More money; more work days for teachers

On a piece by Zsombor Peter and the Journal

When it comes to teacher salaries,
there is a rock and a hard place.

On the one hand, teachers make a decent hourly wage;
the starting wage is somewhere in the neighborhood of
$25 per hour plus benefits.

On the other hand, teachers work less than one day in two, and for only 6.5 hours a day.

Non teachers typically work 250 days times 8 hours;
or 2000 hours a year.

A teacher works 182 days times 6.5 hours;
or less than 1200 hours per year. *

What teachers, and others on a 182 day contract have,
is a permanent part time job that pays well
when viewed from the standpoint of an hourly wage,
but not so well when viewed as an annual salary.

It appears that they would be making $62.5K per year
when they are only taking home $37.5K. Plus benefits.

Unless increasingly wary and resentful taxpayers
are willing to raise teacher hourly rates,
which seems unlikely under the circumstances,

the obvious solution is to make school days and/or years longer.

The 180 school year is based on an agrarian calendar.
Kids used to work on the farm or ranch all summer.


Why shouldn't kids be in school all year long?

Why aren't the length and frequency of vacations
data driven decisions surrounding the actual needs of students?

Perhaps a four day week, all year long,
for students who are making adequate progress,
(four days times 50 weeks is equal to 200 school days.)

and a five day week, all year long,
for teachers, and for students in need of remediation.
(five days times 50 weeks is equal to 250 school days.)

While it cannot be denied that there are those in teaching, expressly for the short workday and vacations; it is not they, who should be determining the length of school days and years.

* The calculation honestly, is not quite that simple, because it does not take into account the hours that teachers spend working outside the duty day. In that regard, some teachers routinely spend several hours a day, outside the duty day, grading papers and preparing lessons.
And there are of course, some teachers arrive late, and leave early.


On a different subject, but from the same article;

What bothers some ATF members is the way the union arrived at its position— without them.
In typical negotiations with APS, the union formally consults with its members before striking any deals.
"This is a little different," Bernstein said.
... the ATF had no time to consult members.

Almost exactly the words Beth Everitt used when she moved a bunch of principals around in her administrative Chinese fire drill * a few months ago.

* "... any large, ineffective, and chaotic exercise." >>wikilink<<