Teacher Tuesday! (Very Long)

Typically I am a happy blog writer. Life isn't crappy for me, most of the time, and I usually have something positive to talk about. However, today is a little different. I have a lot to say and so if you are worried about my being a "Negative Nancy" rubbing off on you, I suggest you close out this blog now and go read one of my other happier ones.

For those of you who have known me a long time, you know that I have wanted to be a teacher since I was in the 4th grade. I had an incredible teacher, Patricia Devine, who taught me a lot about life and a lot about myself, all while teaching me everything I could possibly ever want to know in the fourth grade. My goal in life has always been to become just like her. To teach my students as much as I possibly can, all the while having fun and helping them grow into productive members of society. However, as of late, I have pondered if I have made a wise career choice. Here are my reasons:

1. Teachers don't "teach" anymore.
~ Now don't read this statement and think to yourself, "What does she mean teachers don't teach? That's their job right?" And to all of you teachers out there reading this, I don't want you to think, "I teach, what's she talking about?" I am not saying that we aren't teaching the students things they need to know, but simply saying that we are not "teaching" the way we were taught.
Teachers used to have activities and lessons that were based on the material students should know by their fourth year in school and whether or not they got it was not strictly placed on the teachers shoulders. Parents were required to help their child at home and a teachers job was not based on what some stupid standardized test says their kids know, but what the teacher can prove their kids know.

2. Using a standardized test, written on a collegiate level, to assess students.
~ The people writing laws and creating standardized tests for schools nowadays are telling teachers that they aren't doing their jobs because the students aren't learning the required objectives as mandated by each state. And the way they assess the students learning is by giving them a comprehensive test based on these standards, which is fine except for the fact that it is written on a college level.
Let me tell you what, I am a college educated person. I spent four years working on a degree and I can write a paper that would blow your mind, but to read some of these questions that these students have to answer, I even have to go read them two or three times to get the meaning. No wonder these fourth grade students are freaking out, this test is too hard to understand. But according to the law makers, students should know the material and be able to take this test to prove that.
I can't tell you the amount of parental phone calls I get because even the parents cannot understand what on earth the practice tests are asking. I guarantee that if I could take that test and put it in language that is familiar to my students, my students could answer the questions with no problem. But no, the law makers want to make it the teachers fault if the students do poorly. That is garbage! Make the test readable!

3. People who have never taught a day in their life telling teachers how to do their jobs.
~ This is the biggest pet peeve of mine. People who have never taught a single day in their lives, telling me how to do my job. I believe that if you can make a law for schools, then you should be required to have taught at least one year in each level of education. That means you must have taught a year at the elementary, the middle, and high school level.
It is so easy for someone that has never spent a day in a classroom to stop by a teachers room and say, "This person doesn't know how to teach." or, "You should be doing it this way." It's a completely different thing for a person who has never been in a classroom to spend a day in a teachers classroom and see that there is far more going on than meets the eye.
Sure, some of the things that lawmakers have passed sound good on paper, ex: No Child Left Behind, but in reality it is just a HUGE mess that teachers have to deal with and is not good in practice. I'm a huge fan of "If it's not broke, don't fix it" and "If it doesn't work, find something else that will." (No offense to anybody who tutors through this program. It is different for you than it is for the classroom teacher. You are not held accountable for the child's success or failure. The classroom teacher is.)

4. Teaching is such an easy profession.
People who say that teachers have the easiest jobs on the planet have no idea. Teaching is the equivalent of three jobs. Not only are you responsible for making sure that your students learn, but you have to play nurse if they are sick and don't feel good, as well as playing disiplinarian to those who choose to act out. On top of your regular duties of teaching, you have to write lesson plans, discipline students, do duties, show up to events at the school, parent teacher conferences, faculty meetings, grade level planning, grade papers, Tier plans, small groups, remediation for low students, etc. Sure, I might get paid from 7:20am to 3:20pm, but I'm typically at that school from 6:45am to 5pm most days. And guess what? I don't get paid extra for all the extra stuff I do!

5. People who say, "I can do it better."
~ Well by all means, please come show me how to do it better. I can't stand when a parent tells me that I'm not teaching something correctly or they don't like how I run my classroom. By all means, if you think you can walk a day in my shoes, then please come on. I'd love to watch you do it. And if you do a great job, more props to you. Go get a degree and get your own classroom. That classroom door has MY name on it. So nobody can run MY CLASSROOM better than ME.

6. The continual cutting of teachers pay.
~ Teachers are some of the most underpaid professionals in the world. But why? If it weren't for teachers we wouldn't have electrical engineers, doctors, lawyers, dentists, astronauts, psychologists, nurses, etc. They all had to be TAUGHT how to do what they do. We should be some of the highest paid people in the country, but yet, here are teachers who are the ones that TEACH these people how to become what it is they want to become and we are all barely making enough to scrape by.
I'm a third year teacher. After they take out all of the taxes, insurance, social security, medicare, etc out of my check, I'm down over $900 off of my gross income. Because of all of the tax increases and the recession causing prices to go up, I currently make less now, as a third year teacher, than I did as a first year teacher. I MAKE LESS NOW THAN I DID WHEN I STARTED! HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE? Who wants to work hard at a job that pays you less than what you started out making?

7. Not having updated text books.
~ This is no lie when I tell you that I am currently teaching out of the same books that I was taught out of when I was in 4th grade. We are still using the same history books, science books, english books, math books, etc that I did when I was a kid.
Seriously? I was in fourth grade in 1996 and even then, the books we were using were old and outdated. Are you telling me that I am teaching my kids out of a book that has been around over 16yrs! Why the hell can't we afford new books?

8. Education being put on the back burner.
~ How many times a week on the news do you hear about another cut to the education budget? How many teachers are working minimal wage jobs because they lost their jobs due to pay cuts or are working second jobs to try and supplement their income because they have had to take a furlough day or other pay cut? How many laws are put into place to help these "disadvantaged children" but yet there is no funding to actually do anything to help them? How many extra curricular classes like art and music that give the kids an outlet to grow and release some tension caused by the constant strain of teachers having to teach to a state test are being cut because "there just isn't enough money?" How many more children will be at risks because class sizes are so big that a teacher can't take the time to work one on one with a child that is struggling? How many more kids are going to drop out at age 16 because they don't have someone there to push them and feel like learning a test is a waste of time? Why are there less and less people looking into teaching as a career and more and more looking into things such as nursing and computer technology? Why are more teachers leaving the field to pursue other careers because they are burned out, or tired, or frustrated, or feel like they aren't able to do their jobs because of too much red tape and paperwork?

9. Extending the school year.
~ Our current president has said that America's students do not go to school long enough. That for us to be the most powerful country in the world, our students are lacking in education. I think this is crap. Extending the school year is only going to cause more stress on teachers and students. We rely on that break of summer to recharge the batteries. I can't teach 12 months straight. It's not possible. If it comes to that, I will certainly be going back to grad school and figure out another profession. I can't do this my whole life at the rate it is going.

I'm sorry that this blog has been so long and negative. I just had an epiphany today and I realized that teachers truly are mistreated. There is so much going on in schools that nobody realizes. I just wanted to put that out there for the world to see.

I want to encourage everyone out there to write to their state representatives, senators, and even to the President himself. Tell them how you feel about education and the teachers that work so hard every day. I know that my one letter won't make a difference, but perhaps if we get several people writing, that might get some attention. And granted, I know that there are teachers out there that don't do their jobs and what they are supposed to, but don't penalize all of us that do for their mistakes.

Thank you for reading. :)