Posted on 04/29/2007 5:57:17 PM PDT by george76
Stephan Goyne entered teaching as a "fight the good fight" kind of guy, taking a job in East Oakland right out of college.
"I come from a family of teachers. It wasn't even a question of whether to do that," Goyne said. "The question was whether to do elementary, middle or high school."
But after six years in the trenches -- transferred from campus to campus, forbidden from organizing field trips and ordered to teach math only after lunch -- Goyne left the profession.
Now he works in real estate and runs a Brazilian jiujitsu studio in Oakland.
"That last year, I had enough of it," said Goyne. "The biggest skill you're applying is crowd control. You're not really having a say in the curriculum or what goes into it."
Teachers stifled by bureaucracy and blocked from making decisions in their own classrooms are leaving teaching in droves, according to a new study by Cal State University's Teacher Quality Institute.
Nearly 22 percent of California teachers leave teaching after four years, according to the Public Policy Institute of California. With this type of exodus, the Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning projects a 33,000-teacher shortage in California by 2015.
(Excerpt) Read more at contracostatimes.com ...
they are forced to teach what to think
very frightening
If you can do better than teaching (job, colleagues, pay, benefits, lifestyle) by all means do. For my part, I’d totally disestablish public schools and make every parent pay for tuition - cutting taxes to the general public at the same time. If parents paid for their children, we wouldn’t put up with half the cr@p that passes for education now.
Hmm. And all along I thought is was only about money. Now we find out that teachers have no say in the bureacracy and all they do is crowd control. Just as I figured.
but but but its the fact we’re not paying someone teaching 2+2 = 5 $85,000 a year thats the problem.
Let’s solve this the liberal way: pass a law forcing them to stay teachers.
And how is that different from any other job?
btt
They no longer teach how to think, and how to gather and process information,
they are forced to teach what to think
very frightening
Good post!!
“And how is that different from any other job?”
Why don’t you try it and see?
I did! For 19 years.
Get the federal government out of the education business.
There, title fixed.
Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)
I believe this came about under the term "Critical Thinking Skills". When that term began to be applied is when they stopped teaching how to think and just demanded that everyone toe the party line.
Leftists love to twist vocabulary.
brilliant
I'm starting to believe that is the case with education and almost everything else...except defense. If you use it, make it private because there is very little taught in a public school that is worth learning.
Once we have Hillary Health Care, the same will apply there.
Socialized medicine will be like going to the department of motor vehicles.
” They no longer teach how to think, and how to gather and process information,
they are forced to teach what to think ...very frightening “
It has always been this way here in Japan !
My 17 year old has wanted to be a teacher since she has been old enough to think about it. I work at her high school (as a secretary and on budgets). Since she has seen an inside view of how things go, she has really lost her will to do it. Besides, she has conservative values, and she is starting to see how the indoctrination works.
I feel bad, but I don’t even want to encourage her to do it. I’m afraid it will change her too much. I mean, I can lock myself in my office and work on my gajillion budgets all day and not have to deal with the politics, but I could never teach. Publics schools are a joke.
I so wish we could afford to homeschool.
OK, so why did you quit? Not that you owe me an answer, but I’m interested, since I’m in my first year, although I’ve done other things, including 24 years in the USAF.
IOW, the original purpose of government.
Yes, the teaching quality and student learning results were in the toilet at the private school where I taught. It was no better than the government schools. The biggest problem was that all the teachers had to have the same teaching certificate. Was not mandated by the state but was required by the school. A sure recipe for teacher indoctrination and incompetence.
Godspeed, The Dild
It’s Oakland. He should try lily white Chappequa. I’m sure the little angels that attend the public schools there are sufficiently medicated by their shrinks.
I always tell her she is a great teacher - it's too bad she has to do it in public schools.
"And how is that different from any other job?"
The main difference is in how you address the situation. Some organizations (mostly private but also public sector) work to improve processes. The work to increase quality and productivity. Others (including most public schools) don't do this.
And .. the “what” they’re teaching is the homosexual agenda. The liberals use the NEA as a POLITICAL arm of education .. and they demand teachers pony-up dollars to join their stupid union.
My suggestion .. WHY DON’T MORE TEACHERS BAND TOGETHER AND START THEIR OWN SCHOOL - A CHARTER SCHOOL. Surely our children’s future is worth it.
They could fill that in a couple week with imports from just south of the border...
My uncle said that 30 years ago when he retired early from Richmond High School. And he was voted teacher of the year so many times he lost count.
The California schools can easily find illegals who can do the jobs Americans refuse to do. After all, it’s *their* children. < /sarc>
In our area (Northeast)there is a glut. Hard to get jobs.
My niece just dropped her life long dream of becoming a teacher. She’s a Junior in college and finished her student teaching for 6th grade.
She said that the little monsters have no discipline and when she tried to instill a little order in her classroom, she was told to lay off and stick to the lesson plan...
Sad thing is most freepers wouldn’t last a day as teachers and don’t even realize it. Problems in education just a reflection of our society as a whole; problem isn’t the teachers or money.
Wife and I are both reg repubs and teachers. You guys wait until the dems get back in and dismantle what remains of NCLB. You’re going to be shellshocked with increased taxes and spending. Then you all have something to cry about.
The average homeschool family spends just $600 per child per year (compared with the 2004 average for a public school student, which was $9,000 per child per year)
And that is the AVERAGE. A lot of homeschoolers do it for much less than that. Hopefully a few hundred dollars per year isn’t too much for your budget!
I quit for several reasons, many of them quoted by the teachers in the article. (The more things change, the more they stay the same...)
As a science teacher starting in 1968, I got tired of ignorant administrators telling me how and what to teach. It was a constant uphill battle to convince the higher-ups that science has to be a hands-on lab course, not lectures based on some badly-written textbook. They’d rather spend tens of thousands on textbooks than on materials and good library resources. I have to laugh all these years later when I read about concerns over the state of math/science teaching in schools.
I also got tired of the non-stop b*tching by teachers about their jobs. Yet, decades later, many are still in their first teaching job, still kvetching about the same things.
The final straw was when then-Gov. Sununu of NH (a Republican) ignored what teachers wanted for classroom computers, and cut a deal for DEC proprietary machines, instead of IBM or Apple PCs. When Sununu was asked about the lack of appropriate software, he responded: “the teachers will create the software.” So I responded by leaving teaching, getting an M.S. in Computer Science, and working in high-tech for 20 years.
Seriously... they should just get rid of all teachers and have the administrators dole out their political propaganda directly to students.
Eliminate the intermediary, and save them the work of disguising leftist dogma as “math”.
No screenshot, but in the South Park episode “D-Yikes!” the Mexicans take over for Mr. (Mrs.?) Garrison and actually do a better job of teaching the class.
Tell her to apply at charter schools .. they don’t have discipline problems there .. or she might try a Catholic school .. you don’t have to be Catholic to teach.
I call BS. When I see the NEA or AFT negotiating authority and responsibility in the classroom instead of higher pay, I’ll reconsider.
Yeah, I guess it just depends on what is happening in a specific state as to how the agenda will get driven.
Thank you for sharing the experience. We need to start with universities, IMO. I bailed from a socially abominable English program (over forty ranting, raving feminist instructors and administrators in a small, midwestern university). Most people would be shocked by knowledge of social influences on those (including corporate lawyers filing briefs in favor of so-called affirmative action, the Mob, LWV,...).
I guess we live in a little slice of heaven.
We lived in inner-city Minneapolis for many years and once our son went through K and 1st Grade we fled and never looked back.
The Pledge of Allegience begins every day and the teachers are conservatives.
I thank God everyday for bringing me to this place.
I’m sorry, I wasn’t clear. I have to work. That is what I was referring to. I stay very involved with my children in their learning process, and my daughter attends the high school I work at, but I do have to work. At this point, there is just no way around it.
Thanks for the info, though. I had no idea it was so much less expensive.
My wife just left teaching. She’s finishing her 3rd year of law school.
Her family were all teachers in the Los Angeles Unified but the parents retired, and her brother and us moved to Indiana. She taught 3 more years in Indianapolis Public Schools but the system is too broken and too corrupt everywhere.
We’ll make more money with her as a lawyer and I won’t have to go to ‘Parent Nights’ with her anymore... to remind the parents to behave.
It is far deeper than what you posted, although you have touched the tip of the iceberg...
As a teacher, I can speak from experience. Teachers in the trenches are fed up with many (or all) of the following, depending upon the circumstances at the specific school (listed in no particular order):
1. Lack of discipline (thank you courts who don’t allow real discipline any more, administrators who don’t have the guts to stand up to loud parents, and “special” treatment and regulations if students are classified as “SPED” -
2. Paperwork Way beyond what teachers had to do in years back.
3. Lack of respect and authority.
4. Government’s strong hand telling teachers and schools what they teach, then holding the teachers over the fire for students who move from school to school repeatedly within a school year, don’t give a rip, do drugs, come from horrid conditions at home, work many hours per week, and have “better things to do than worry about school”.
5. In some areas, teachers are still WAY under-compensated for the work they do - particularly under the conditions of some schools. *Yes, some schools in some places pay very well.
6. Some teachers literally face risk of injury, death, health issues, etc. simply be reporting to work and trying to do their job.
7. Increasing licensing demands that require more and more uncompensated training and in-service time.
8. Frustration with the politics of public education.
9. Apathetic co-workers who either have negative attitudes that make for an unpleasant workplace, or who do not do their job - thus putting even more stress and responsibility on those teachers who DO their job.
I am certain that other teachers could add to this list - but a person must TRULY love teaching to stay in the profession.
All the while, some states are bending over to try to recruit teachers - opening up alternative certification programs. Unfortunately, among the good teachers that have come about through such programs, others slip through that make all of our jobs much more difficult.
You should look into getting on to the overpaid gravy train.
Interesting :) I am doing the same thing. VA is finishing my degree then I am going to move into an alternate path into teaching next year. (20% disability - Voc Rehab)
Get enough of us retired military in the system and we can change them. I am too old to change!
government control of funding of schools and Curriculum is Part of the Communist manifesto
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