School board member threatens Godwin teachers: I’ll be looking at you

MoonHowler

https://www.facebook.com/TracyAConroy/videos/10154143168594901/

 

I would be remiss as a former Prince William County educator if I did not address the behavior of Neabsco School Board member Ms Diane Ralston who told the Godwin Middle School teachers that she would be watching them. She also suggested that those teachers who had spoken against the name change did not belong at that school.

You have to hear it for yourselves.

I have to say Ms. Raulston’s remarks were threatening and totally unacceptable. I heard some teachers had considered resigning.

Teachers: Don’t be fools. Do not resign. Hold your heads up high and continue to teach and inspire the boys and girls of Godwin Middle School. There are legal resources to handle these kinds of threats from your employer. I was approached tonight by someone who will represent you. Please contact me and I will pass along the information to you. [email protected]

Ms. Raulston should consider resigning immediately. Her behavior makes her unsuited for any role of leadership in Prince William County Schools. We absolutely cannot have our teachers threatened in this way.

It’s one thing to threaten a colleague as she did Willie Deutsch, ordering him to stay out of her district. It’s quite another thing to threaten employees.

It is my greatest hope that Ms. Raulston will think about the liabilities associated with her actions and at least attempt to walk back her remarks. We cannot have teachers threatened and admonished for their thoughts and opinions.  The first amendment is still functioning in Prince William County.  Those Godwin teachers are the closest ones to the community and the children. We want happy teachers, not beaten down, scared, watched teachers.

We cannot have members of our school board bullying their colleagues or their employees.

Sandy Hook and Oklahoma: Thank the teachers

MoonHowler

teacher

For the past couple of years, if most teachers are honest, they will tell you that they feel beaten up, under-appreciated, over-worked and the political victims of whatever people feel ails American education.  Any time someone has a gripe, teachers have been in the first line of fire whether it’s over  test scores, the decline of America’s youth, the graduation rate,  or unions financially strapping municipalities.

In Virginia, not to stray too far from home, legislation has tinkered with teacher accountability, teacher evaluation, and teachers’  job security, especially along the lines of continuing contract.  More is being asked of teachers and less is being given to them in the way of reward and compensation.   In Virginia, teachers now must pay their own VRS.  Elementary teachers still don’t have adequate planning time and secondary planning time is often encumbered with meetings and other wastes of time. Teachers often plan from their own homes, far in to the night.

On the one hand, teachers are trusted less which is evidenced by the frequency of evaluation, and general supervision by administrators, as though the teachers are the students.  Ironically,  more is being demanded of these same people.

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Susan J. Demas: Michigan’s New Motto: Blame It on the Teachers

MoonHowler

Reprinted with permission from Susan J. Demas whose guest opinion appeared in the Huffington Post.

Unless you are saving lives on the operating table or vaccinating children in Africa, it takes a certain kind of chutzpah to constantly insult and berate teachers.

Because chances are, your job is nowhere near as important as that of the folks responsible for shaping the young minds of tomorrow. That goes for lawmakers, lobbyists and yes, annoying reporters like myself.

Anyone who has to corral a bunch of sugar-addled kindergartners or try to break through to angry teenagers deserves hazard pay. Because if our kids don’t get the education they need in their early years, they are screwed. That didn’t used to be the case, when the auto industry was fat and happy and doled out jobs as high school graduation gifts.

But nowadays, if kids don’t earn a college degree, they are almost completely shut out of the middle class. Maybe an associate’s degree in a technical field will suffice. But that’s about it.

Teachers are critical to this process. So are parents, but most of them are too busy working 60 hours a week, often at a couple jobs, to teach their kids very much at home. And let’s face it. Once kids start bringing home algebra, most of us are hopelessly lost.

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Those wascally fat cat teachers are just greedy!

MoonHowler

Jon Stewart has it all figured out about teachers and has a little private talk with them.  He wants them to straighten up and fly right. 

 

 

 

Jon Stewart’s mother really was a teacher, in New Jersey.    Don’t let these teachers fool you!  Those money grubbers.

Stewart explores class warfare.  The Democrats are pitting the top 2% against the lower 98%.    What can be done abouut these villans of chalk board?  They are living in the 1890’s.   They are destroying America.  They have chalk dust on their clothing.  They drive old cars.  They have special text books with all the answers in them.  Who has a gym and a cafeteria at the work place, other than Google employees?  What about the greed that led these people into their profession?   The Crisis in Dairy Land continues.  The Curds are angry.

R.I. Community in Crisis When all Teachers Fired

MoonHowler

How sad for all concerned. Given: One of the poorest communities in Rhode Island and the rigors of No Child Left Behind (which is what is behind all this educational crisis.) Depending on who you talk to, there are lots of fingers being pointed. Faulty statistics are being bandied about. Administration is drawing its line in the sand. Teachers have refused to take on extra burdens without compensation. The teachers’ union doesn’t seem to be supporting the teachers. Somewhere out there, there is the truth. I expect it is in the middle.

The one missing part of the puzzle seems to be what the students are doing. What is the community doing? How fast can attitudes in poor, immigrant communities be turned around? Should teachers of students in low achieving communities be compared to teachers in wealthier areas?

Who will be willing to go in and replace all those teachers? The nation will need a million new teachers by 2014. Where will they all come from? When will communities, parents and students start to assume responsibility for their own learning? You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make him drink. After all, its all about accountability.

The Rhode Island teachers will have the last laugh, in all probability. The data-driven replacement crowd will come in all full of themselves and will soon find out that perhaps the job isn’t so easy. The newcomers will probably not do much better, they will burn out and move on. And one day very soon, there will be no one to teach the children. Younger people simply will not want to put up with the insult and there are lots of easier ways to earn $75,000. (that amount was NOT starting pay, btw)