How is FCPS teacher/staff shortage?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers want a 4 day workweek?! They already have summer off, winter break, spring break and tons of holidays. Most people work all week and all year. And they want students to have online learning one day a week?!

We need to get teachers from other countries like some districts have done. They are willing to work.

Teacher here. I don’t want a 4 day work week.

I want the following:

1) A salary that I can afford to live in this area.
2) Class Sizes not to exceed 24 kids.
3) Get rid of mandated CLTS and let the team and individual teachers plan how they want without being micromanaged.
4) Less useless professional development. We need more individual choice.
5) Better maternity leave policies
6) Better ESOL/Sped support in ES
7) Actual consequences for kids who misbehave
8) Parent follow through

Most teachers want reasonable things.

This would be awesome!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers want a 4 day workweek?! They already have summer off, winter break, spring break and tons of holidays. Most people work all week and all year. And they want students to have online learning one day a week?!

We need to get teachers from other countries like some districts have done. They are willing to work.

Teacher here. I don’t want a 4 day work week.

I want the following:

1) A salary that I can afford to live in this area.
2) Class Sizes not to exceed 24 kids.
3) Get rid of mandated CLTS and let the team and individual teachers plan how they want without being micromanaged.
4) Less useless professional development. We need more individual choice.
5) Better maternity leave policies
6) Better ESOL/Sped support in ES
7) Actual consequences for kids who misbehave
8) Parent follow through

Most teachers want reasonable things.

Amen. I started hating my job when they started taking my planning. When my youngest goes to school, I will 100% be reading the contracts for what happens during planning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We need some drastic moves recruit and retain high quality teachers. One bold move would be to go to a 4-day school week for kids. Increase T-F by 30 minutes. Kids do async work on Monday’s. Teachers plan, have pd on Monday’s. That means less time away from kids T-F. There are other models to accomplish this.

Parents will have to decide whether they want 5 days of school with a crappy, unqualified teacher in a large class or figure out childcare one day a week and get a high quality teacher in a decent sized class.

https://www.edsurge.com/amp/news/2022-06-22-can-four-day-school-weeks-keep-teachers-from-leaving

https://www.texastribune.org/2022/07/19/texas-schools-four-day-weeks/amp/

I’m in full support of a 4-day in-person week with Monday planning time for teachers while students use digital tools. I know for a fact this would be a huge boost for retention and the well-being of our staff

OMG. I hope this is a joke. I"m here for the kids, not the teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers want a 4 day workweek?! They already have summer off, winter break, spring break and tons of holidays. Most people work all week and all year. And they want students to have online learning one day a week?!

We need to get teachers from other countries like some districts have done. They are willing to work.

Teacher here. I don’t want a 4 day work week.

I want the following:

1) A salary that I can afford to live in this area.
2) Class Sizes not to exceed 24 kids.
3) Get rid of mandated CLTS and let the team and individual teachers plan how they want without being micromanaged.
4) Less useless professional development. We need more individual choice.
5) Better maternity leave policies
6) Better ESOL/Sped support in ES
7) Actual consequences for kids who misbehave
8) Parent follow through

Most teachers want reasonable things.

Number 3 would be great. I know admin sees them as valuable, but I never get done what I need to get done during that time. I don’t need a full day of planning on a Monday. I need the hour a day M-F to be my own time, unencumbered rather than regularly spending 2/5 of them in CT meetings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers want a 4 day workweek?! They already have summer off, winter break, spring break and tons of holidays. Most people work all week and all year. And they want students to have online learning one day a week?!

We need to get teachers from other countries like some districts have done. They are willing to work.

Teacher here. I don’t want a 4 day work week.

I want the following:

1) A salary that I can afford to live in this area.
2) Class Sizes not to exceed 24 kids.
3) Get rid of mandated CLTS and let the team and individual teachers plan how they want without being micromanaged.
4) Less useless professional development. We need more individual choice.
5) Better maternity leave policies
6) Better ESOL/Sped support in ES
7) Actual consequences for kids who misbehave
8) Parent follow through

Most teachers want reasonable things.

Amen. I started hating my job when they started taking my planning. When my youngest goes to school, I will 100% be reading the contracts for what happens during planning.

Yes, these are pretty much all the things we want. Most of them don't even cost anything.

[Anonymous]

Parent here. Here's what I want.

1. A standard curriculum with real, approved textbooks, workbooks, work sheets and none of that TPT comic sans bullshit that contains grammatical errors. I would like the instructional designers at FCPS to do their jobs so that my kid doesn't come home with worksheets created by a 22 year old who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, but sure can buy some pretty clip art on Etsy.

2. Less testing and less preparation for testing.

3. Full weeks of school without random holidays and teacher workdays on Mondays and Fridays of the same week (put them where they make sense).

4. Better support for ESOL/SPED kids AS WELL AS those children who don't have special needs but are far behind their classmates. A parent shouldn't have to pay $5000 for someone to find a mild disability and then hire a lawyer or advocate in order for their child to get extra reading/math help. PLUS there are a lot of parents who can't afford to do that but their kids still need a little extra help. Not everyone can afford to spend the $1000/month on tutors that I do.

5. Actual discipline for children who are consistently misbehaving and disrupting class. There was a year when at least twice a week, half of someone else's class would have to pour into my child's classroom because of one kid. Why aren't schools removing the problem child so that the other kids can keep learning?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent here. Here's what I want.

1. A standard curriculum with real, approved textbooks, workbooks, work sheets and none of that TPT comic sans bullshit that contains grammatical errors. I would like the instructional designers at FCPS to do their jobs so that my kid doesn't come home with worksheets created by a 22 year old who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, but sure can buy some pretty clip art on Etsy.

2. Less testing and less preparation for testing.

3. Full weeks of school without random holidays and teacher workdays on Mondays and Fridays of the same week (put them where they make sense).

4. Better support for ESOL/SPED kids AS WELL AS those children who don't have special needs but are far behind their classmates. A parent shouldn't have to pay $5000 for someone to find a mild disability and then hire a lawyer or advocate in order for their child to get extra reading/math help. PLUS there are a lot of parents who can't afford to do that but their kids still need a little extra help. Not everyone can afford to spend the $1000/month on tutors that I do.

5. Actual discipline for children who are consistently misbehaving and disrupting class. There was a year when at least twice a week, half of someone else's class would have to pour into my child's classroom because of one kid. Why aren't schools removing the problem child so that the other kids can keep learning?

I mean except for the holiday thing: where they would have to consult you to figure out what makes sense to yiu. Believe me not everyone would agree! The list is the same.
Well there is the no more comics sans and bad clip art which just shows that you are a bit naive because you think there aren’t errors in published textbooks and work books. It is sort of refreshingly cute that you trust big companies like that. The misbehavior is really part of sped and that is why we are saying more support there.
I think there should be a study about holidays across age ranges. Sometimes for the little kids they are able to do so much better after a break. I don’t know if the mind synthesizes the information better when they take a break or if just because they are rested they can concentrate more but the first couple of days after a long weekend are teaching gold. You can get so much in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers want a 4 day workweek?! They already have summer off, winter break, spring break and tons of holidays. Most people work all week and all year. And they want students to have online learning one day a week?!

We need to get teachers from other countries like some districts have done. They are willing to work.

Teacher here. I don’t want a 4 day work week.

I want the following:

1) A salary that I can afford to live in this area.
2) Class Sizes not to exceed 24 kids.
3) Get rid of mandated CLTS and let the team and individual teachers plan how they want without being micromanaged.
4) Less useless professional development. We need more individual choice.
5) Better maternity leave policies
6) Better ESOL/Sped support in ES
7) Actual consequences for kids who misbehave
8) Parent follow through

Most teachers want reasonable things.

Title 1?

We have to adhere to the caps even this year.

No I work at a school that isn’t Title 1 but still has a large ESOL/ SPED population and not enough support.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent here. Here's what I want.

1. A standard curriculum with real, approved textbooks, workbooks, work sheets and none of that TPT comic sans bullshit that contains grammatical errors. I would like the instructional designers at FCPS to do their jobs so that my kid doesn't come home with worksheets created by a 22 year old who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, but sure can buy some pretty clip art on Etsy.

2. Less testing and less preparation for testing.

3. Full weeks of school without random holidays and teacher workdays on Mondays and Fridays of the same week (put them where they make sense).

4. Better support for ESOL/SPED kids AS WELL AS those children who don't have special needs but are far behind their classmates. A parent shouldn't have to pay $5000 for someone to find a mild disability and then hire a lawyer or advocate in order for their child to get extra reading/math help. PLUS there are a lot of parents who can't afford to do that but their kids still need a little extra help. Not everyone can afford to spend the $1000/month on tutors that I do.

5. Actual discipline for children who are consistently misbehaving and disrupting class. There was a year when at least twice a week, half of someone else's class would have to pour into my child's classroom because of one kid. Why aren't schools removing the problem child so that the other kids can keep learning?

I mean except for the holiday thing: where they would have to consult you to figure out what makes sense to yiu. Believe me not everyone would agree! The list is the same.
Well there is the no more comics sans and bad clip art which just shows that you are a bit naive because you think there aren’t errors in published textbooks and work books. It is sort of refreshingly cute that you trust big companies like that. The misbehavior is really part of sped and that is why we are saying more support there.
I think there should be a study about holidays across age ranges. Sometimes for the little kids they are able to do so much better after a break. I don’t know if the mind synthesizes the information better when they take a break or if just because they are rested they can concentrate more but the first couple of days after a long weekend are teaching gold. You can get so much in.

#1 and 2 would make teachers so happy. The amount of planning and teaching time that we would get back would be amazing. I, personally, do not feel strongly about #3.. #4 is directly linked to $$$$$. #5 is a parent issue. There are way too many parents out there saying they’re going to sue the school district. We’d be able to discipline kids better if there were consequences at home or if parents let us discipline them without threatening to sue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent here. Here's what I want.

1. A standard curriculum with real, approved textbooks, workbooks, work sheets and none of that TPT comic sans bullshit that contains grammatical errors. I would like the instructional designers at FCPS to do their jobs so that my kid doesn't come home with worksheets created by a 22 year old who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, but sure can buy some pretty clip art on Etsy.

2. Less testing and less preparation for testing.

3. Full weeks of school without random holidays and teacher workdays on Mondays and Fridays of the same week (put them where they make sense).

4. Better support for ESOL/SPED kids AS WELL AS those children who don't have special needs but are far behind their classmates. A parent shouldn't have to pay $5000 for someone to find a mild disability and then hire a lawyer or advocate in order for their child to get extra reading/math help. PLUS there are a lot of parents who can't afford to do that but their kids still need a little extra help. Not everyone can afford to spend the $1000/month on tutors that I do.

5. Actual discipline for children who are consistently misbehaving and disrupting class. There was a year when at least twice a week, half of someone else's class would have to pour into my child's classroom because of one kid. Why aren't schools removing the problem child so that the other kids can keep learning?

Teacher here.

1) Textbooks should be used as a resource not a curriculum. Even when I was in school, our textbook was used for HW not instruction. The only textbook in ES that would be helpful is math. The reading levels are too varied for content textbooks to be useful.

2) Totally agree. The testing as gotten out of control.

3) I support having the holidays off, but we have waaay to many PD days that can be school days for Full Weeks.

4) Yes, but this is also tricky. If there is data to support a kid needs intervention/ help then they should be getting it regardless of label. The issue I have seen more of are when kids are inconsistent in performance and are passing their SOLS. It is very hard to figure out what the issue is.

5) I think parents in general would be disgusted with what they see in the classroom regarding behavior. Yes, there are individual problem children but there is also a lit of disrespect coming from kids to the teacher. Parents also need to be on board with consequences and this seems to be the larger issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent here. Here's what I want.

1. A standard curriculum with real, approved textbooks, workbooks, work sheets and none of that TPT comic sans bullshit that contains grammatical errors. I would like the instructional designers at FCPS to do their jobs so that my kid doesn't come home with worksheets created by a 22 year old who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, but sure can buy some pretty clip art on Etsy.

2. Less testing and less preparation for testing.

3. Full weeks of school without random holidays and teacher workdays on Mondays and Fridays of the same week (put them where they make sense).

4. Better support for ESOL/SPED kids AS WELL AS those children who don't have special needs but are far behind their classmates. A parent shouldn't have to pay $5000 for someone to find a mild disability and then hire a lawyer or advocate in order for their child to get extra reading/math help. PLUS there are a lot of parents who can't afford to do that but their kids still need a little extra help. Not everyone can afford to spend the $1000/month on tutors that I do.

5. Actual discipline for children who are consistently misbehaving and disrupting class. There was a year when at least twice a week, half of someone else's class would have to pour into my child's classroom because of one kid. Why aren't schools removing the problem child so that the other kids can keep learning?

Teacher here.

1) Textbooks should be used as a resource not a curriculum. Even when I was in school, our textbook was used for HW not instruction. The only textbook in ES that would be helpful is math. The reading levels are too varied for content textbooks to be useful.

2) Totally agree. The testing as gotten out of control.

3) I support having the holidays off, but we have waaay to many PD days that can be school days for Full Weeks.

4) Yes, but this is also tricky. If there is data to support a kid needs intervention/ help then they should be getting it regardless of label. The issue I have seen more of are when kids are inconsistent in performance and are passing their SOLS. It is very hard to figure out what the issue is.

5) I think parents in general would be disgusted with what they see in the classroom regarding behavior. Yes, there are individual problem children but there is also a lit of disrespect coming from kids to the teacher. Parents also need to be on board with consequences and this seems to be the larger issue.

I’m a special education teacher with my own kids who have IEPs, so yes, more support for special ed and behavior and all of it. About #3, I think “they” have done an awful job of explaining that you’re going to need more built in PD days if you have secondary teachers on AT contracts who are going to need some built in time or if you no longer allow teachers to have a sub so the teacher can go to PD during the school day (because there are no subs!) - and yes, in special ed alone people need to be trained annually in MANDT, take hours of training to administer the KTEA, learn a new program to support the needs of particular kids on your caseload that year, etc. It’s especially needed if you have new/provisional teachers (which we do and will in special ed). And that’s just from my little window on the world! I feel like it all builds on itself to make a mess.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers want a 4 day workweek?! They already have summer off, winter break, spring break and tons of holidays. Most people work all week and all year. And they want students to have online learning one day a week?!

We need to get teachers from other countries like some districts have done. They are willing to work.

Teacher here. I don’t want a 4 day work week.

I want the following:

1) A salary that I can afford to live in this area.
2) Class Sizes not to exceed 24 kids.
3) Get rid of mandated CLTS and let the team and individual teachers plan how they want without being micromanaged.
4) Less useless professional development. We need more individual choice.
5) Better maternity leave policies
6) Better ESOL/Sped support in ES
7) Actual consequences for kids who misbehave
8) Parent follow through

Most teachers want reasonable things.

Title 1?

We have to adhere to the caps even this year.

No I work at a school that isn’t Title 1 but still has a large ESOL/ SPED population and not enough support.

Yup been at a school like this-it makes everything feel chaotic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent here. Here's what I want.

1. A standard curriculum with real, approved textbooks, workbooks, work sheets and none of that TPT comic sans bullshit that contains grammatical errors. I would like the instructional designers at FCPS to do their jobs so that my kid doesn't come home with worksheets created by a 22 year old who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, but sure can buy some pretty clip art on Etsy.

2. Less testing and less preparation for testing.

3. Full weeks of school without random holidays and teacher workdays on Mondays and Fridays of the same week (put them where they make sense).

4. Better support for ESOL/SPED kids AS WELL AS those children who don't have special needs but are far behind their classmates. A parent shouldn't have to pay $5000 for someone to find a mild disability and then hire a lawyer or advocate in order for their child to get extra reading/math help. PLUS there are a lot of parents who can't afford to do that but their kids still need a little extra help. Not everyone can afford to spend the $1000/month on tutors that I do.

5. Actual discipline for children who are consistently misbehaving and disrupting class. There was a year when at least twice a week, half of someone else's class would have to pour into my child's classroom because of one kid. Why aren't schools removing the problem child so that the other kids can keep learning?

I mean except for the holiday thing: where they would have to consult you to figure out what makes sense to yiu. Believe me not everyone would agree! The list is the same.
Well there is the no more comics sans and bad clip art which just shows that you are a bit naive because you think there aren’t errors in published textbooks and work books. It is sort of refreshingly cute that you trust big companies like that. The misbehavior is really part of sped and that is why we are saying more support there.
I think there should be a study about holidays across age ranges. Sometimes for the little kids they are able to do so much better after a break. I don’t know if the mind synthesizes the information better when they take a break or if just because they are rested they can concentrate more but the first couple of days after a long weekend are teaching gold. You can get so much in.

#1 and 2 would make teachers so happy. The amount of planning and teaching time that we would get back would be amazing. I, personally, do not feel strongly about #3.. #4 is directly linked to $$$$$. #5 is a parent issue. There are way too many parents out there saying they’re going to sue the school district. We’d be able to discipline kids better if there were consequences at home or if parents let us discipline them without threatening to sue.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Baltimore City hired a lot of teachers from the Philippines many years ago. There is a documentary about it. I'll see if I can find it. Anyway, they were shocked by the behavior of students in the U.S. They were used to being revered as a teacher. Many couldn't deal with student behavior.

https://youtu.be/fPocrzBTd3A

This would be the problem, there are lots of people in Philippines, India, and China and other countries who are fluent in English, but they’d be shocked at the cultural environment of the US, especially our “troubled” areas where there is a real teacher shortage. I still think sponsoring foreign teachers could be an option, but 1) it’s probably pretty expensive, might as well just pay current and new teachers more money, and 2) you’d have to be very mindful of where they were placed for teaching.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent here. Here's what I want.

1. A standard curriculum with real, approved textbooks, workbooks, work sheets and none of that TPT comic sans bullshit that contains grammatical errors. I would like the instructional designers at FCPS to do their jobs so that my kid doesn't come home with worksheets created by a 22 year old who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, but sure can buy some pretty clip art on Etsy.

2. Less testing and less preparation for testing.

3. Full weeks of school without random holidays and teacher workdays on Mondays and Fridays of the same week (put them where they make sense).

4. Better support for ESOL/SPED kids AS WELL AS those children who don't have special needs but are far behind their classmates. A parent shouldn't have to pay $5000 for someone to find a mild disability and then hire a lawyer or advocate in order for their child to get extra reading/math help. PLUS there are a lot of parents who can't afford to do that but their kids still need a little extra help. Not everyone can afford to spend the $1000/month on tutors that I do.

5. Actual discipline for children who are consistently misbehaving and disrupting class. There was a year when at least twice a week, half of someone else's class would have to pour into my child's classroom because of one kid. Why aren't schools removing the problem child so that the other kids can keep learning?

I mean except for the holiday thing: where they would have to consult you to figure out what makes sense to yiu. Believe me not everyone would agree! The list is the same.
Well there is the no more comics sans and bad clip art which just shows that you are a bit naive because you think there aren’t errors in published textbooks and work books. It is sort of refreshingly cute that you trust big companies like that. The misbehavior is really part of sped and that is why we are saying more support there.
I think there should be a study about holidays across age ranges. Sometimes for the little kids they are able to do so much better after a break. I don’t know if the mind synthesizes the information better when they take a break or if just because they are rested they can concentrate more but the first couple of days after a long weekend are teaching gold. You can get so much in.

Wow, condescending jerk, much? Literally every teacher my child has had (maybe including you honey) has had incredibly poor grammar and mistakes on their homemade worksheets, so maybe you should hire an editor like the big companies do. You sound like an ass and I hope you don't teach at my child's school, peachy pie.