MT teacher's

[Grizlaw]

BAC & GL-

was curious about this, because without teachers, you would not be where you are in life, and you seem to being doing well for yourselves, so you should probably thank and endorse teachers.

-rebecca

Oh I know, Becca. I had some truly great teachers in my life, and I am thankful to all of them. Nothing I've said in this thread should be read as a slam on teachers, or as an argument that they shouldn't be paid as much as the economic realities of the system will allow (which could lead to a whole other discussion that I'm not prepared to go into right now).

The only thing I've been picking on is the "80 hours" claim (and that was more for fun than anything else); I'm not knocking the importance of good teachers in any way.

[wbtfg]

I agree that 80 hrs a week is a little far fetched for most teachers, but I know people who have taught at small schools where they have to prep for 5 or 6 different classes, that's a lot especially for a first year teacher. Plus, when you're a young teacher, you are expected to volunteer your time in the evenings and weekends to student organizations, working bball games, chaperoning dances...etc.

Once the teacher has had a job for a few years, I would be that they work 50-60 hours a week, but I there is substantial number of first and 2nd year teachers in small town Montana who work their a$ses off for $21,000/year, and minimal health and retirement benefits.

[Cat Grad]

Okay, I'll post my own experiences with education in Montana versus Georgia. My first teaching position in Montana was 11k and my reserve W-2 was over 25k so I made the decision to go back to all my fun experiences at Ft. Benning and Ft. Stewart. Picked up a masters and a specialist while in the South and left to return to take care of aging parents.

Last contracted teaching position was 62k--in Georgia mind you. Georgia only has 180 school districts, they have a state pay schedule, thereby more money gets to the classroom instuctors and the scale is determined by the legislature. We have 452 school districts in Montana serving 145k k-12 students (down from 164k about five years ago) and virtually all of them have superintendents, district clerks, special education directors, and even curriculum directors rewriting the national standards and benchmarks that OPI could in fact be doing for us

I don't know of any districts in Montana that do not have union agreements with the teachers and staff lawyers bickering with the administrations lawyers in order to come to an "agreement" sucking all that money from the schools into the bargaining process. Then, you examine the Montana High School Association and the money we waste with our watered down athletic levels and it's a wonder our teachers make what they do. The distances our "big" schools travel has to have some eye opening fuel, meal and motel expenses. How many retired Montana educators head for Washington or Nevada--as examples--in order to make a decent retirement? I could list many other examples where we could streamline operations--but then that bad word out here would surface--consolidation (and throw in reorganization for good measure). Sometimes bigger is better--and not just in sex There's actually more opportunities for kids to be involved in larger systems and schools. Much of the latest educational reseach is starting to argue for the advantages of larger schools over the small school setting.

But back to the topic--for what we do as teachers in Montana, we're well compensated. I'd suggest get rid of the union lawyers and representation and let the legislature set up a state salary schedule, do some consolidation of administrative functions, and require OPI to serve as a central office for all the local school systems. But then, you wouldn't have so many board members, superintendents...

[gtapp]

Problems with increasing teachers pay:

1. UNIONS! Get rid of the union and you would have a better chance.

2. Taxes are too high already. Very few would like to spend more money on education.

3. Inefficiency: The only organization that is close to being as inefficient as the school systems would be the people managing our airports.

4. Paid trips to Hawaii to talk about efficiency.

5. Work nine months per year.

6. Most work 40 hours per week or less (most use the work from the previous year, over and over).

7. Unions, show me a system that rewards good teachers and not lousy ones and maybe we can work something out!

[Cat Grad]

I think AMTRAC has the worst managers

[BobCatFan]

I guess my big gripe with the system now is that there are no incentives in place to reward good teachers, and I think that is a lot of the problem with recruiting into the profession and the overall low pay scales. When you have to pay the worse the same as the best, you are going to end up with severely underpaid people.

There is incentive system in place. It is called moving to a larger school district.

A friend of my who is now a VP in Billings, did work those 70-80 hours per week. Nobody could figure out why. Even his wife.

I told him if the teachers got rid of the unions, the best teachers like him, would be in demand and the price of their services would increase.. (Currently, all teachers get paid for time & serivce, for the most part. ) Most teachers do not understand that being the best means more pay.

[PortlandCat]

Merit pay is necessary and you must revise or eliminate tenure. In what other job are you nearly impossible to fire after a mere three years of service.

Most teachers are scared to death of getting canned. Parents are consistently unreasonable and often blame their children's failures on their teachers. Most fail to realize it is probably a parenting issue.

Local control has plusses and minuses, but we need objective standards, economic incentives and incentives to move.

[El_Gato]

You had to go and get my BP up with this topic, didn't you Rebecca?

JK!

But this IS a sore subject with me.

I got into a lengthy email battle with the head of the MEA a couple of years ago and that guy has been so brainwashed, it's no surprise to me that the "rank & file" are mostly only capable of repeating the montra "Moooooooore money, mooooooooooore money......"

First of all, I ran some very similar comparisons to those sited by Rebecca regarding teachers vs the "average" (non-teaching) Montanan. It simply boils down to this: How can teachers ask THE LOWEST PAID PEOPLE IN THE USA to compensate them at a level that would place them anywhere but 50th in national rankings?? In other words, doesn't it simply make logical sense that the state with the lowest paid workers would also have the lowest paid teachers? Given that MT teachers rank 47th and the "rest of us" are 50th, I'd say that's a damn clear sign that we value very highly what they do.

Also, it is VERY enlightening to see that when you compare teachers salaries to those of non-teachers, the DIFFERENCE in MT ranks them SEVENTH IN THE NATION. When I ran my comparison a couple of years ago, I ran the ratios of teacher pay-to-non-teacher pay in 12 western States and MT ranked behind ONLY 1 state.

The message to me is that our teachers are being compensated MORE THAN FAIRLY, given the current economic structure in Montana from which they derive their pay.

Or, as I ended my "war" with the MEA head in Helena 2 years ago: If people lived in Montana for the money, there'd be NOBODY here to teach...

[briannell]

Or, as I ended my "war" with the MEA head in Helena 2 years ago: If people lived in Montana for the money, there'd be NOBODY here to teach...

-el gato

true. my brother & sister-in-laws kirt & pam nell are in red lodge schools, so this subject comes up a lot in family discussions.

i think it is a shame how low montana pay scales are compared to the rest of the US, especially because those that want to raise a family there, can't afford to do so. housing is too high (Missoula & Bozeman) same price there as it is here in Olympia, WA we have higher pay. don't know how people do it.

-rebecca

[Grizlaw]

I think AMTRAC has the worst managers

Amtrak is a horrible system from an economic standpoint, but I'm not sure it's the managers' fault.

As I've said before (on this board, I believe), the biggest problem with Amtrak is that they're forced to provide service to the entire country, even though about 90% of the country does not really have sufficient demand to justify the service. Here in the Northeast Corridor, pretty much every train Amtrak runs is full to capacity, and if Amtrak only served the northeast, I'm sure they could operate profitably. The problem is, the routes for most of the rest of the country do *not* operate at a profit, and the taxpayers end up paying for the difference (with those of us in the northeast who do actually use Amtrak's service effectively subsidizing a good portion of it as well, I might add).

I think we need to decide whether or not we, as a nation, consider it a priority to have national rail service. If we do, then we need to accept the fact that Amtrak will never operate profitably without government subsidies, and stop bitching about the cost. If we do not consider it a priority, then we should stop funding Amtrak, and accept the fact that a lot of the country probably won't have rail service in a few years.

[Cat Grad]

Agree to disagree here. Turn it over to the states and get them off the freight lines. Besides, what could be more beautiful than boarding the Empire Builder and sitting in the lounge car (where else) and watching Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana's prairie out your window I know, you think the Little Rockies, Bearpaws and Sweetgrass Hills make it all worthwhile and that way we can leave all the lines your school's byproduct owns (Montana Rail Link) sit vacant or once or twice a year travel the Yellowstone, Helena and on down the Clark's Fork...anyway, my take would be to privatize the entire passenger train network. Kind of like the old bumper stickers around Mazzola: Free Enterprise--Regulate Government Private companies would do a much better job than a bunch of bureaucrats.

[Cat Grad]

...and yes, I think private school's do a much better job than our public schools.

[Grizlaw]

Agree to disagree here. Turn it over to the states and get them off the freight lines. Besides, what could be more beautiful than boarding the Empire Builder and sitting in the lounge car (where else) and watching Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana's prairie out your window I know, you think the Little Rockies, Bearpaws and Sweetgrass Hills make it all worthwhile and that way we can leave all the lines your school's byproduct owns (Montana Rail Link) sit vacant or once or twice a year travel the Yellowstone, Helena and on down the Clark's Fork...anyway, my take would be to privatize the entire passenger train network. Kind of like the old bumper stickers around Mazzola: Free Enterprise--Regulate Government Private companies would do a much better job than a bunch of bureaucrats.

I'm not sure what it is that you think we're disagreeing on here, Cat Grad. I'm not opposed to privatizing the passenger train network; my point is only that if we do so, we can't expect Amtrak to serve parts of the country where there is not sufficient demand.

[Cat Grad]

Probably should have just stated Amtrak has the worst managers I like what Amtrak has done between Philly and Jacksonville: pull car transports behind the passenger cars so you can make the trip in either the lounge car or the coaches.

[CatFamily]

I have to agree 37K is not bad at all... but what about the extra $$ they have the opportunity to make in the "off" season? That should be factored into a teachers salary as well.

[El_Gato]

catgrad and grizlaw have HIJACKED an Amtrak train and are demanding to be taken to Cuba...

[briannell]

wondered why Amtrak has taken over a discussion on fair pay for teachers. guess the threads never stay on the original subject around here.

-rebecca

[Grizlaw]

catgrad and grizlaw have HIJACKED an Amtrak train and are demanding to be taken to Cuba...

Heh...sorry; Amtrak is just one of those issues that's on my mind right now, and whenever it gets mentioned, I always have to throw my .02 in.