MCPS faces Teacher shortage next year
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Anonymous
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More than 400 support staff openings, 270 full-time teaching positions
https://bethesdamagazine.com/bethesda-beat/schools/hundreds-of-mcps-support-staff-vacancies-will-cause-district-to-suffer-if-not-filled-union-president-says/ I guess McKnight's recruiting trip back to her sorority didn't fill those spots, huh. |
Anonymous
McKnight seems to have moved heaven and earth to avert this crisis here despite the best efforts of the COVID Karen's to run off all the teachers. |
Anonymous
| Supporting Dr McKnight while using a sexist slur doesn't help her as much as you think it does. |
Anonymous
That's not true. If she really "moved heaven and earth" she would have put the schools with high infections virtual for two weeks before begging for the national guard to bail her out. She's a real piece of work, having the nerve to keep kids in person when she doesn't even have enough bus drivers to get them there. And no, she couldn't even do that. She still had to send 31 schools virtual and I think the only moving of heaven and earth she did was to shift around the covid dashboard to cya what a bad call it was. And this August is shaping up to be even worse. 270 open teaching positions? It's August. Even if they hire everyone today, will they even know what material to start with come Aug 30th? 421 staff open positions? You seem to think staff also magically show up knowing what to do. Yes folks, McKnight and the board fully own this one. The arrogance and incompetence is mind-blowing. |
Anonymous
Right. So many parents were so happy with going virtual! |
Anonymous
The McKnight salker is back! |
Anonymous
I still haven't made up my mind on McKnight, so I am genuinely interested in hearing what she did to avert the crisis. Some things that I haven't heard her doing, which I'm wondering why not .... offering signing bonuses, removing the cap on lateral transfers from other districts for teachers, surveying teachers to find out what are the top things that would keep them from resigning. Did they even offer a DROP plan on retirement? That often is an incentive for people to stay a few more years. I genuinely don't know what she's doing, and would love to know. |
Anonymous
Most of this is covered by the union contacts and she can't unilaterally do them. |
Anonymous
She could, you know, like, take a stance on some of those issues. |
Anonymous
Just because it's outside of her control doesn't mean we can't blame her or at least complain in a way that implies it's her fault. |
Anonymous
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As far as I can see, MCPS didn’t publicly mention anything about the severe lack of staffing until a couple weeks ago in their Community Message. So it does seem like a tragic lack of foresight from leadership re: suddenly trying to fill 400+ jobs within a month.
It also doesn’t appear like MCPS is really trying very hard to fill the positions. If they offer benefits and stability (floating to different schools with guaranteed pay) to substitutes, for example, I’m sure there would be more applicants. Basically being a temp is so unappealing, especially in the current job climate where workers have their pick of positions. The problem with not making a vigorous effort to fill these positions is the burden falls on already strained teachers. |
Anonymous
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There was a press conference today where they provided some updated numbers. They said they are 98% staffed.
https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/press/index.aspx?pagetype=showrelease&id=13179&type=&startYear=&pageNumber=&mode= |
Anonymous
Apparently, NOT. They moved heaven and earth to avoid this crisis since they're 98% staffed. |
Anonymous
Well obviously. But the union is as motivated as she is to cure the shortage crisis. It's my understanding that they've long opposed the cap on the laterals, for example, so that seems like an easy one to just come up with an MOU. It could even be a short-term pilot MOU with the union. And unions usually loooooove a DROP program (because they're voluntary, so win-win) -- has that been offered to retain teachers approaching retirement? They generally can be designed to be basically cost-neutral. I guess the union might oppose signing bonuses because they would be concerned if it's taking away from raises for current teachers (I generally also am not a big fan of signing bonuses, because they get people in the door but don't keep them there) -- but I bet the union would love some retention bonuses and might be okay with signing bonuses too. They'd certainly be okay with raises! I just haven't heard a single example of McKnight going to the union and saying "We have a crisis, and we'd like to amend the CBA to do X, Y, Z" -- except for things that put more burdens on individual teachers, which seems like it will only increase the problem. It seems like taking a sick patient and trying to do a blood transfusion from the patient itself! |
Anonymous
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One thing I've learned is to pay careful attention to MCPS statements. It doesn't make sense that teachers were forced to different schools if everything was fine. I find it difficult to believe they found hundreds of hires so quickly.
Not sure what the deal is, but I'm sure once the school year starts and the pressure ramps up, everything will come out in the wash. |