What kind of policy can improve Teacher Quality?

Improving quality of teachers, improve their pay- it's that simple. Throwing money at a situation seldom helps it, all you have to do is look at our current school system to understand that, but there is a corillation between money and teachers in one simple way- teachers can't afford to live and teach in Florida. Our retirement level pay is not as much as some states beginning salaries. Now, if you are a student who has just graduated from some of our fine teaching institutions in Florida and let's say you get a starting salary of $22,000.00 in Florida and a starting salary of $60,000.00 in Ohio, where you gonna go?

Interestingly enough I new the very day that we started throwing our gambling money at the education board they would start to cut funds in other areas. We worked very hard to pass a bill that would give pay raises to teachers over a five year period and it didn't happen. More importantly Tallahassee does not Know what happened to the money earmarked for the teachers. (That's the actual excuse they used).

I work within the school system and have been a teacher (I now just sub). I have seen my teacher friends leave for greener pastures or just quit. It is very disquieting. The money we use for say, FCAT could be used to increase salaries.

So let's review some of the other complexities of being a teacher in Florida-
1. In our school district (and many others are following suit) we have "same page" teaching. It literally means what it says. Teachers go to their computers every Monday and download the cirriculum for the week. Every teacher is supposed to teach the same thing on the same day. The ultimate insult to every living teacher, never mind that you may have a slower class than someone else, never mind that you may have a fun, creative way to teach, never mind that you have a mind.

2.FCAT look it up. It is not only the demise of students, but also of teachers. Assessment testing does not just take away some classroom time- It takes up to about one full quarter. One quarter cramming on subjects your child may not have even studied yet. One quarter that your child could be actually learning something by a passionate, inspiring teacher. Every teacher can also tell you that in most public schools the last quarter is "burn out time " ask your teacher, she'll explain. This year because of time constraints our school had the ROTC instructor teaching English prep for FCAT. The ROTC instructor?

3. No Kid Left Behind? You gotta be kidding. Good luck with that one. Yeh, the graduation rate looks better on paper but that is because so many students decide to dropout before they graduate. Teachers used to try to inspire students who had difficulties at school, spend more time with them, encourage them. They can't do this anymore. They have No Child Left Behind, FCAT, Same Page classrooms, no planning sessions, no aides in the classroom, no time. You want no child left behind, which is theoretically impossible, give a teacher some time, assistance, and let them do their thing. Maybe a child gets left behind but they will leave with some pride in themselves and the knowledge that they did the best they could.

4.Pressure- Now teachers need to stop complaining about pressure. This is a high pressure job, always has been. Kids are a challenge and always will be. I found that the reason it seems to be more difficult to control them is because teachers "got no power" anymore. Remember the days of the paddle and raising your hand to leave your seat. Now, I am not proposing capital punishment be brought back, but the mere threat of the paddle was usually enough to staive off even the most difficult case. I am merely pointing out that teachers have been stripped of personal contact with their students when it comes to students behavior. We can no longer discipline the student in class for fear of a lawsuit by the parents so students act up knowing the teacher can do very little to stop them.Teachers are no longer encouraged to hug a child or pat them on the back. They are to send the student to the office for disciplinary action. No positive or negative contact. The end result is teachers spend much more time asking the students to be quite and sit down with nothing to back up the request. I had a student once walk out of my classroom to the office because I grabbed the back of his shirt, let alone that he was punching a kid in the face at the time, and a parent actually called me in the office for it. I had to explain why I had to grab the child to stop him from pummeling another student. No one in that meeting even brought up the fact that he was hitting a child for no reason, can you believe that? My daughter had a karate instructor in school that was an incredible teacher. The girls would always run up to him and give him hugs. He always did this in plain sight where anyone could see with no sinister intensions. The administration told him he had to stop because hugs were inappropriate. When are hugs ever inappropriate? Every day more and more nurturing and disciplinary personal contact is taken away. This is not healthy.

5.Budget cuts, and cuts, and cuts... How does anything ever get better by getting less....no aides for classrooms, no enrichment programs, no advanced studies, no aftercare, no sports, no arts, no music, no mentoring, less teachers, less classes, less education!

6.Administrative/teacher co-operation- Local school boards have become ineffectual, unable to support their teaching staff. Local school boards have power taken from their own hands by the state. This makes it difficult for them to support independent teaching ideas. It takes a strong principle to stand up for their staff while negotiating through the flotsum and jetsom of school boards and the multitude of new edicts from Tallahassee.

Teachers do have to answer to someone. They have to uphold standards. We do expect results. Teachers have to answer to students and parents, not a school board. A school board is there to administer, not teach. It does not take an assessment test to know if a teacher is living up to it's potential. Students and parents will let the school know if a teacher is not living up to their potential; that information costs nothing to the tax payers.

That's the same kind of misuse here. We had an instance where the school board approved $2500 for marki gras beads to be thrown by one of it's members. The one that threw them and used a business car to do it was fired, but nothing happened to the other members that approved the funds.

It's very sad and difficult. If there are others you need to meet as a group and compare notes, gripes...you need to unite. One person can bring change but you need support. If there are problems that are not being addressed in the building, district, board, you take it another step. Letters to the editor, letters home to families, local newspapers and bulletin boards. I don't know what the problems are but the teachers union or Dept. of Ed. may help.
It's very difficult and it takes a lot of time and effort but you can do it. Kids come first. "Lack of funds", Look at spending and waste. I know a school that threw perfectly good text books (2-3 years old)in the dumpsters (2 dumpsters full) when they were replaced with e-books. These could have been sold or given to districts in need, overtime misused...On the administration level it's a business, on the teaching level it becomes a job (this is not an insult I know teachers are torn by parents, administrators and the state). The administrators are going to do everything in their power to look good. That may mean they will lie, lay off, cut back...if you disagree with them you will be dealt with.
Someone has to police the administrators as they do not always put children first, the business comes first.
You need to be persistent.

We actually have an unprecidented layoff of 400 teachers in our county because of lack of funds. All of the suggestions for the superintendant to maybe give a little of his pay raise or the school board to do the same has gone unanswered. Most people think the school board should be fired for being unaffective. Apparantly I'm not the only one who tried to get problems solved only to have them sit on it. Isn't it sad that the district gets in trouble and none of the people at the top have to answer for it. Only the teachers are paying, and the problems are everyone's to share..from the parents to the superintendant.