more on teacher shortages

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The teacher shortage is going to continue unless the school districts start fixing the system. First the administration needs to back off on the administrivia that is piled onto the teachers. The teachers are now putting in as much time handling paperwork, testing, training, documentation as they are in the class. And in many cases, they are doing a lot of this after class. At our school there were regularly teachers showing up 2 hours before school, or staying 2 hours after school daily to handle paperwork. The load of non-classroom related work is absolutely ridiculous.

Then the school system needs to develop better policies for managing the terribly overentitled parents. While I have absolutely sympathy for parents who need to contact the school for behavioral issues, bullying, etc., there are too many parents who are helicoptering and calling, berating, and abusing teachers over grading and classwork. I've see and heard of far too many parents who try to browbeat teachers into changing grades or excusing poor behavior on their kids' parts. The number of kids who don't read any of the information that teachers provide and then wait until the end of the grading period to complain and have their parents complain is just unreasonable.

The combination of unreasonable administration demands and unreasonable kowtowing to parents is chasing teachers away from a profession that most of them love. Let them get back to teaching and you'll get more people interested in joining the profession. Until policies change to start curbing administration policies and parental behavior, you are going to continue to have a greater exodus of teachers from the profession than people joining the profession.

I would not have quit if they were hounding me about grades and behavior. THAT, I expect. But, as a 1st grade teacher, I was inundated (8 - 17 emails a week) about missing lunch kits, bringing home the wrong folder, their child needs help with their clothing, a 2 hour meeting on learning correct signing and secret checklist folders for a child's bathroom problems (yes, this really happened), parents changing a child's transportation or me collecting a second set of things for a child to go home with another parent 20 MINUTES BEFORE DISMISSAL, angry email's about me removing their child's cricut monogram sticker on a chromebook because they did not read the policy that it is not theirs and I have to remove it before sending it back to warehouse, and my favorite: please use this comb I send in to brush my child's hair before dismissal so that it does not look a mess when I pick her up. I literally counted the hours until this school year and that chapter of my life ended. What a nightmare. Parents, this is just too much. If I ever want to have kids, I vow never to be like this.

Why are you on this blog if you don’t have kids? Seems odd. It’s in the name of the site?

The above sounds like normal things for teaching elementary school. Why can’t you remind a kid at dismissal to comb her hair? Or tell the parent that you can’t remind her.
Are the admin really so pro-parent that you would be disciplined for emailing back that you simply cannot meet a parent’s request? Why can’t you set appropriate boundaries like any other professional?
If someone in an office job decides to not meet a customer’s request, either their management is going to support their choice or explain why it’s not allowed to ignore the request. You then have the choice to quit or not.

Why are teachers resentful about parents asking for things when they don’t clearly state that it’s not appropriate and that asking for favors or 2 hours meetings about bathroom issues just won’t be tolerated?

If my child was anxious and upset about toilet issues, I would absolutely ask for a meeting to talk about how maybe we could work together to have them not paralyzed by anxiety over it. If that’s the scenario, wouldn’t you need to make a choice whether you want to deal with the anxious child or whether you want to understand and help the child so both of your days are better?

Any career is filled with the stress of “other duties as assigned” which fill up your workday. If you don’t want to meet those requests or feel it’s not part of your job, it’s the professional thing to communicate that and either have your management back you up or decide whether this job and the “other duties” are right for you.

Shortage or not, no one needs a jaded teacher. I personally don’t feel any other career field will be any less filled with the tedious or eye rolling tasks which fill your day. I’ve filled out a lot of “TPS reports” in my career and I’m not a teacher.

No, I doubt there are many careers filled with “other duties as assigned” like teaching is. I’m a career changer. My old corporate job was a cake walk compared to a day teaching. I never sit. I never get a moment during the work day to actually get caught up on work. Catching up happens at night and during the weekend. I’m sorry to tell you that you’re going to see more jaded teachers because the list of teacher responsibilities are growing. We are teachers, social workers, nurses, safety officers… all at once. While we are reminding the one student to brush her hair so she looks nice at pick-up, we also have 20+ other students who need their own individual needs met. I suspect you don’t have so many competing requirements at your job.

No, administration usually isn’t too keen on a teacher saying “no.” We are expected to get request #101 fulfilled. Period. That’s one of the reasons you see teachers leaving in droves right now. You mention above that teachers should decide if these “extra duties” are for them. Guess what? Many of us are saying no and leaving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The teacher shortage is going to continue unless the school districts start fixing the system. First the administration needs to back off on the administrivia that is piled onto the teachers. The teachers are now putting in as much time handling paperwork, testing, training, documentation as they are in the class. And in many cases, they are doing a lot of this after class. At our school there were regularly teachers showing up 2 hours before school, or staying 2 hours after school daily to handle paperwork. The load of non-classroom related work is absolutely ridiculous.

Then the school system needs to develop better policies for managing the terribly overentitled parents. While I have absolutely sympathy for parents who need to contact the school for behavioral issues, bullying, etc., there are too many parents who are helicoptering and calling, berating, and abusing teachers over grading and classwork. I've see and heard of far too many parents who try to browbeat teachers into changing grades or excusing poor behavior on their kids' parts. The number of kids who don't read any of the information that teachers provide and then wait until the end of the grading period to complain and have their parents complain is just unreasonable.

The combination of unreasonable administration demands and unreasonable kowtowing to parents is chasing teachers away from a profession that most of them love. Let them get back to teaching and you'll get more people interested in joining the profession. Until policies change to start curbing administration policies and parental behavior, you are going to continue to have a greater exodus of teachers from the profession than people joining the profession.

I would not have quit if they were hounding me about grades and behavior. THAT, I expect. But, as a 1st grade teacher, I was inundated (8 - 17 emails a week) about missing lunch kits, bringing home the wrong folder, their child needs help with their clothing, a 2 hour meeting on learning correct signing and secret checklist folders for a child's bathroom problems (yes, this really happened), parents changing a child's transportation or me collecting a second set of things for a child to go home with another parent 20 MINUTES BEFORE DISMISSAL, angry email's about me removing their child's cricut monogram sticker on a chromebook because they did not read the policy that it is not theirs and I have to remove it before sending it back to warehouse, and my favorite: please use this comb I send in to brush my child's hair before dismissal so that it does not look a mess when I pick her up. I literally counted the hours until this school year and that chapter of my life ended. What a nightmare. Parents, this is just too much. If I ever want to have kids, I vow never to be like this.

Why are you on this blog if you don’t have kids? Seems odd. It’s in the name of the site?

The above sounds like normal things for teaching elementary school. Why can’t you remind a kid at dismissal to comb her hair? Or tell the parent that you can’t remind her.
Are the admin really so pro-parent that you would be disciplined for emailing back that you simply cannot meet a parent’s request? Why can’t you set appropriate boundaries like any other professional?
If someone in an office job decides to not meet a customer’s request, either their management is going to support their choice or explain why it’s not allowed to ignore the request. You then have the choice to quit or not.

Why are teachers resentful about parents asking for things when they don’t clearly state that it’s not appropriate and that asking for favors or 2 hours meetings about bathroom issues just won’t be tolerated?

If my child was anxious and upset about toilet issues, I would absolutely ask for a meeting to talk about how maybe we could work together to have them not paralyzed by anxiety over it. If that’s the scenario, wouldn’t you need to make a choice whether you want to deal with the anxious child or whether you want to understand and help the child so both of your days are better?

Any career is filled with the stress of “other duties as assigned” which fill up your workday. If you don’t want to meet those requests or feel it’s not part of your job, it’s the professional thing to communicate that and either have your management back you up or decide whether this job and the “other duties” are right for you.

Shortage or not, no one needs a jaded teacher. I personally don’t feel any other career field will be any less filled with the tedious or eye rolling tasks which fill your day. I’ve filled out a lot of “TPS reports” in my career and I’m not a teacher.

No, I doubt there are many careers filled with “other duties as assigned” like teaching is. I’m a career changer. My old corporate job was a cake walk compared to a day teaching. I never sit. I never get a moment during the work day to actually get caught up on work. Catching up happens at night and during the weekend. I’m sorry to tell you that you’re going to see more jaded teachers because the list of teacher responsibilities are growing. We are teachers, social workers, nurses, safety officers… all at once. While we are reminding the one student to brush her hair so she looks nice at pick-up, we also have 20+ other students who need their own individual needs met. I suspect you don’t have so many competing requirements at your job.

No, administration usually isn’t too keen on a teacher saying “no.” We are expected to get request #101 fulfilled. Period. That’s one of the reasons you see teachers leaving in droves right now. You mention above that teachers should decide if these “extra duties” are for them. Guess what? Many of us are saying no and leaving.

Funny, I am a teacher and was about to roll my eyes at the old “we’re social workers, nurses and safety officers “ line but then I stopped and realized…it’s true! I had to get training this year on administration of Epi-pens and other meds, what to do in a lockdown situation, how to spot mental health problems in my students on top of all the normal professional development courses!

[Anonymous]

I just got contacted by Johns Hopkins CTY. I guess they are recruiting more directly now to teachers. This was for a Computer science /Robotics course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CTY?

I can’t imagine cty struggling for staff…really?

If so, that’s a wrap for teaching in this country

A lot of teachers don’t like teaching that demographic. The parents are a nightmare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PA and NY are competitive as well. When I taught in VA most teachers I met were from PA and NY. Also quite a few from NJ and a few more from MA. All in one school plus people at PDs. Most weren’t from VA. They struggled to find a job in their home state and relocated. It gets less competitive once you hit DC and heading south.

There are some subjects that may have less competition such as special Ed, math and science but even those can be competitive. It’s mostly just private schools that don’t pay much and the worst of the worst public schools that have a shortage. I know people who studied to teach math and special Ed and they had to sub or work at a private school before landing a public school job.

I am a teacher in VA and think this is spot on. I actually don’t think there is a dramatic teacher shortage here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the model has to do with race that much…. My point was stated that offer tenure, pension, and fairly nice raises every year don’t seem to struggle to find applicants as much as the states without tenure, that do away with pension, and that hardly have step increases or just freezes them for years. They also don’t hate textbooks and like to give teachers resources. There’s plenty of old crumbling buildings staffed with good teachers and good resources up here. Down in the south there’s so many nice, shiny, new looking buildings not from the 1920’s or 1950’s or even 1970’s but they’re not full of resources or staff that feel they’re compensated fairly enough to stay there for over 30 years.

Nice buildings shouldn’t be the top priority. We have plenty of old eyesore buildings up here full of teachers in their 20th year and beyond.

Va teacher here. This is what I desperately want. The worst part of my job is the obscene hours I have to spend coming up with materials for teaching, because Virginia doesn’t provide resources and expects teachers to be content developers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just got contacted by Johns Hopkins CTY. I guess they are recruiting more directly now to teachers. This was for a Computer science /Robotics course.

Does CTY provide resources for the teachers or do they expect for teachers to come up with everything on their own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just got contacted by Johns Hopkins CTY. I guess they are recruiting more directly now to teachers. This was for a Computer science /Robotics course.

Does CTY provide resources for the teachers or do they expect for teachers to come up with everything on their own.

Not CTY, but Northwestern's CTD in Evanston supplies some materials and books. In the end, though, it is the teacher who spends HOURS developing a week's worth of amazing lessons. Part of why programs like these are having trouble finding people. The hourly isn't so bad until you consider the hours and hours and hours spent creating the week's plans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the model has to do with race that much…. My point was stated that offer tenure, pension, and fairly nice raises every year don’t seem to struggle to find applicants as much as the states without tenure, that do away with pension, and that hardly have step increases or just freezes them for years. They also don’t hate textbooks and like to give teachers resources. There’s plenty of old crumbling buildings staffed with good teachers and good resources up here. Down in the south there’s so many nice, shiny, new looking buildings not from the 1920’s or 1950’s or even 1970’s but they’re not full of resources or staff that feel they’re compensated fairly enough to stay there for over 30 years.

Nice buildings shouldn’t be the top priority. We have plenty of old eyesore buildings up here full of teachers in their 20th year and beyond.

Va teacher here. This is what I desperately want. The worst part of my job is the obscene hours I have to spend coming up with materials for teaching, because Virginia doesn’t provide resources and expects teachers to be content developers.

That's not a statewide thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just got contacted by Johns Hopkins CTY. I guess they are recruiting more directly now to teachers. This was for a Computer science /Robotics course.

Does CTY provide resources for the teachers or do they expect for teachers to come up with everything on their own.

Another teacher of mine was invited to work in a high achieving summer robotics program. They just gave him Lego Mindstorm. He and the students were extremely disappointed. Do your research folks!

One summer, I did a program in a middle school and they shut down the computer network making it impossible to log-in. I decided to never do summer robotics programs again after that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PA and NY are competitive as well. When I taught in VA most teachers I met were from PA and NY. Also quite a few from NJ and a few more from MA. All in one school plus people at PDs. Most weren’t from VA. They struggled to find a job in their home state and relocated. It gets less competitive once you hit DC and heading south.

There are some subjects that may have less competition such as special Ed, math and science but even those can be competitive. It’s mostly just private schools that don’t pay much and the worst of the worst public schools that have a shortage. I know people who studied to teach math and special Ed and they had to sub or work at a private school before landing a public school job.

I am a teacher in VA and think this is spot on. I actually don’t think there is a dramatic teacher shortage here.

At our Northern Virginia middle school, we had long-term subs filling 6 core (ELA, Math, Science, SS/Civics) positions open for the entirety of last year. That's a shortage to me!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PA and NY are competitive as well. When I taught in VA most teachers I met were from PA and NY. Also quite a few from NJ and a few more from MA. All in one school plus people at PDs. Most weren’t from VA. They struggled to find a job in their home state and relocated. It gets less competitive once you hit DC and heading south.

There are some subjects that may have less competition such as special Ed, math and science but even those can be competitive. It’s mostly just private schools that don’t pay much and the worst of the worst public schools that have a shortage. I know people who studied to teach math and special Ed and they had to sub or work at a private school before landing a public school job.

I am a teacher in VA and think this is spot on. I actually don’t think there is a dramatic teacher shortage here.

At our Northern Virginia middle school, we had long-term subs filling 6 core (ELA, Math, Science, SS/Civics) positions open for the entirety of last year. That's a shortage to me!

This is what I see too--it's not that there's no teacher in the class, just long-term subs, a teacher who is still in school getting their initial teaching license, etc. It doesn't register as a vacancy, but it's not the same as having a fully qualified teacher who was hired for their expertise in a position.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the model has to do with race that much…. My point was stated that offer tenure, pension, and fairly nice raises every year don’t seem to struggle to find applicants as much as the states without tenure, that do away with pension, and that hardly have step increases or just freezes them for years. They also don’t hate textbooks and like to give teachers resources. There’s plenty of old crumbling buildings staffed with good teachers and good resources up here. Down in the south there’s so many nice, shiny, new looking buildings not from the 1920’s or 1950’s or even 1970’s but they’re not full of resources or staff that feel they’re compensated fairly enough to stay there for over 30 years.

Nice buildings shouldn’t be the top priority. We have plenty of old eyesore buildings up here full of teachers in their 20th year and beyond.

Va teacher here. This is what I desperately want. The worst part of my job is the obscene hours I have to spend coming up with materials for teaching, because Virginia doesn’t provide resources and expects teachers to be content developers.

That's not a statewide thing.

It is for middle school math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the model has to do with race that much…. My point was stated that offer tenure, pension, and fairly nice raises every year don’t seem to struggle to find applicants as much as the states without tenure, that do away with pension, and that hardly have step increases or just freezes them for years. They also don’t hate textbooks and like to give teachers resources. There’s plenty of old crumbling buildings staffed with good teachers and good resources up here. Down in the south there’s so many nice, shiny, new looking buildings not from the 1920’s or 1950’s or even 1970’s but they’re not full of resources or staff that feel they’re compensated fairly enough to stay there for over 30 years.

Nice buildings shouldn’t be the top priority. We have plenty of old eyesore buildings up here full of teachers in their 20th year and beyond.

Va teacher here. This is what I desperately want. The worst part of my job is the obscene hours I have to spend coming up with materials for teaching, because Virginia doesn’t provide resources and expects teachers to be content developers.

That's not a statewide thing.

It is for middle school math.

LOL. PREACH!

Our middle school only provides textbooks for Science. Science!!!

Do we provide textbooks for ELA or Math, the most important subjects? NOPE! No textbooks for the most important subjects. But Science textbooks, sure thing!?!

I'm not knocking science, but if you can't read then that textbook isn't going to do you a bit of good. And if you can't add or subtract, then you won't get the full value out of the textbook either.

We're in CRAZY LAND where the decision makers in our school systems have absolutely NO IDEA what teachers and students need. No wonder my colleagues are throwing up their hands and walking out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the model has to do with race that much…. My point was stated that offer tenure, pension, and fairly nice raises every year don’t seem to struggle to find applicants as much as the states without tenure, that do away with pension, and that hardly have step increases or just freezes them for years. They also don’t hate textbooks and like to give teachers resources. There’s plenty of old crumbling buildings staffed with good teachers and good resources up here. Down in the south there’s so many nice, shiny, new looking buildings not from the 1920’s or 1950’s or even 1970’s but they’re not full of resources or staff that feel they’re compensated fairly enough to stay there for over 30 years.

Nice buildings shouldn’t be the top priority. We have plenty of old eyesore buildings up here full of teachers in their 20th year and beyond.

Va teacher here. This is what I desperately want. The worst part of my job is the obscene hours I have to spend coming up with materials for teaching, because Virginia doesn’t provide resources and expects teachers to be content developers.

That's not a statewide thing.

It is for middle school math.

I can't imagine every middle school in every Virginia district is lacking materials and resources.