Why does no one acknowledge how overworked teachers are?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

Exactly. Paying good teachers well, firing bad fits, and acknowledging differences in performance helps everybody, and not having this hurts the best teachers while creating job security for the worst

Theoretically I agree but in practice I have never seen any ideas for rating performance that I would consider fair. I was a special ed teacher. Test scores are meaningless for kids who are performing 4+ grade levels behind. 95% of the admin that did my performance evaluations had virtually zero sped experience (my evals were always fine but do I think that 15 min observation should determine pay/other perks?).

Special Ed teachers should be paid MORE. There is so much paperwork. And meetings. And paperwork. Did I mention the paperwork?

Certainly. I have just never seen any performance pay models that acknowledge any special ed situations, our students just seem to be included in these testing models.
The paperwork was also frustrating because I was known for being on top of it, having well-written IEPs, etc, but I do not recall any admin including that in an evaluation (and really there were no specific sections that addressed it) but obviously it's a huge part of the job and if you make an error and someone notices, central office will be all over you.
So there is zero upside to being a high performer on a huge, very stressful aspect of the job, in fact I usually had more responsibilities piled on me. This is in addition to the teaching that you are actually evaluated on.

But basically yes the review process in teaching is demotivating and systemically problematic rewarding the very aspects we don’t want and not rewarding what is very valuable, important work

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

SLPs, OTs, and PTs too. Should we pay them less too?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

NP I wouldn't call it a "sweet gig" (that doesn't describe any school job imo) but it was way easier than being a classroom teacher in terms of the daily routine. There has always been a shortage because the requirements for being an ESOL teacher are much harder to meet than for classroom teachers. It requires a master's degree and fluency (or at least many years study) in a foreign language. Regular classroom teaching only requires a 4-year degree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

Exactly. Paying good teachers well, firing bad fits, and acknowledging differences in performance helps everybody, and not having this hurts the best teachers while creating job security for the worst

Theoretically I agree but in practice I have never seen any ideas for rating performance that I would consider fair. I was a special ed teacher. Test scores are meaningless for kids who are performing 4+ grade levels behind. 95% of the admin that did my performance evaluations had virtually zero sped experience (my evals were always fine but do I think that 15 min observation should determine pay/other perks?).

Special Ed teachers should be paid MORE. There is so much paperwork. And meetings. And paperwork. Did I mention the paperwork?

Certainly. I have just never seen any performance pay models that acknowledge any special ed situations, our students just seem to be included in these testing models.
The paperwork was also frustrating because I was known for being on top of it, having well-written IEPs, etc, but I do not recall any admin including that in an evaluation (and really there were no specific sections that addressed it) but obviously it's a huge part of the job and if you make an error and someone notices, central office will be all over you.
So there is zero upside to being a high performer on a huge, very stressful aspect of the job, in fact I usually had more responsibilities piled on me. This is in addition to the teaching that you are actually evaluated on.

But basically yes the review process in teaching is demotivating and systemically problematic rewarding the very aspects we don’t want and not rewarding what is very valuable, important work

When I was teaching I had 4 different admins do evals for me, and only one of them actually observed my class. Once. The others literally just made stuff up. It wasn't bad stuff, just not based on anything I did.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

I'll go you one better. Have a friend that taught 4th grade for 2 years, decided it was too much work and became an elementary school librarian. She does almost no work and gets paid as much as she was making being in the classroom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

I just ordered the praxis study guide and will take the praxis and take a job. I will be glad to take up that vacancy. Many teachers at my job are doing similar the ESOL teacher said, “everyone is asking me about that and thinking about switching.” I’ll report back next year. I’m guessing no report cards, no parent conferences, fewer meetings, and no whole group behavior management will definitely be easier.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

I just ordered the praxis study guide and will take the praxis and take a job. I will be glad to take up that vacancy. Many teachers at my job are doing similar the ESOL teacher said, “everyone is asking me about that and thinking about switching.” I’ll report back next year. I’m guessing no report cards, no parent conferences, fewer meetings, and no whole group behavior management will definitely be easier.

SHould add that recent lawsuits have upped the number of ESL teachers needed, so that is part of the reasons for vacancies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

I just ordered the praxis study guide and will take the praxis and take a job. I will be glad to take up that vacancy. Many teachers at my job are doing similar the ESOL teacher said, “everyone is asking me about that and thinking about switching.” I’ll report back next year. I’m guessing no report cards, no parent conferences, fewer meetings, and no whole group behavior management will definitely be easier.

The ESOL teacher at my ES sits in on conferences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

I just ordered the praxis study guide and will take the praxis and take a job. I will be glad to take up that vacancy. Many teachers at my job are doing similar the ESOL teacher said, “everyone is asking me about that and thinking about switching.” I’ll report back next year. I’m guessing no report cards, no parent conferences, fewer meetings, and no whole group behavior management will definitely be easier.

The ESOL teacher at my ES sits in on conferences.

Right, but “sitting in” and nodding or making one statement is an entirely different level of stress and planning a complete class set of conferences around all domains/subjects.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

I just ordered the praxis study guide and will take the praxis and take a job. I will be glad to take up that vacancy. Many teachers at my job are doing similar the ESOL teacher said, “everyone is asking me about that and thinking about switching.” I’ll report back next year. I’m guessing no report cards, no parent conferences, fewer meetings, and no whole group behavior management will definitely be easier.

The ESOL teacher at my ES sits in on conferences.

Right, but “sitting in” and nodding or making one statement is an entirely different level of stress and planning a complete class set of conferences around all domains/subjects.

oops:
Right, but “sitting in” and nodding or making one statement is an entirely different level of stress and planning versus what is involved in organizing and planning a complete class set of conferences around all domains/subjects.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Teachers need to quit whining. Even this thread is about why nobody supposedly acknowledges how overworked teachers are. We get it, you feel stressed out, but so are many other professionals. We've already heard you complain about it 1000 times. Why do you think you're special and get to whine louder than everyone else?

I don’t think you can appreciate the stress of teaching unless you’ve done it. Is it the ONLY hard job? Of course not. Are teachers extremely overworked? Yes.

-career changer who has worked in the corporate world. I hard rough weeks in that job, but teaching is considerably more time-consuming and stressful to me.

Fact is that many middling college students who'd rather not get stressed out over grad school self-select into the teaching profession because they think it's an easier gig with lots of vacation time. And then those people get all upset when they realize that teaching is just as hard as many other jobs. So it's not the work per se but the false expectations about teaching that's causing all the whining.

Teachers get very little paid vacation time and that time is dictated to them. They do not have the option of working for more than the ~190 days of the school year without applying for another, different,temporary job. For all practical purposes, they are furloughed every summer.

I have missed three family weddings and will miss putting my child on the bus for his first day of kindergarten. This isn’t to mention missing every school concert, ceremony, party, field trip, and event because teaching offers zero flexibility. But yes, I get the summer off, unpaid. I teach at a camp then, instead. It’s hard seeing people who make three times what I do being able to flex hours or work remotely to take their kid to the doctor, take a long weekend, or go visit their kid’s class. They certainly aren’t working harder or more than I am. Sorry.

How do you know that? Just because someone can flex their hours doesn't mean they don't work hard.

I didn’t say they aren’t working hard. I said they aren’t working harder or more than I am. I know this because this is describes many of my friends and family members. A lot of them work from home and have entire days that they are “working” but have nothing at all to do, or have a couple brief phone calls. I never have a day at school like that, and I certainly can’t work from home if my kid is sick or a plumber is coming. I also see a tremendous amount of parents at school concerts at 11:00. Or parents who are both in the car for drop off AND pickup. Do you both only work five hours a day? Or not at all? This is on an everyday basis. How demanding can your jobs be if you can just block out that time every single day to sit in the school parking lot?

Right. If you look at threads about SAHM/WAHM there are so many posters claiming that they are working moms with high incomes but they don't have to sacrifice time with their kids because they really only have to work during school hours and it's totally flexible for school events during the day, etc.

Teaching is difficult because there is little flexibility when school is in session. That's absolutely true. The lack of flexibility requires teachers to have to miss their own kids' school events, which many of us can attend. I keep asking if there isn't some way to improve on that, whether through teaching as teams or having a floating backup at school, or some other way to give teachers a chance to take an occasional day off without too much stress.

On the other hand, you don't know what other people have done to earn or keep flexible work arrangements. When my kids were in early elementary school, many of the moms who had been SAHMs were looking for jobs and were dissatisfied with what they could find. They would tell me how "lucky" I was to have a part-time job. I did consider myself to be fortunate to have that part-time position, but before getting that, I worked countless hours as a litigator, almost around the clock, in order to have time with my kids. Even that "part-time" job required more hours than I was paid for and often saw me up at 4:00 a.m. working to make up for the "flexibility" to be there for my kids during the day.

You never know.

But I agree that teachers have to work harder than they should and will tell anyone willing to listen that the busy administrative work that takes time away from actual teaching needs to go ASAP.

Understood. It is unfortunate with teaching though that even if you have seniority, have been a high achiever, etc, you will never get to a place where you have "earned" this high amount of flexibility and reduced hours that many other working moms on DCUM speak of as if it's expected. And pretty much all of these other jobs pay (way) more than teaching.
Now, I get that some of this should be known before becoming a teacher, which is why I always wanted to be a SAHM once I had kids. Some of it, however, was difficult to understand until I started working in the school system.

NP and I don’t feel overworked but what has started to bother me about the job is that seniority, experience, strong performance gets me nothing. That part of the job gets tiring especially when co workers who don’t have those qualities get the same schedule, courses, etc as me.

+1,000 I mean the ESL teachers pull
Small groups of 4 or less kids and get paid the same. Why am
I putting up with parents and 23 kids + sped inclusion. Also why is that equitable for anyone- children or teachers

Again, if being an ESOL teacher is such a sweet gig, why are there so many vacancies in this area? Could it be that’s challenging in different ways?

I just ordered the praxis study guide and will take the praxis and take a job. I will be glad to take up that vacancy. Many teachers at my job are doing similar the ESOL teacher said, “everyone is asking me about that and thinking about switching.” I’ll report back next year. I’m guessing no report cards, no parent conferences, fewer meetings, and no whole group behavior management will definitely be easier.

The ESOL teacher at my ES sits in on conferences.

The ESL teacher at my school never showed up to service the students on her caseload. She was supposed to push in and work with several of my kids and would just turn up at the end of the period and act like she didn’t realize she was expected to be there. She never had any materials provided and was always submitting her paperwork late. It was really tiresome. I’m sure not all of them are like that, but when I moved to another district it was a very similar story. The kids came to her classroom but she did the same BS work with kindergarteners as fifth graders and the kids were getting nothing out of the service. I subbed for her once and was surprised by how easy her schedule is. It’s demoralizing when you’re working hard and other people are just getting by.

[Anonymous]

PP - assuming you don't think its fair to be judged as not working hard because there is at least 1 regular teacher sloughing off somewhere in the universe - seems like it also isn't fair to say that all ESL teachers work less because you've met one who is mailing it in

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:No Child Left Behind/Every Child Succeeds Act required school districts to jump through certain hoops each year involving high stakes state tests for students in grades and evaluating teachers in part based on student test score improvement.

Is there any evidence that requiring high stakes tests every year has actually improved student learning, though?

Because it's a LOT of testing. And causes a lot of disruption to the school day. We have the state tests, then the county benchmark tests. And kids with accommodations get their accommodations but not always at the same time as the classroom tests, so they sometimes miss some more instruction. Not just once a year, but many many times a year.

Is all this testing showing good results? Because if not, maybe we could get rid of all these mandatory tests and get rid of school report cards based on how well students perform on these tests.

(Except if we got rid of the school report cards, how would parents know where to buy a house?)

Or if the teachers can effectively teach the students? Testing holds schools accountable. Without them, parents will be kept further in the dark as to how much learning is really taking place relative to national standards. Whenever I hear educators rail against testing, what I really hear are educators who want to reduce oversight and transparency in their classrooms.

We should have test to see if parents can effectively parent anymore.

What would you recommend happening if parents fail your weird social norms test?

I think we all know this was sarcasm.... but you seem worried about this test.

No, I'd like the PP to expound on what a "parenting test" is. You seem to want to overlook the PP's intent to....idk....remove kids to foster care? Forcibly sterilize parents who fail? What is the rubric for this test? Will single parents fail? Will LGBTQ parents fail?

You're a trumper, aren't you.

You're hysterical and have issues but please continue on with your rant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP - assuming you don't think its fair to be judged as not working hard because there is at least 1 regular teacher sloughing off somewhere in the universe - seems like it also isn't fair to say that all ESL teachers work less because you've met one who is mailing it in

This! There are people mailing it in within every profession.