Gardner, Walt
"Public Schools Are Damned One Way or Another"
Reality Check Column in Education Week
Posted Online on March 9, 2011
URL: http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/walt_gardners_reality_check/2011/03/public_schools_are_damned_one_way_or_another.html
This is the other Gardner who taught for 28 years in the Los Angeles School District and was a lecturer in the UCLA Graduate School of Education. He writes this short article for the education community, but he is also crying out to the public at large about the hypocrisy towards our society's view of teachers. His basic point is society is wanting better teachers and says good teachers should be paid more. Then when a school district in Long Island, New York does consistently well and the superintendent is rewarded with a nice salary package, people are screaming that the education community is overpaid.
Maybe if it was a teacher that was being paid more this would not be a problem. However, watching the recent budget debates I do not think that would be the case. As teachers and as people living in society as a whole, this article brings up a good point that if Wall Street people can receive nice salary increases for good performance, why can't teachers and administration be allowed the same treatment? Why are free marketeers okay with the one and not the other? Is it truly a case of the public schools being damned if you do and damned if you don't?
Perhaps they are seeing the cost of education budget rise but there is no corresponding rise in teacher's pay.
ReplyDeletePeople ask, where is the money going? To more bureaucrats or to union bosses or funneled to political candidates? It's frustrating as a tax payer to not see your money being used in the way in which you want. It's really frustrating to be forced to join and have your pay garnished only to see it go to a political party or cause that you don't support.
It is modern day taxation without representation.
Teachers seem, unwittingly in many cases, to be pawns in this grab for money and power.