child's responsibility. They outsource the health care to doctors, the spiritual care to clerics, and the education to teachers. If there is a deficiency in any area, it is up to the professionals to take care of it.In the context of a discussion of the worth of teachers or the lack thereof, it is damning for the pro-teacher argument to shift blame to the parents. Doctors don't get to blame the parents for a child's untreated infection after twelve years of intensive care. Blaming the parents in these situations is an admission of worthlessness and incompetence.
Do you get to blame your clients for the shitty state of their codebase that you created? No - you wouldn't create a shitty codebase in the first place because you know that crap wouldn't fly, and would ultimately threaten your food supply.
Not so if you're a teacher. This doesn't mean they're all bad... yet. But give it time.
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@hoodaticus said:
@RTapeLoadingError said:
Who said anything about "after"? If a kid shows up at the doctor's office for the first time with ailments showing that they're clearly malnourished and living in unsanitary conditions, their poor health is not the doctor's fault, and there's only so much the doc can do to improve it. Likewise, if a kid shows up to school and can't read yet, the teacher's already operating at a disadvantage from the very beginning.Are you saying that the education of your child is something that is 100% the responsibility of teachers, or just learning to read?
A child's total welfare is ultimately the parents' and child's responsibility. They outsource the health care to doctors, the spiritual care to clerics, and the education to teachers. If there is a deficiency in any area, it is up to the professionals to take care of it.In the context of a discussion of the worth of teachers or the lack thereof, it is damning for the pro-teacher argument to shift blame to the parents. Doctors don't get to blame the parents for a child's untreated infection after twelve years of intensive care. Blaming the parents in these situations is an admission of worthlessness and incompetence.
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@boomzilla said:
Said unions always say that they're doing things "for the children," but their actions are always "for the teachers."
WTF gives you the idea teachers unions care about the teachers?!? The first, and foremost, concern of any mature union is the union. Everything else is a means to this end.
If this wasn't true, unions would be much easier to work with, and would cause a lot fewer problems. They'd also be easier to get rid of.
Teachers' unions will do a lot to help the worst of the teachers, because they know those people will always vote for the union. In my experience, when some of the most capable of the teachers offers to do something to help the others do their jobs better, the union reacts to it like it was a threat to their existence - teachers who could keep their jobs without the unions? We can't allow that to spread any further!
My favorite high school teacher tried offering evening classes to any of his fellow teachers who were interested, and the union started maneuvering to get him fired, despite the fact that he had tenure four or five times over, and his students always scored quite a bit higher on average on standardized testing than the other teachers - yet he didn't teach as much to the tests as they did.
He backed off, and they dropped it - getting rid of him as a teacher like that would've hurt them, as it would've clearly shown where their interests were, and they thought they only had to put up with him for another few years. He ended up mentoring a few on the sly, but the school as a whole really lost out.
I've heard a number of other people with similar stories. I've only heard a couple that went the other way - and those were both from people in my parent's generation.
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@boomzilla said:
That's certainly been true in the past, but in the US, unions are TRWTF. And public sector unions are always a serious WTF. Even robber barons like FDR and George Meaney thought they were wrong. In addition to the travesty of the public school systems here, also witness the unions trying to stop Boeing from opening a new plant in South Carolina.
But isn't that more of a reason to [b]not[/b] dismantle the unions? It seems like there's two extremes to the continuum, from "Foxconn Sweatshop" to "Indistinguishable From the Mafia". From everything I've seen, there's no natural equilibrium between the two states. That is, unless there's constant monitoring and reform, the balance will always slip past the "sweet spot" to one of those extremes. I don't like either, but I see the All Powerful Union as the lesser of two weevils.@boomzilla said:
@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:
Said unions always say that they're doing things "for the children," but their actions are always "for the teachers."
Always? I'm going to have to cite you for sweeping generalizations. I'll refer you to the case of Blakeyrat vs. The Universe.
I'd be ecstatic if you could offer a counterexample. I don't know of any.
ok, some of the things a Teacher's Union does that isn't "for the children" (caveat, based on the OSSTF, so YMMV on the exact details)
1) Ensure that all teacher's a properly certified, as per the government's laws, overseen by the appropriate teacher's collge
2) Provide professional development and training to teachers
3) Oversee OSHA and other health & safety concerns
4) Provide professional guidance to help teachers navigate the (goddamn fucking massive) amount of red tape that comes from being a public servant. (ie: maternity leave)
5) Mediate employee disputes (between each other, admin, etc)
6) Charitable work, both with local communities and oversea project. (Though this does usually get flown as "for the children" since the charities are generally, you know-- for children. Building schools in impoverished nations type of charity)
There's a few examples for you.
@boomzilla said:
I'm not sure what a "Maple Tea Bagger" is, but if this is any indication of your understanding of the current American "Tea Partiers", then I can guess that you guys probably also cut out economics, too.
An oversimplification for comedy's sake, but in the 90s, the conservative government made it its mission to cut funding. They did that by very hostile cuts to critical public sectors-- and they justified the cuts by painting those public sectors as slothful, lazy, useless drains on society. It was very, very ugly, and caused permanent damage not only to the sectors they cut, but to the public relations between those sectors and the public they serve.
Teachers were one of those sectors, but so were nurses. They lost almost all of their experienced, trained nurses who were either driven out, or "compelled" to take early retirement. So they drove away all the people who could do the job, took away the funding to replace them with people who knew how to do the job, and made it unpalatable for new people to enter the field.
Low pay + no training + being called a lazy fuck at every turn = extreme lack of trained public servants in that sector.
@boomzilla said:
@Lorne Kates said:
@WTF Seriously? said:
Riots blah blah
Or it could be gangbangers who wanted to steal shit?I think that basically explains most of it, but then there's the "interesting" case of top grammar school student caught with stolen loot, too.
"interesting" insomuch as it proves that there's assholes at every education level? (And thus it isn't "teh teachers caused riots")?
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One more note re: pensions. I've always been baffled when people bitch and complain about teacher's pensions-- especially the Ontario teacher's union's pension. "Why should I pay for someone's retierment?". Newsflash, milkfucker, you aren't. It isn't your money.
You know why they've got, literally, billions of dollars? Because they took their own money from their own salaries, and hired a company to invest it for them. And the company invested it really, really, really well. There are actually days when they're sitting around saying, "hmm, we've got a little bit of extra cash to invest. Wanna buy Bell Canada?"
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@RTapeLoadingError said:
Are you saying that the education of your child is something that is 100% the responsibility of teachers, or just learning to read?
@hoodaticus said:
A child's total welfare is ultimately the parents' and child's responsibility. They outsource the health care to doctors, the spiritual care to clerics, and the education to teachers. If there is a deficiency in any area, it is up to the professionals to take care of it.
I agree that parents need to take an active role in their child's education. If that child leaves school unable to read then I believe that he/she has been failed by both their parents and the educational system. (This is clearly a sweeping generalisation; there are situations where this would not be true.)
Are you saying that if a child gets fed inadequately (i.e. there is a nutritional deficiency at home) it is the responsibility of the professional doctor to take care of it?
@hoodaticus said:
In the context of a discussion of the worth of teachers or the lack thereof, it is damning for the pro-teacher argument to shift blame to the parents. Doctors don't get to blame the parents for a child's untreated infection after twelve years of intensive care. Blaming the parents in these situations is an admission of worthlessness and incompetence.
Are you implying that "a child's total welfare is ultimately the parents' and child's responsibility", but if that child leaves school unable to read it is the teacher's and only the teacher's fault? Because I would say it's not a case of shifting blame but of admitting a joint responsibility.
I am not a teacher. I'm not saying all teachers are saints or martyrs or even good at their jobs. I'm not saying they are underpaid or work great hours. What I'm saying is with something as fundamentally important as education (especially basic literacy and numeracy) I think it is a reckless attitude to outsource it and hope for the best.
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@hoodaticus said:
So you're taking an extreme, extreme end of the teacher spectrum and making that the norm? According to that, the average pay for a teacher is $47.6k, in California alone it's $57.6. I made more than that OUT OF COLLEGE. Also, I was looking at benefits for teachers, and it came out to about 20% of total pay. That's twice what it was for a non-teacher (or was it non-public sector, I think) of 10%. So that's an extra $10k/yr in benefits. So a teacher who has worked for awhile, in a state that costs twice as much to live in, makes more if you add in their benefits, than I made out of college only if you don't include my benefits. I'm not worried that they make too much.@Sutherlands said:
I think either you're underestimating the difference in pay, or you're overestimating the benefits of a teacher.
I read things like this: http://www.ehow.com/facts_6931126_average-california-teacher_s-salary.html
which say that the highest paid high school teachers make above 80k. Before benefits.
And then I read that most high school graduates can't do algebra, with shockingly large fractions who cannot read their diplomas, and I wonder why I don't become a government baby sitter, too.
I find it hard to appreciate teaching as a profession when decades of their unonized care have sent Detroit 47% of the way back to pre-history, to the time before writing, with the rest of the country to follow. The legal profession would never leave a client undefended, medicine would never leave a critical patient untreated, but the teaching profession seemingly could care less about leaving their pupils illiterate and with therefore no hope of curing their abject ignorance.
And we should subsidize and reward this behavior with the respect due an angel. WTF?
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@Mason Wheeler said:
If a kid doesn't enter school already knowing how to read, they're already badly disadvantaged and there's only so much a teacher can do.
WHAT? I entered school without knowing how to read, and eventually did OK (a Master's from Stanford). Reading and 'riting and 'rithmatic were the three R's, the basic stuff that public schools were created to teach. AFAIK the whole idea was that the nation is better off if it's citizens are literate, so they created public schools to ensure that all citizens were literate.
Now it may help a kid if she can read before she gets to school. It also helps if she know calculus before she gets to college. But demanding that as a prerequiite is changing the rules of the game.
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@Lorne Kates said:
One more note re: pensions. I've always been baffled when people bitch and complain about teacher's pensions-- especially the Ontario teacher's union's pension. "Why should I pay for someone's retierment?". Newsflash, milkfucker, you aren't. It isn't your money.
So, in reply to a post on how teacher's pensions are funded in the UK, you deny that it's subsidized massively by tax payers in the UK because that's not how it works in Ontario?
Riiiiiggghht.....
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@hoodaticus said:
The profession as a whole is degraded by the unwashed masses effect.
Whu?
School is intended to wash the masses that enter.
There was a comic in the wall on one of my old classrooms. It was a picture of teacher in a classroom who said: "Right now you are all idiots; but by the end of this you will be smart."
@hoodaticus said:
Education should not be compulsory.
Observation: Poor education! Poorly educated people!
Solution: Less education! That'll teach 'em!
I don't get you. Maybe you can add nuance? As it stands, those comments are complete nonsense.
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All this talk about teachers reminded me of a recent article I read on TechDirt:@When Innovation Meets the Old Guard said:
Khan’s programmer, Ben Kamens, has heard from teachers who’ve seen Khan Academy presentations and loved the idea but wondered whether they could modify it “to stop students from becoming this advanced.”
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@Mason Wheeler said:
I said that literacy is fundamental enough that it needs to be in place before the kid is old enough to enter school.
?
I find your comment nonsensical. School teaches kids to read.
I don't know how it is in the US, but kids go to school at 4 years here. You enter grade 1 and 2, e.g. kindergarten, which is mostly fucking about. Then move on to Base School, starting at grade 3. You are now 6. I was 5 because I was already capable of reading and skipped grade 2.
In grade three kids learn to read. Things like Tree, House, Fish, Dog, Cat. Cursive writing. Aa Bb Cc Dd. Controlling a fountain pen.
There was a math exercise in grade 8 that playfully introduced me to x!. Grade 7 and 8 teach some basic English.
Obviously, parents should expose their kids to reading material by having books of every kind around, and by reading stories to them. But to say that school should be deferred until basic literacy is fully achieved (~8, 9 years) is poppycock.
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@boomzilla said:
I think that basically explains most of it, but then there's the "interesting" case of top grammar school student caught with stolen loot, too.
Sweet! You have 1 data point. Why are you bringing it up as though it had significance?
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@boomzilla said:
I suspect part of it is probably the fact that we try to shove everyone through college, including billions of dollars to subsidize them. We have a glut of college graduates, and many of them weren't really college grade material anyways
There are new regulation coming into effect next year here, in the Netherlands, that will cause exactly this. University education will become more expensive, and schools can be fined for not graduating a student within the allotted 4-5 years.
Result I: Fewer students. Studying becomes a thing for the rich again.
Result II: Schools will pass unfit students.
What will not happen: Increased output of smart, well-educated graduates.It makes me sad.
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@frits said:
Those who can, do teachers.
Reminds me of the gym 'Body Pump' class....... It wasn't until the second class that they told me you are only allowed pump your own body, no one elses. Sad really as I though the rest of the class would enjoy it.
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@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:
That's certainly been true in the past, but in the US, unions are TRWTF. And public sector unions are always a serious WTF. Even robber barons like FDR and George Meaney thought they were wrong. In addition to the travesty of the public school systems here, also witness the unions trying to stop Boeing from opening a new plant in South Carolina.
But isn't that more of a reason to not dismantle the unions? It seems like there's two extremes to the continuum, from "Foxconn Sweatshop" to "Indistinguishable From the Mafia". From everything I've seen, there's no natural equilibrium between the two states. That is, unless there's constant monitoring and reform, the balance will always slip past the "sweet spot" to one of those extremes. I don't like either, but I see the All Powerful Union as the lesser of two weevils.
God god, man! What sort of dystopia are you guys running up there? Most of America is non-union, partly because private sector unions usually end up being counter productive. In my state, Virginia, public employees aren't allowed to bargain collectively. Private firms have competition, which either causes the reform or drives the company out of business. Nothing's perfect and life ain't fair, but that's no reason to institutionalize extortion via unions.
@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:
@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:
Said unions always say that they're doing things "for the children," but their actions are always "for the teachers."
Always? I'm going to have to cite you for sweeping generalizations. I'll refer you to the case of Blakeyrat vs. The Universe.
I'd be ecstatic if you could offer a counterexample. I don't know of any.
ok, some of the things a Teacher's Union does that isn't "for the children" (caveat, based on the OSSTF, so YMMV on the exact details)
...stuff...Well, they usually point to that as being necessary for the children, but I guess I won't press this point too hard. I will say, however, that we don't really need a union for this sort of thing. Especially for public employees.
@Lorne Kates said:
An oversimplification for comedy's sake, but in the 90s, the conservative government made it its mission to cut funding.
I don't really follow Canadian politics, but I thought it was the Liberal government, under Jean Chrétien who got your fiscal house in order:
The Liberal government under former prime minister Jean Chrétien and finance minister Paul Martin began a concerted effort to balance the budget in 1995. Between 1995 and 1998, the government cut spending by a whopping 14%. As the report's authors note, "if the U.S. government were to cut real spending by 14% over the next three years, the budget in [fiscal year] 2013 would be US$473-billion (in 2010 dollars) less than the FY 2010 budget."
...Most importantly, the Chrétien-era Liberals were able to balance the budget, "not with large tax increases, but with substantial cuts in government spending." Federal spending as a percentage of GDP went from 18% in 1993 to 13% in 2009. And the Canadian economy prospered because of it.
Sort of an only Nixon can go to China moment, I guess.
@Lorne Kates said:
@boomzilla said:
@Lorne Kates said:
Or it could be gangbangers who wanted to steal shit?
I think that basically explains most of it, but then there's the "interesting" case of top grammar school student caught with stolen loot, too.
"interesting" insomuch as it proves that there's assholes at every education level? (And thus it isn't "teh teachers caused riots")?No, more that the "gangbangers" in the sentence was unnecessary. I suspect that she's not very representative of the average looter. My earlier point was that the teachers are just a little cog in the wheels of civilizational dysfunction in Britain. So, not completely blameless, but not exactly a root cause.
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@Lorne Kates said:
One more note re: pensions. I've always been baffled when people bitch and complain about teacher's pensions-- especially the Ontario teacher's union's pension. "Why should I pay for someone's retierment?". Newsflash, milkfucker, you aren't. It isn't your money.
I don't recall anyone getting upset about teachers pensions in Ontario.
@Lorne Kates said:
You know why they've got, literally, billions of dollars? Because they took their own money from their own salaries, and hired a company to invest it for them. And the company invested it really, really, really well. There are actually days when they're sitting around saying, "hmm, we've got a little bit of extra cash to invest. Wanna buy Bell Canada?"
Here's how it typically works in the US. The teachers get a salary, plus benefits. They generally never see (this is changing a lot now...see Wisconsin or New Jersey for examples) anything about the cost of their health insurance or pension. It's very rare for them to contribute more than a tiny fraction of their salary to a pension. The pensions have traditionally been defined benefit, meaning that they make some percentage of their final salary, prorated by years of service. They never see the cost, which is paid by the tax payers, and has been more or less hidden.
Now, the union or the state typically invests the money, although from what I've seen the amounts they've been putting away generally assume that everything is going to be awesome. Of course, if the fund is underfunded, the taxpayers end up picking up the difference. This also happens with other public employees besides teachers.
What you've described is more like a defined contribution plan, where the employees are putting in most (all?) of the money themselves. This is the sort of thing that most Americans have, and it's the direction in which public employees are heading, too. When you hear screaming about pensions, it's precisely the sort of model you're talking about that the screamers want to see.
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@dhromed said:
@boomzilla said:
I think that basically explains most of it, but then there's the "interesting" case of top grammar school student caught with stolen loot, too.
Sweet! You have 1 data point. Why are you bringing it up as though it had significance?Uh, yeah, at least as a counter example to the gangbanger theory. See above for more elaboration. Are you saying you don't find it interesting?
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@hoodaticus said:
I wonder why I don't become a government baby sitter, too.
Perhaps you could. And teach them a thing or two. Is that idealistic of me?
@hoodaticus said:
I find it hard to appreciate teaching as a profession when decades of their unonized care have sent Detroit 47% of the way back to pre-history, to the time before writing, with the rest of the country to follow. The legal profession would never leave a client undefended, medicine would never leave a critical patient untreated, but the teaching profession seemingly could care less about leaving their pupils illiterate and with therefore no hope of curing their abject ignorance.
Yep. Dire situation.
I mean, really? 53% literacy? What sort of illiteracy are we talking about here? I mean, there are gradations between breezing through Kant's complete works* and not knowing what the symbol "K" means.
*) unpossible. The man can't write for shit.
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@dhromed said:
I mean, really? 53% literacy? What sort of illiteracy are we talking about here? I mean, there are gradations between breezing through Kant's complete works* and not knowing what the symbol "K" means.
*) unpossible. The man can't write for shit.
Pretty bad:
@CBS said:“Not able to fill out basic forms, for getting a job — those types of basic everyday (things). Reading a prescription; what’s on the bottle, how many you should take… just your basic everyday tasks,” she said.
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@boomzilla said:
@dhromed said:
@boomzilla said:
I think that basically explains most of it, but then there's the "interesting" case of top grammar school student caught with stolen loot, too.
Sweet! You have 1 data point. Why are you bringing it up as though it had significance?Uh, yeah, at least as a counter example to the gangbanger theory. See above for more elaboration. Are you saying you don't find it interesting?
Yeah, I don't find it interesting when presented like you did. It's statstics: There's Always One.
But in light of this comment of yours:
I suspect that she's not very representative of the average looter. My
earlier point was that the teachers are just a little cog in the wheels
of civilizational dysfunction in Britain. So, not completely blameless,
but not exactly a root cause....I'm going to drop it, because all I was trying to do was break what I thought looked like the sciency all-or-nothing idea where you providing a single counterobservation would completely obliterate the opposing hypothesis. :)
This is quite pervasive in political dscussions. People seem to argue black & white all the itme, instead of asking "How much" or "To what extent" or "What combination of influences".
Ok.
As you were.
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@dhromed said:
@boomzilla said:
Pretty bad:
Holy fucking balls.
I am...
what?
To be fair, I should mention that this is my favorite Detroit dystopia story so far:
@The Detroit News said:Detroit - When selecting the best raccoon carcass for the special holiday roast, both the connoisseur and the curious should remember this simple guideline: Look for the paw.
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@dhromed said:
You enter grade 1 and 2, e.g. kindergarten, which is mostly fucking about.
When each of my children entered kindergarten, I told them very firmly that this year they needed to learn three things:
- SIT DOWN
- SHUT UP
- PAY ATTENTION
If the kid learns those three things in kindergarten, I would be satisfied. Kindergarten teaches kids all the basic procedures that later grades use when imparting knowledge. My kids, pre-kindergarten, did not know to stay still, did not know to talk only when asked, did not have good attention spans. Those three basic skills were taught in kindergarten. They can NOT be taught at home because they relate to being in a large group.
(P.S. I agree with everything else you said.)
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