Teachers Resigning Like Crazy?

[Anonymous]

You can do the OG training without a Master's because a few of my co-workers did it last month. None of them have a Master's degree. Maybe you mean the OG certification?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

Garbage. It should command more education, not less! It’s highly specialized. To be good at it, you would need to be able to read people, emotions, learning challenges, behaviors, and have a whole arsenal of helpful coping mechanisms, tactics, special learning techniques, etc.

None of those skills require a degree, let alone several. If we're being honest.

Very few jobs in the real world require one or more degrees.

What does this mean? Is there a fake world? Bizzaro world perhaps?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You can do the OG training without a Master's because a few of my co-workers did it last month. None of them have a Master's degree. Maybe you mean the OG certification?

An acquaintance had planned on being a tutor, but was turned down for training without a masters. It may have been specific to her school district.

In any case, you need at least a Bachelor’s, which is not what the PP is advocating for. I’ll take someone who is highly educated and experienced over hurriedly educated, especially when dealing with kids with learning issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

You’re a fool if you think FCPS is actually even teaching kids in the system using the Orton Gillingham program. It’s time intensive and requires specialized training. Most people pay for private tutors outside of school because the schools don’t provide this.

[Anonymous]

The OG training takes 30 hrs for a classroom teacher. It is $$$ but plenty of districts pay to have teachers take it. I paid on my own but in my group, there were public school districts from around the country taking it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

You’re a fool if you think FCPS is actually even teaching kids in the system using the Orton Gillingham program. It’s time intensive and requires specialized training. Most people pay for private tutors outside of school because the schools don’t provide this.

I won’t call you any names based on the inaccuracy of your information, but I can tell you that FCPS absolutely does use OG instruction in special education classrooms. FCPS teachers have been trained in OG, though I don’t know
how many.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

You’re a fool if you think FCPS is actually even teaching kids in the system using the Orton Gillingham program. It’s time intensive and requires specialized training. Most people pay for private tutors outside of school because the schools don’t provide this.

FCPS Admin here: FCPS IS currently implementing OG and is training many more teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

Throw dollars at it. There are plenty of Gen Ed teachers who have SPED certifications and don't want to teach SPED because it's a lot more work for the same pay. Next year the extended contract for SPED teachers is expiring and a lot of people are not going to be willing to take a pay cut for a job that's already underpaid. At the end of the day, people will do exhausting jobs for high pay, but they won't do exhausting jobs for low pay when they can get paid the exact same amount at a less-exhausting job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

Throw dollars at it. There are plenty of Gen Ed teachers who have SPED certifications and don't want to teach SPED because it's a lot more work for the same pay. Next year the extended contract for SPED teachers is expiring and a lot of people are not going to be willing to take a pay cut for a job that's already underpaid. At the end of the day, people will do exhausting jobs for high pay, but they won't do exhausting jobs for low pay when they can get paid the exact same amount at a less-exhausting job.

Hard to disagree with simple supply and demand economics. I do wonder the add’l impact of simply hiring more special educators to reduce caseloads. What is clear is that special education has become so burdensome and broken in America that something will need to give. I am not sure all localities will be able to hugely improve salaries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

Throw dollars at it. There are plenty of Gen Ed teachers who have SPED certifications and don't want to teach SPED because it's a lot more work for the same pay. Next year the extended contract for SPED teachers is expiring and a lot of people are not going to be willing to take a pay cut for a job that's already underpaid. At the end of the day, people will do exhausting jobs for high pay, but they won't do exhausting jobs for low pay when they can get paid the exact same amount at a less-exhausting job.

Exactly. The answer certainly isn’t putting under qualified people in the classroom. They quit and you’re left with the vacancy anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

Throw dollars at it. There are plenty of Gen Ed teachers who have SPED certifications and don't want to teach SPED because it's a lot more work for the same pay. Next year the extended contract for SPED teachers is expiring and a lot of people are not going to be willing to take a pay cut for a job that's already underpaid. At the end of the day, people will do exhausting jobs for high pay, but they won't do exhausting jobs for low pay when they can get paid the exact same amount at a less-exhausting job.

Exactly. The answer certainly isn’t putting under qualified people in the classroom. They quit and you’re left with the vacancy anyway.

Qualified people are quitting too. The problem isn't qualifications. Or pay. The problem is too much work for one person - we've made the job too difficult.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

Throw dollars at it. There are plenty of Gen Ed teachers who have SPED certifications and don't want to teach SPED because it's a lot more work for the same pay. Next year the extended contract for SPED teachers is expiring and a lot of people are not going to be willing to take a pay cut for a job that's already underpaid. At the end of the day, people will do exhausting jobs for high pay, but they won't do exhausting jobs for low pay when they can get paid the exact same amount at a less-exhausting job.

Exactly. The answer certainly isn’t putting under qualified people in the classroom. They quit and you’re left with the vacancy anyway.

Qualified people are quitting too. The problem isn't qualifications. Or pay. The problem is too much work for one person - we've made the job too difficult.

Precisely. This is why condensed certificate programs can help lighten the load. It'll also ensure people like Rachna Sizemore Heizer, who normally only virtue-signal and talk the talk, now have very little excuse for not obtaining a quick certification and working in the real trenches.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

Throw dollars at it. There are plenty of Gen Ed teachers who have SPED certifications and don't want to teach SPED because it's a lot more work for the same pay. Next year the extended contract for SPED teachers is expiring and a lot of people are not going to be willing to take a pay cut for a job that's already underpaid. At the end of the day, people will do exhausting jobs for high pay, but they won't do exhausting jobs for low pay when they can get paid the exact same amount at a less-exhausting job.

Exactly. The answer certainly isn’t putting under qualified people in the classroom. They quit and you’re left with the vacancy anyway.

Qualified people are quitting too. The problem isn't qualifications. Or pay. The problem is too much work for one person - we've made the job too difficult.

Precisely. This is why condensed certificate programs can help lighten the load. It'll also ensure people like Rachna Sizemore Heizer, who normally only virtue-signal and talk the talk, now have very little excuse for not obtaining a quick certification and working in the real trenches.

Tell me you don’t know special ed without telling me you don’t know special ed…

A sizable portion of a teacher’s education is student teaching opportunities. Do you propose that is omitted since you want to condense it? Enough people quit now when they see what it’s really like. They’ll quit even faster with no prior classroom experience and inadequate training.

More money will bring more people who want to earn it. That will lighten caseloads and keep qualified teachers in the classroom. I think experienced teachers with graduate degrees make a fairly decent wage around here, but it’s obviously not enough to keep people. Offer more money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not in Fairfax, so feel free to disregard my post if you'd like.
I am in the Chicago area. I am sped certified and no joke, I'm getting emails and texts every single day, multiple times a day, asking me to interview for one of the thousands of sped positions that are open. I already have a job in gen ed. I think we're seeing the collapse of special ed and at some point, either the government is going to have to take over sped or it is going to have to be completely outsourced to private companies. Already, private companies are hiring "contract teachers" for these positions (paying them more, but they typically don't get a pension then).

SPED as a career is in a weird place. It's the kind of job that really shouldn't command a high amount of education. Certainly not an MS. I truly think the licensure can be achieved through an Associate's level education. That would help solve some of the problems with qualified people.

No. Sped teachers need MORE education, not less. The amount of methods, types of interventions, techniques and more they have to know is insane.

But the problem is that a significant portion of the additional skills that you need to be good in SPED is not book-learning or class learned skills. They are skills at reading and analyzing situations and children with unique needs, learning to help them cope and learning how to provide them a good environment for their particular needs. These are not skills that you will learn from a master's in education. A good SPED teacher does not need additional coursework, but internships and hands-on environmental training. Yes, additional methods, interventions and techniques can be taught, but you can learn those from seminars and training sessions that do not require college or post-graduate enrollment or degrees. SPED teachers do not need a second degree, whether college level or graduate level.

The problem is that requiring higher criteria for hiring SPED teachers, culls the field down, when you are in desparate need of additional teachers. Much of what is taught in master's education programs will no be appropriate nor make a SPED teacher better at their job. So, you would do better to open up the SPED positions to teachers will your basic education degrees and look for candidates with the right personality. You want empathy and patience. You want problem solvers and self-starters.

By restricting the candidate pool, you are limiting the number of applicants and creating more vacancies. And those vacancies are being filled by long-term subs, teaching assistants and administrative staff who have fewer qualifications for this work than the candidates with education and teaching backgrounds, but not the advanced degrees. Talk about biting one's nose to spite one's face.

The gold standard for dyslexia right now is Orton Gillingham. You cannot be trained in Orton Gillingham without a masters. You need knowledge of child development, psychology, reading disabilities, reading instruction, and assessment, to name just a few things. You also need knowledge of IEP procedures, special education law, IEP development and progress monitoring. You can’t give (and interpret) an individualized, normed assessment without an advanced degree in most cases. I imagine your child doesn’t have a reading disability. I’ll take the highly educated teacher who can assess and remediate my child’s needs over your guy or gal with no degree. Thanks!

No one is saying that this isn't the optimal way to hire SPED teachers. But right now, every school district in the country is short SPED teachers for the number of roles that they have available. What do you do when you have only 65% of the number of SPED teachers than you have openings available? What if this is the case when the next school year starts? What are you going to do about the children who need support and there are no teachers to provide that support? Right now, that is the case. If there are not enough SPED teachers, the you will have children who require individual attention, not getting it and you have children and gen ed teachers struggling to handle situations for which neither is really adequately supported for.

So if you can't hire people with the right qualifications, are you just going to let the special needs children flounder in gen ed situations with no support? We need more teachers than are available. How do you propose to address the situation when there are not sufficient applicants to meet the need?

Throw dollars at it. There are plenty of Gen Ed teachers who have SPED certifications and don't want to teach SPED because it's a lot more work for the same pay. Next year the extended contract for SPED teachers is expiring and a lot of people are not going to be willing to take a pay cut for a job that's already underpaid. At the end of the day, people will do exhausting jobs for high pay, but they won't do exhausting jobs for low pay when they can get paid the exact same amount at a less-exhausting job.

Exactly. The answer certainly isn’t putting under qualified people in the classroom. They quit and you’re left with the vacancy anyway.

Qualified people are quitting too. The problem isn't qualifications. Or pay. The problem is too much work for one person - we've made the job too difficult.

Precisely. This is why condensed certificate programs can help lighten the load. It'll also ensure people like Rachna Sizemore Heizer, who normally only virtue-signal and talk the talk, now have very little excuse for not obtaining a quick certification and working in the real trenches.

How does this lighten the load once you are in the job position?