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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I don’t think they are underpaid. Yes I think they work hard and deserve our respect but what the earn is ovoid considering the amount of days off they get over the course of a year ( teachers) compared to other jobs. I am not s nurse but do shift work similar to a nurse schedule, they’re not working every day either and depending on where they work and seniority can get cushy schedules too. [/quote]

Well, at 60 hours a week during the school year and 25-30 hours a week during my unpaid summer, I definitely feel underpaid. If your reasoning for keeping teachers’ pay low is some perceived idea of days off, then consider yourself corrected. Today was a day off. I worked 8 hours prepping for next week. I’ll finish planning tomorrow, on Labor Day.

Don’t confuse “days off” with “days not working.” The only difference to me is that I can pee when I want to on weekends and during the summer.[/quote]

Stop it. You aren't working that much.[/quote]

Guess what? Some teachers ABSOLUTELY work this much. Let’s take a look at teachers who have to grade essays. If you figure 10 minutes an essay for 140 students, that’s over 23 hours of grading for that assignment alone. The teaching doesn’t stop and the tons of other duties don’t stop, so that happens on your own time. Or… consider the teacher at an understaffed school who has to spend every free moment covering a class. ALL planning and grading has to happen at home. And summers? That’s time for curriculum revisions, additional coursework, etc.

We can ignore reality all we want, but teachers are leaving because this is what they are experiencing. [/quote]

The problem with many teachers is that they have no idea of how most white collar professions work --- they think others don't struggle with hours, working outside of hours, burnout politics, I don't get days off when my kid is sick and don't think I should, staffing shortages, increasing demands (although the last is pretty bad in teaching, I will give you that). It's shocking to me how unequipped teachers are to work in other professions and don't know basic office norms. There is bound to be someone who comes on and says "I worked in investment banking and now teach it's so much harder." Fine. But for a nonprofit , mission - oriented job, the conditions aren't really all that different elsewhere. Outside bathroom breaks.
There are also very few barriers to entry in some teaching jobs. Not so in other jobs.
I thought about teaching. I felt like i wasn't for me, b/c it would be the same job for years --you couldn't advance. I don't know how true that really is, and knew even less in my 20s. It didn't have to do with $ in my case but it just seemed like i twasn't a job for an ambitious person. That should change.[/quote]
[b]
The problem with many non-teachers is that they have no idea of how the teaching profession works. [/b](I can use that argument, too.) I could write on and on about increased responsibilities placed on teachers as my proof, but that would simply be rehashing what others have said on this thread.

My issue is with your assumption that teachers aren’t ambitious. I am a very ambitious person. My ambition just doesn’t resemble yours. I don’t aspire to a fancy office or title. What I want is for the 2,400 students I have already taught, and the many to come, to be a bit better off because they were in my class. I want them to have more confidence in their academic abilities. I want them to go into this world reflecting the drive, discipline, and self-respect that is modeled in my classroom. Positively affecting the lives of others is an ambitious goal. Fortunately, I had strong teachers as my models and mentors. Unfortunately, that’s who is currently leaving the classroom. This profession is dying because people can only give so much of themselves before it becomes unsustainable.[/quote]

In some ways, the bolded is true, in the sense that as people who have gone through school most of us prob think we know more than we actually do. But I am continually shocked at how little most of the teachers in my family can even understand the very basics of operating in a non-school, professional environment. And why should they? 
But what I find shocking, continually, is how teachers complain about things that have a "same tune, different verse" in many other professions, esp. service based ones, with real ignorance about those differences. My sister for instance was offended that her principal made her take the day off to attend a special day at the school where her kid also attends (b/c she got her kid into a way better school than her address would mandate, based on teaching there) in the role of a mother (but not teacher). And doesn't really seem to understand most of us can't have real mental breaks from work, b/c we don't operate on the school year model. Or also many of us also had to take care of our children during the pandemic, and couldn't say "well I can't be at work b/c I have to take care of my own kids," or "I can't be with my kids b/c i am grading my students' exams." Some teachers seem to expect special dispensation b/c they work with children that their own kids need can't get in the way of work. And I am not saying that's wrong, but it is in no way unique to the teaching profession.
And I say this as someone who abs thinks teachers should be paid 5x what they are. But my experience is that many teachers act entitled in ways that would be a serious no-go in the rest of the working world.

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