In Taylor Swift's song, "Shake It Off!," She sings, "The Haters are going to hate, hate, hate!" Well, they sure don't let a week go by without hating on teachers or education in Oklahoma so that they can push their agendas. Here's a sampling of comments from this week.
1. Teachers get paid enough money because they only work 9 months. My salary has been stagnate for almost ten years. In those ten years, I received two Master's Degrees; salary basically the same. I want to work on a Doctoral Degree in Curriculum, but I don't want the debt. My son is a senior next year, and his college education comes first. Teaching is a 24/7, 12 month career. I spend my weekends and the summers either working on new ideas for curriculum, collaborating with colleagues, going to conferences, and reading books about new ideas. I even wrote a book called The Pass Survival Guide, and I just finished a book called The Ye Olde Literary Shoppe's Grammar and Writing Guide that I will use in my classes next year. By the way, you can access this book for free on iTunes. Also, teachers in other states have summer breaks and get paid more money, so a comparison to other states does not make sense.
2. Using the ACT for testing would cause curriculum to be less rigorous than the EOI tests. I was appalled at this suggestion that the ACT preparation would cause curriculum to be less rigorous. The ACT score is what colleges look at when evaluating a future student. I have a student who is writing her persuasive essay in favor of replacing the EOI tests with the ACT test. I showed her this article from The Daily Oklahoman that implied that the ACT would not be good enough because other states do not use it. Why do we always play follow the leader? We need to the be the leader in education and teach like there is no box that a student should fit. The ACT means more to students than the EOI; they understand why that test is needed in high school. The reading and English sections are upper level and have more rigor. What's the problem? The EOI tests are not used to show what students know; they are used to punish schools and teachers. There has to be way to keep teachers
in their place. That's the real problem. At the high school level, it's time to start mirroring college courses; start by using the ACT. Instead of looking at what has more rigor, we need to look at what has more value.
"The Haters are just going to hate, hate, hate! But just "Shake It Off!"
I'm with you on the whole summer vacation trope. So tired of it.
ReplyDeleteOne year I kept track of every off-contract hour I worked for school...planning, grading, meetings, phone calls, working in my room in the summer. I worked the equivalent of a 50 week year: 8 hour-a-day, 5 days-a-week job. Just did all that work in 36-ish weeks. No wonder teachers are always so tired. Do not talk to me about summers off. Instead admit they're unpaid vacation. We don't schedule those vacations. They're not for our benefit. They are forced leave.
Thanks for punching holes in these arguments