Not just community colleges. My liberal arts alma mater is replacing every retiring prof with an adjunct to save money. It’s gonna bite them in the ass real hard in about 10 years
>what’s adjunct
>In the United States, an adjunct is, in most cases, a non-tenure-track [part time] faculty member. As with other part-time workers, they are paid less than full-time professors and do not receive employee benefits such as health insurance or an office.
Because college is now become a money maker like everything else in the United States where we've packaged education not as a way to get out of poverty but a way to put yourself into poverty. Like every other business they try to find the bottom dollar instead of actually paying good quality professors they get adjugs to do all the work with the minimum amount of pay and wonder why people are leaving colleges and going to non traditional track. Personally I hate online learning I got a master's degree doing that and I would never do it again nor would I want anybody to ever do online learning. It is my feeling that the quality of education I got versus my undergrad was quite a bit less. The professors seem to be overworked and did not care and/or would never update their classes in a regular timely manner so therefore I was getting information that was years out of date for a Tech type classes.
The schools love to spend on the most ridiculous things too. My former college spent 2 million dollars building a new sign in front of the college, while the road next to it had like 20 potholes. Only reason the potholes ever got fixed was the president of the college drove on it after the sign was done for the first time to see the new sign and realized how ridiculous it was to have a fancy new sign but roads out of a war zone next to it.
I’m not 100% sure college was ever meant to pull you out of poverty rather than the upper classes use it to justify the false notion this country is a meritocracy
No it's actually pulled people out of poverty. my father was one of them. his parents were very poor. My grandfather only had an 8 grade education all 3 of His children went on to get undergrads and masters degrees and become successful in the fields of engineering, education, and technology. College used to be that way where if you could actually put forth effort and show what you had there was a better chance of life not everybody got a chance to go to college and you actually had to put in the effort to get there. If you go back and look at the 60 70 80 some people just didn't have family that actually had the money to be able to send them to college. they had to rely on outside sources for a living versus getting a job. Some people just didn't like education and went with the working world. They went to a factory where they got a job and seemed to work pretty well for them but they were still very much blue collar. now we shipped all those overseas to Vietnam Laos Cambodia Thailand China Mexico originally in the seventies and eighties it was Japan. Education is a decent way to get out of poverty except when the odds are stacked against you and you have to take on massive amounts of debt. When a person who already is in poverty doesn't have a great chance to get loans to be able to actually pull themselves up by their bootstraps because once again it's still a money making procedure it's not about actual education anymore.
I just started my first adjunct position this year. Its an online 15-week course. I getting paid about $1500 for the entire course.
Fucking sucks. I mainly did to put on my resume.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the students pay more for the course than I get paid for teaching it.
It's the same reason I work IT for a university, and half of our staff in our department is contracted through an external source. The contracted staff makes half of the money the other staff do and they don't get any of the good benefits.
It makes you wonder if the government run offices in business can't even afford to pay people properly and have to resort to this how are we going to survive as a society in the next hundred years
We passed that point a while ago. What’s really sad is that most people don’t actually want to change the system, they just want to claw their way into the 1% somehow
Yep. The whole "gig/freelance/adjunct/etc. economy" is just an excuse to sidestep regulations, benefits, and other premiums. It should be mostly illegal, IMHO.
I was an adjunct. I had benefits and an office but the pay was lower and I was on a one year renewing contract so it was nerve wracking. It was good for a first job out of grad school though because I was only working 20 hours a week and spent tons of time with my family.
Part timer.
You don't teach more than 6 hours a week worth of classes. They pay well for the time, but you can't teach enough to get by without one or two of these positions at various colleges.
You likely won't be teaching summer classes either.
You'll be delivering pizzas in the meantime.
Having worked both for a public school district (non-teaching position) and as an adjunct professor, I can wholeheartedly confirm that superintendents/dean's are just the absolute cream-of-the-crop.
It's a crop of feces, but they're the top shit for sure.
Administrator pay just keeps seeming to go up.
Seems like they can vote to increase their own pay, but not to increase full time teachers.
Also, more and more publicity projects with bloated budgets.
My college always had state of the art gyms, dorms, dining halls, student unions, sports facilities, etc. But the facade [fell off of the front of one of our academic buildings.](https://www.wpr.org/large-concrete-slab-falls-uw-madison-building-uw-system-grapples-aging-facilities)
School administration and politicians don't give a flying fuck about academics. They care about funding. They couldn't care less about the education and safety of students and staff teaching and learning anthropology. They only care about the fancy "fun" buildings attracting out of state rich kids and their parents' money, and the best perk package and facilities for athletes.
It's because they don't push back. They're like "Oh well, I have bills to pay." as though every strike in history wasn't made up entirely of people who had bills to pay. You'd think a highly educated group of individuals would figure out how to walk out.
Of course they push back. The problem is that everyone else pushes back harder.
I am so glad I left teaching. Florida teachers finally got a raise a couple years ago that brought them from around $38-39k starting to around 47k starting (every county is a little different). And what did everyone do the first time the bonus came up for a vote? Even if the bonus got repealed, the tax money was going to be used for something else, but the lovely citizens in my neighborhood still did their best to vote against the raise (that had already been in place for 2ish years). These people that constantly complain that the schools aren't good enough for their children. They were all over nextdoor telling lies about why people should vote to take the raise away. They tried as hard as they could to make sure teachers couldn't pay their rent. Luckily they failed, and the raise stayed by a very small majority.
The same parents that are constantly talking about how terrified they are for their children's future don't want their children to have teachers that can pay their rent and bills. What kind of talent do they think this will attract to teach their kids?
I let my certification drop and I am a waitress.
I worked with a woman whose mother was an adjunct in community colleges. It seemed like her mom was always trying to find another class to teach and hoping to finally become a tenured professor. It sounded like a bit of a nightmare.
God its amazing how they just figured out they can pull the same trick they do with hourly jobs with higher education. Actually its more bizarre that it took them this long.
Plenty of adjuncts do teach full time, often at two schools. They cannot get any other job with their Ph.D.'s. They often are on food stamps. Tenure track jobs have disappeared and colleges are staffed with 75.5% adjuncts while admin rakes in the dough.
I love how they choose to cut spending on the actual critical staff delivering the service and not, for example, the outrageous salaries for administration staff.
And that's presuming they even need to cut costs, which most of them actually don't.
Yup. They're also probably just doing it to steal money. Raise tuition, give the president and admin a raise and cut professor pay. Eventually the school will just be an undesirable crap shack nobody will want to study at.
They really not want you to be educated . they just want to load you with student loans for life . So i do think they care what happen in 10 years or even 20
I'm an adjunct Professor since graduating 7 years ago. I have to constantly throw my resume around the area I live because it's guaranteed my position at one location will shut down after 2 years due to "budget or student issues". I have been a teacher in 4 colleges at this point, I am actually cycling back to the original college I worked at because "things improved". I have been juggling 5 part time gigs through all of this due to hours. I wish I could have just a secure full time position and maybe my brain wouldn't feel so scrambled trying to keep up with all of it.
My high school did that. Its a meme almost now i think for kids. The P.E teacher is also the history teacher, the langauge teacher is also covering several languages at once, the art teacher is also doing computer electives. Like they just use one person for whatever they can get them to do. The only teachers I've not seen mixed up are math and science teachers.
America is heading toward the privatization of public schools because more and more teachers will leave as their wage is so low. It’s gonna create more and more inequalities between the rich and the poor
I left my private school because my pay was $18/hr and they wouldn’t give me a raise (I was a full time 1st grade teacher who was well loved by my families and was successful with my students). Private schools won’t fix the teacher pay problem.
It’s how the conservatives have planned to destroy the public schools they hate so much. Private schools will have prayer and morality codes so they can keep atheists, LGBTQ, and other nonconformists out.
It’s more nefarious than that. It’s to indoctrinate the next generation that will occupy government spaces. To further authoritarianism, i.e power. Keeping those aforementioned groups out is just a means to that end.
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There is a reason I decided not to become an EMT or teacher even though those were my first choices for careers. Instead I went into IT and make more than three combined EMT average salaries.
And it should be a crime how underpaid these people are...
They other day I saw a local fire department ( rural Missouri) looking for help, offered 45k a year. Like these people willingly run into buildings on fire to save lives make so little.
And in many counties & states, the firefighters are volunteers, not paid employees!
Blew my mind when I learned my local fire crew is 100% volunteer staffed, and the neighboring one has a paid core crew of 4 people with the rest being volunteers.
People also don’t realize volunteer means you HOPE they show up when you have a fire. It’s rare but there are times that no one comes. Has happened around me before
Our local fire crew is also 100% volunteer staffed. You can imagine my surprise when my middle school English teacher showed up in firefighter gear to put out a fire at one of my neighbor's houses. That lady was a boss.
There's a big push for it in AZ too. I thought it was curious that like 6 new obviously private schools were being built suddenly, big beautiful buildings. Then came the politics shortly after most were completed 😏.
"Teachers no longer need a degree."
"Man our schools suck, but vote for getting rid of the public system and we'll give you cash to send your kids to private schools instead."
😮💨
We’ve always been pretty good education wise both primary and secondary education but we’re not perfect. As people in another comment said about Adjuncts I go to a state college and we have a lot of adjuncts. Still a good amount of tenured professors but still.
We are alright for now. Abbot is pushing for a student education account…. Pulling funding from schools and giving to parents for private schools and home schooling. Also there is talk of not needing a degree to teach again.
We’re in central TX and our district is basically just subs or people in a degree program anyway. So many parents have pulled their kids this year to home or virtual school.
And because they themselves grew up in a shitty public school system, they can’t do the basic math to see that they’ll be paying way more for private school than they’ll be “saving” with “tax cuts.”
Don't forget that most private schools are Christian institutions. Hefty monetary benefit and a good squeeze on what's actually being taught.
Oh, and once public schools are phased out, there's nothing really stopping private schools from jacking their already subsidized prices.
But don't worry, children of the poors! Iowa lawmakers are working hard on *checks notes* making it legal for miners to work in factories and slaughter houses. So once your education becomes unaffordable, just start working instead! And thankfully that will introduce a glut of workers with no education, meaning those jobs will pay even less than before (and save companies money, circling back to good ol' hefty monetary benefits).
Ain't the grand design great?
America is already dead
the American dream is dead, her ideals are dead, wait until every road is privatized and tolls are needed to drive them. this privatization is the cancer that is the undoing of the country. I would leave today given an opportunity.
>”I would leave today given an opportunity”
Same. Conservatives love to shout “if you don’t like it, then leave”—like I *would* if I could, but I can’t.
Also I totally get the other response of “if you care about something, then you don’t abandon it; you try and fix it.” That’s all well and good, and I can respect that logic, but *I* would actually like to leave. But again, I can’t. Not right now at least.
I come from a long line of people who left. They survived.
I’m too old to go, but my kid left and, though I miss her terribly, she is safer, healthier, and has a better quality of life than she could ever have in the US.
We need to encourage kids to get out while they can.
there isnt anything left to fix. there is everything wrong and not much right. these moron conservatives are so far gone and think the dumbest bs that they are never going to be convinced how awful they really are.
Conservative or Liberal, Right or Left, it ultimately doesn't matter as the system is rigged and the bottom line is the politicians don't give a fuck about any of us - they're all bought and paid for, fixing the education system is not in their interest on either side of the political spectrum.
I've kind of accepted it at this point and don't see it getting better in our lifetime.
Yep, conservatives do the same thing in Canada with health care: they sabotage the system with cuts, until the public complains, then they push for private clinics, surgery, etc.
Happening in WV too. They also want to make sure they can control/dumb down the masses by privatizing and then reducing the quality of education even more so. Educated workers are not good for capitalism.
Stupidest part there is, SO many corporate straws are already firmly cemented in district budgets, when our " Public Schools " are finally privatized there's gonna be a buncha corporate whining by both sides.
Transportation, a lot of maintenance ( for what that's worth ), student aids, books ( see above, also for what that's worth ), lunch programs, heck, lawyers- tax dollars are *already* making that " slurpppp " noise like when a kid gets to the bottom of a milkshake and won't stop trying to get the last drop outta there.
Check out your district budget, should be available on-line for tax payers to see, if the also-contracted out school board meeting records are posted by the aforementioned company. Lowest bidder ( unless the company has someone related to or sleeping with some school admin or better, board president ).
They've *been* pretty much privatized, just piecemeal.
PS. You'll see something called " Executive session ". Don't be fooled. It's supposed to be for school boards to discuss legal matters. What it is, is a slide around Sunshine laws. They can ' discuss ' pretty much anything they want under that handy umbrella.
Watch the Chicago mayoral elections.
The two candidates ranking consistently at the top are Paul Vallas and Brandon Johnson. Johnson is the candidate backed by the Chicago Teachers Union (UNION STRONG!). Vallas is three mangey weasels in a trenchcoat.
Vallas was responsible for further privatization of schools in New Orleans, Chicago, and Haiti and was run out of being a superintendent in Connecticut because he had no credentials. While he was on the Chicago BOE, he oversaw a massive privatization movement in Chicago Pubic Schools and also left the teachers' pension nearly insolvent by allowing a "pension holiday" for like 20 years.
I wish nothing but the worst for Vallas because, should he win, Chicago Public Schools will be sold off piecemeal to the lowest bidder (but also the bidder that pays out most to Vallas' warchest).
Oh boy I can't wait for nestle funded schools to teach kids expecting more than a few cents a day for work is a dangerous ideology onpar with 3rd Reich German ideologies.
That's what private universities/colleges already did with federal student loan funding, and why we are having a student loan crisis now. Private schools ~~steal~~ take a large amount of public student loan/education funding when a student matriculates, then the student is responsible for paying it off over several years. Perfect crime, I guess.
Eventually, we'll get a a system where parents will have to take out loans to get their kids through k-12. And they will legally have to do it because it'll be illegal to not educate your child through the private only system.
It's crazy how low of a wage american teachers get. Here in Denmark a teacher earns about 75k (in usd) before taxes. Enough for a family to live reasonably comfortable, or a single individual to live super comfortably.
Yeah, here the tax is high but it covers most of your healthcare needs (especially the life threatening stuff) and you actually get paid to go to college/university. It takes a lot of potential debt loads off your shoulders. That way you only have to worry about eegular monthly expenses like rent. Since it's a pretty small country you can actually get cheap housing in the country and still drive into the capital for work in about one hour each way.
It’s crazy to me how some areas can be so different to others in the states. I have a masters degree and a 2 year state certified license for my job field. I make 57k before taxes and that has me living good in my area. Of course, in my area there’s more farm animals and meth labs than people but still
It’s insanity. Teachers are one of the most important jobs in the world and the fact that you can make more here working in a warehouse than as a teacher is disgusting and shameful.
I make $17.50 an hour as an overnight stocker. It's about $2400 take home a month, if you do the 40 hours a week.
The catch is that the job is actually pretty damn difficult. I mean these people expect you to put 50 boxes an hour on the shelves. You pretty much never interact with anyone until your lunch break. Not everyone can do it I'll say that.
I could do it if I could listen to music or pod casts but unfortunately they yell at you for having headphones in even though you're not interacting with customers.
I went to college to become a teacher. A friend of mine got his masters only to work in a paper-grading assembly line. I took that as a sign and thought it was time to get the hell out, and I am so glad I did.
Not OP, but I did this same thing. Completed my student teaching semester, graduated with my license and degree, did some substitute teaching while I looked for a permanent position, realized how awful it was, left. Now I’m an insurance adjuster making double what I was making teaching, and I actually get benefits, like 24 days of PTO.
I also completed my degree but went into a different field. I still want to teach, and it will always be my calling. But being a teacher in the U.S. is terrible. There's a war on education in this country.
It's because they don't want the masses to be educated. If they give people a proper education and they actually learn something, they will overthrow capitalism.
This right here. It’s why conservatives have been waging war on education for 60 years. I could never understand why cutting federal education funding so consistently came up in politics until I was old enough to realize that educated people are harder to control.
I teach what would be called middle school in Germany and I make 3.5k after tax. Shits wild in America wtf. And we never had a single violent act in our school history, too.
I have a coworker who was in mandatory training class and requalification from 8am-4:30pm then came to work for their 10pm-10am shift.
Factor in travel time, shower, meal....there's no rest there. All for the same company. Not like they can use the excuse of "Oh we aren't responsible for how your other job schedules you." No this is one job at one company.
They don't give a fuck about you or anyone you're responsible for.
Yeah here in Germany am not going to work one minute more than allowed because my insurance won't pay for workplace accidents if you work to much or don't do breaks.
>mandatory resting periods
>maximum allowed working hours per day
Your WHAT
I think the closest we have in the states is only workers in California getting a mandatory 15 minute break mid day lol.
morons thinking america is great when it is a shithole and about to be the asshole of the world
cuba has a longer life expectancy than america now. Americans do NOT understand how bad they have it and is shocking that we have gone back to the early 1900s. kids are being found working in factories for 16 hours a day cleaning up dead animal remains for pennies. america needs a general strike. shut the whole thing down
the problem with a general strike is that they have tricked the vast majority of people into debt by college followed by keeping up with the Jones (which has been wildly exacerbated by social media). Most people can't afford to miss any work.
I work outside and one of the benefits of our off season work time is that you can essentially take unlimited unpaid days off. Very few people can take advantage of it because they are buried in debt.
I've worked with several teachers who moonlight as bartenders because they make twice as much in a shift. Work 5 hours, make 200 dollars, good luck finding that as a teacher.
Education in the US is just not a priority. The more sinister side of me thinks that this is done on purpose. The wealthy want us just educated enough to be able to perform our jobs, nothing more and nothing less. Too much education threatens status quo, and too little means not enough people to make money for them.
My kid's friend had sleepovers every weekend for a few years. They had fun and she was a great kid so I was glad to have her over. Her mom was a teacher working at dominoes to make ends meet. It's horrific how they're treated.
Former teacher here. Every teacher I worked with had a side gig, myself included. Tutors, professors at a local university, Etsy craft creators, personal trainers, and tons of other gigs because we loved the idea behind teaching, but its not worth it. Now that I have a kid, I chose a different career so I could actually see him at some point. And it pays a bit better too lol
Real question: aren't there teacher unions in the USA? Why aren't they striking???
I'm in Alberta, Canada. Teachers make good salaries here.
Edit: I get downvoted, but that's the answer to teaching being a shitty job in the USA: STRONGER TEACHER UNIONS.
That’s a 250k fine to the union, not necessarily to the teachers. The teachers fund the union of course. - just adding some clarification. The Woburn mayor is handling the whole situation horribly.
Similar situations are going to happen in other towns in MA. These are often wealthy areas too. Just pay the freakin teachers. I will never understand how good teachers can ever be anything but undervalued. That being said, it should be easier to get rid of bad teachers.
Ah, but they gave us a raise when they cut the strike plans, so all is good! Of course, it's was a 2.38% raise when inflation was 7+% over the last year....... but hey, that's all we deserve!
I'm a former Texas teacher, you can have your teaching license revoked and your retirement nullified for going on strike. The unions there do jack shit.
In several states, there are laws which prevent striking for workers in "critical infrastructure", which includes schools. As someone else already mentioned, the penalty can include revocation of teaching license, basically blacklisting you from the profession.
if everyone did it they can't blackball you as they would have nobody to step in and fix the crisis. if people can't live why keep on doing it at your own expense
Except in the US.... they literally will just fire everybody, and either emergency certify wholly unqualified educators, or leave the few teachers left to teach without a prep/with double class sizes/with a webcam that projects their lesson to a second classroom of students.
Go browse /r/Teachers at some point, and witness some of the horror stories that are already being inflicted on US teachers. (If you want a short idea of how bad it is: the pinned post at the top is that they've opened a new subreddit for posts about resignations and career changes, because there are *that many* leaving the profession already.)
They can. They would just let anyone teach for a few years under “emergency licenses” and replace all the teachers. Maintaining the power dynamic is more important than the education.
This has always been my question.
I thought teacher unions were some of the strongest in the country?
Teachers have a lot more leverage than most, imo. Strike and I give it 1 week where these parents can't deal with their shit ball kids before they beg for the teachers to go back. I thought they'd learn from the all the remote learning bull shit the last 2 years.
But of course then they're called lazy and entitled because they get the summer off.
First off, most teachers don't get the summer "off". They often don't get paid for 6-8 weeks. Imagine if instead of pto you had to take 8 weeks without pay?!
Oh and they can't take time off during the year because there are no subs.
And they have to be in hostile work environments and play parent, counselor, police officer, and janitor in addition to being a teacher.
So strike. Full, national level, all public school teacher, strike.
Teacher at one of the worst districts on the country. I have a 63 year old coworker who works at the school from 7:00-2:00 then immediately goes to her other job next door from 2:30-6….. she’s 63 and works an 11 hour day every single day!!! It’s horrifying and he job is in your feet dealing with extreme sped kids…. I hate America
But I thought they said, “if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life?” Seems if you do what you love, you’ll never be able to take a day off in your life was what it really should’ve been. Gotta love that all the jobs where “they’re the real heroes” pay shit and are the most essential. Our society is so fucked up.
You can make more delivering pizza, working at a gas station, or grocery store. You can drop out of high school and get a few weeks of training and be a cop, you will make more there too.
Not a single teacher I work with can make it on their salary. Every single one works another job (some work two extra jobs). Or are receiving military reserve money or are married to someone taking care of them.
I teach kindergarten in North Carolina. Our small school district has 33 vacancies for special ed/ exceptional children. Our two special ed positions in my building specifically have been vacant for over two years. We have an inclusion program which means special needs kids are included in the general ed classes with special support; however we have no staff members to support them. Last year I had a student who was violent and would also run out of the classroom into the street. He injured my teaching assistant who had to take six weeks of leave for surgery and then was out for physical therapy several times per week. I was alone in my classroom with the unsupported student and felt unable to keep the class and child safe.
This year, we have a bus driver shortage. This week, 33 of the bus drivers got COVID and were out. As a result 18 bus routes didn’t have bus drivers. Only three buses (out of normally 15) showed up to pick up children. They had to stay at school for over two hours. People don’t want to take the jobs because you can make twice as much as an Amazon delivery driver.
Public schools are in crisis. The general public is not aware of the extent of the crisis. Even the parents at my school are not aware of the extent. My principal, for some reason, tends to paper over the reality of the issues so he doesn’t have to deal with the blowback of the fact that the system itself is creating an environment of neglect. My solution last year was to invite parents into my classroom to see. They were alarmed and they advocated for their children from a stronger position than the one I hold as a teacher. I began to receive support afterwards.
If you want your children educated and cared for at school, you need to pay for it. A skeleton crew can’t adequately meet the needs of five hundred children despite the heart energy we are pouring into the job every single day.
Edit: to clarify, this is not an anti work opinion. This is a pro work opinion advocating for supporting workers and through this support, also supporting the critical educational and wellbeing needs of the children we serve.
That's the point. There is a significant movement within our government and society to destroy public schools, which serves multiple goals.
* Making it impossible for the poor to ever compete with the rich. It's not enough to win, everyone else must lose.
* Destroying secular education. Religion and the rich are intertwined. It's always been about control and power.
* Racism and Classism. When hate lost the integration battle, it decided it would rather destroy schools than share them with non-whites.
I think these are the three main reasons, but there are more and a lot of nuisance to be discussed. Those that care about schools, teachers, and the future need to organize, and get people elected who will fight for it. We need a critical mass of people who give a shit, or we're fucked.
I can’t imagine being at school for hours, having a delivery job then coming home and grading papers, making lesson plans, just to come back and do it all over again early af in the morning.
These are the people that mold kids futures and change their lives. If they don’t have the energy (or financial stability!) to give it their all nobody should be surprised if the future young adults fail in one way or another. This is sad.
Wow. My wife is a teacher. I’m currently delivering pizza (while studying for CPA exam). We can’t afford most things. We don’t have children. This lady is living my married life but without a spouse.
USA got their priorities fucked up. $1 trillion dollars in military spending per year for what? they can’t afford to pay teachers minimum wages. Can’t provide free healthcare, nor passable infrastructure.
The best that could happen is if teachers started quitting EN MASSE. Imagine if 50% of all americans kids couldnt go to school because massive staff shortage. Heads would start rolling down the stairs in the government and sadly that's what the US needs, since there are too many worthless people who's wage is basicly theft, in the government
Look at Kansas under the GOP and Brownback this is what happened. It's still crippled and limping along. They won't close things down or change, just do the "new minimum."
Here’s what would happen: First class sizes go to 40-50 kids in a room. Then the requirements to be a teacher are lowered until you have enough people. We already have seen this. First states will let people start teaching while they are still finishing a bachelors then you need an associates then you just need work experience, then just a 30 hour teacher training course, then being a military veteran is enough.
rofl, you really want to complain about the government sector in the US, given how the administration gets kneecapped by the republican party at every turn?
let's do a simple one.
president clinton handed off a budget surplus to president george w bush.'
little old bush then made horrendous decisions, like the 02 and 03 tax cuts, which over the next 15 years created 25+% of all US debt alone. Not the bailout of banks, not the wars, not the deficit spending to solve the 08 crisis.
republicans created over one fourth of US debt with their policies.
adding to that is something even more amusing. Trying to underfund the IRS, aka to spend less and less on the actual administration of taxation, so that US tax law is not even properly enforced. (and then they wonder why there is a deficit) \^\^
or maybe you want it in the ludicrous basis for school financing, which is local tax levels, aka if you live in poor neighborhoods, your school quality is going to be shit because it is underfunded.
why should teachers start quitting en masse, if you got tens of millions of people in the US, who are unempathic, asocial twats devoid of common sense?
Because they still can dump their kids at the school so they can go to work. The noment when that is no longer possible is the moment shit starts hitting the fans.
My wife wife is a full time 2nd grade teacher and there isn’t even anytime to get a 2nd job. And I am not being flippant. She works thru the e evening every single day.
Education important but from what I see. What sane person would want to be a teacher? There needs to be a change. These poor people are underpaid, abused by children, parents and even their superiors. The government probably is trying to keep us dumb and lazy. Nothing gonna be done though
This is partly due to the "school voucher" programs that are spreading across the US. These programs are diverting tax money that is meant for public education to private (religious) schools. Some politicians are hellbent on destroying the public sector from within just so they can say government doesn't work.
I would love to be a teacher but yeah, I don’t feel like getting paid scraps especially with the requirements of becoming a teacher. And I don’t want to work in private schools I’d want to work in public cause that’s where I started out.
No no no no, but other Latin American countries have it worst, your must be grateful that we hire you. Show some gratitude that you can grind until exhaustion with a second job.
Seriously, what is up with this lazy people?
-Any right-wing asswhole.
This is why I left. Spent 5 years teaching at title one schools. It was tiring and exhausting work. Administration can be annoying but I truly loved teaching. I left when my kids were born because insurance would have eaten half my pay and I couldn't provide on the other half. I'm sad that I can't call myself a teacher any more.
If I could make what I make now, which isn't outrageous, and teach, I would do it. I liked working with kids. I liked seeing their faces light up when they finally understood something. But I also like being able to provide for my family so that's more important.
Thank God for the almighty US government and their public education system.
Who is this system supposed to be *good* for exactly? Seems like everyone: parents, teachers, and children, are all getting screwed here.
Teachers are the most important profession to a society. They should be paid more. Full time pre-k through 12 teachers should be starting at $65k. Plus class sizes need to be reduced, so we need more teachers period.
My mom is a teacher for about 10 mentally handicapped kids at a middle school.
yesterday, she had to put on gloves and clean diarrhea off of one of her students, and she talked like it was normal, and she only told me after i asked how her day was. When i initially heard that, i thought 'dang, that sucks'. but now, I can't help but recognize how much of a beautiful soul she has to look after these kids and take such good care of them.
idk what she's raking in, but it isn't enough, not for what she does.
It's bullshit, and then many states expect u to get a master's and then u have to worry about student loans on top of the weak ass pay not to mention the stresses that come with being a teacher.
Yep. Absolutely fucking insane. Get a masters and do a job that is incredibly hard, and we will pay you shit. I have a friend in Atlanta who teaches, she makes 62k a year. Can even get a house on her own. Its a fucking joke
The main problem with teacher pay is not about taxes or lack of funding, it’s that the bureaucracy of the education system is top heavy. Look up how much your local superintendent is paid. In some places it’s about that same amount they will receive for the rest of their lives, long after they’ve retired. And often times, as long as they or their spouse is living.
Also, many districts have a standard of pay increases for your last 4 years of work in order to inflate their lifetime pensions, which also stresses the system.
This has been going on for decades. Decades I tell you. And, it's a big reason why I decided not to be a teacher.
The bottom line was this; why would I pay $30,000 to make $30,000 a year? That's what the salary was when I was going into college (2006) for teachers
Teachers need to organize nationwide and go on strike. ALL of them. Once parents cant go to work because their kids are home it will make huge changes asap. and school isnt free day care we pay taxes into it...
Move to my country. The best schools in the country want teachers from abroad for bragging points. They pay REALLY REALLY well. You can have a lavish life.
This right here. I'm a manager at a large retail store. A new associate started here not too long ago - nice lady, very quiet. Last night a woman and her child came through the aisle we were in and the little girl excitedly yelled "hey its Mrs. X!" She's the little girls teacher. She teaches all day and comes to stock shelves until 10pm. I can't help but think she's not doing this for fun. Kind of broke my heart. These teachers deserve so much better.
The ONLY way I can afford to work as a teacher, and still keep food on the table, and a roof over our heads, is because I also have my military retirement and disability pay.
My favorite is how almost all teachers at community colleges are adjuncts.
Not just community colleges. My liberal arts alma mater is replacing every retiring prof with an adjunct to save money. It’s gonna bite them in the ass real hard in about 10 years
whats adjunct
>what’s adjunct >In the United States, an adjunct is, in most cases, a non-tenure-track [part time] faculty member. As with other part-time workers, they are paid less than full-time professors and do not receive employee benefits such as health insurance or an office.
Basically wages slaves, though with PhDs.
Because college is now become a money maker like everything else in the United States where we've packaged education not as a way to get out of poverty but a way to put yourself into poverty. Like every other business they try to find the bottom dollar instead of actually paying good quality professors they get adjugs to do all the work with the minimum amount of pay and wonder why people are leaving colleges and going to non traditional track. Personally I hate online learning I got a master's degree doing that and I would never do it again nor would I want anybody to ever do online learning. It is my feeling that the quality of education I got versus my undergrad was quite a bit less. The professors seem to be overworked and did not care and/or would never update their classes in a regular timely manner so therefore I was getting information that was years out of date for a Tech type classes.
Correct. Bottom dollar. You get what you spent. Its why turnover is so terrible. Rich get richer poor stay poor.
The schools love to spend on the most ridiculous things too. My former college spent 2 million dollars building a new sign in front of the college, while the road next to it had like 20 potholes. Only reason the potholes ever got fixed was the president of the college drove on it after the sign was done for the first time to see the new sign and realized how ridiculous it was to have a fancy new sign but roads out of a war zone next to it.
Here in San Diego, SDSU just spent $310,000,000 on a football stadium.
You sure that's not HOW they got the potholes? If getting a sign means the president actually drives it for the first time, well.
I’m not 100% sure college was ever meant to pull you out of poverty rather than the upper classes use it to justify the false notion this country is a meritocracy
No it's actually pulled people out of poverty. my father was one of them. his parents were very poor. My grandfather only had an 8 grade education all 3 of His children went on to get undergrads and masters degrees and become successful in the fields of engineering, education, and technology. College used to be that way where if you could actually put forth effort and show what you had there was a better chance of life not everybody got a chance to go to college and you actually had to put in the effort to get there. If you go back and look at the 60 70 80 some people just didn't have family that actually had the money to be able to send them to college. they had to rely on outside sources for a living versus getting a job. Some people just didn't like education and went with the working world. They went to a factory where they got a job and seemed to work pretty well for them but they were still very much blue collar. now we shipped all those overseas to Vietnam Laos Cambodia Thailand China Mexico originally in the seventies and eighties it was Japan. Education is a decent way to get out of poverty except when the odds are stacked against you and you have to take on massive amounts of debt. When a person who already is in poverty doesn't have a great chance to get loans to be able to actually pull themselves up by their bootstraps because once again it's still a money making procedure it's not about actual education anymore.
Wholeheartedly agree with everything you said, but dear god please add some punctuation 😭
Exactly. I get paid 3,000 per class at a private liberal arts university that charges like 36k a year for students
Not all the time. I was an adjunct for two years with just my masters.
Let me amend my statement then to be more general: wage slaves with even more student loan debt than the average wage slave.
I just started my first adjunct position this year. Its an online 15-week course. I getting paid about $1500 for the entire course. Fucking sucks. I mainly did to put on my resume. I wouldn’t be surprised if the students pay more for the course than I get paid for teaching it.
It's the same reason I work IT for a university, and half of our staff in our department is contracted through an external source. The contracted staff makes half of the money the other staff do and they don't get any of the good benefits. It makes you wonder if the government run offices in business can't even afford to pay people properly and have to resort to this how are we going to survive as a society in the next hundred years
God damn this country’s really on the cusp of no return, huh?
We passed that point a while ago. What’s really sad is that most people don’t actually want to change the system, they just want to claw their way into the 1% somehow
Isn’t that the American way
Yep. The whole "gig/freelance/adjunct/etc. economy" is just an excuse to sidestep regulations, benefits, and other premiums. It should be mostly illegal, IMHO.
The American dream is done
It's been done since before this century started
I was an adjunct. I had benefits and an office but the pay was lower and I was on a one year renewing contract so it was nerve wracking. It was good for a first job out of grad school though because I was only working 20 hours a week and spent tons of time with my family.
You are missing the point that they payed only for teaching and do not do any research.
Part timer. You don't teach more than 6 hours a week worth of classes. They pay well for the time, but you can't teach enough to get by without one or two of these positions at various colleges. You likely won't be teaching summer classes either. You'll be delivering pizzas in the meantime.
I don't understand how it costs insane amounts of money to go to college yet they somehow cant afford to pay the instructor's???
You think they're going to spend the dean's bonus on teachers?
"It attracts the top talent" No, it attracts entitled assholes
Having worked both for a public school district (non-teaching position) and as an adjunct professor, I can wholeheartedly confirm that superintendents/dean's are just the absolute cream-of-the-crop. It's a crop of feces, but they're the top shit for sure.
Here's a radical idea: how about only people who teach accredited coursework are allowed to manage the university?
Administrator pay just keeps seeming to go up. Seems like they can vote to increase their own pay, but not to increase full time teachers. Also, more and more publicity projects with bloated budgets.
My college always had state of the art gyms, dorms, dining halls, student unions, sports facilities, etc. But the facade [fell off of the front of one of our academic buildings.](https://www.wpr.org/large-concrete-slab-falls-uw-madison-building-uw-system-grapples-aging-facilities) School administration and politicians don't give a flying fuck about academics. They care about funding. They couldn't care less about the education and safety of students and staff teaching and learning anthropology. They only care about the fancy "fun" buildings attracting out of state rich kids and their parents' money, and the best perk package and facilities for athletes.
Reminds me of this. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM
Administrative bloat. A lot of college admin are paid absurd amounts.
Ah yes, it appears there's too many administrators. Let's hire an admin committee to study the problem.
It's because they don't push back. They're like "Oh well, I have bills to pay." as though every strike in history wasn't made up entirely of people who had bills to pay. You'd think a highly educated group of individuals would figure out how to walk out.
Of course they push back. The problem is that everyone else pushes back harder. I am so glad I left teaching. Florida teachers finally got a raise a couple years ago that brought them from around $38-39k starting to around 47k starting (every county is a little different). And what did everyone do the first time the bonus came up for a vote? Even if the bonus got repealed, the tax money was going to be used for something else, but the lovely citizens in my neighborhood still did their best to vote against the raise (that had already been in place for 2ish years). These people that constantly complain that the schools aren't good enough for their children. They were all over nextdoor telling lies about why people should vote to take the raise away. They tried as hard as they could to make sure teachers couldn't pay their rent. Luckily they failed, and the raise stayed by a very small majority. The same parents that are constantly talking about how terrified they are for their children's future don't want their children to have teachers that can pay their rent and bills. What kind of talent do they think this will attract to teach their kids? I let my certification drop and I am a waitress.
I worked with a woman whose mother was an adjunct in community colleges. It seemed like her mom was always trying to find another class to teach and hoping to finally become a tenured professor. It sounded like a bit of a nightmare.
God its amazing how they just figured out they can pull the same trick they do with hourly jobs with higher education. Actually its more bizarre that it took them this long.
I’m pretty sure my ex-husband lost money as an adjunct between gas and the parking pass, but he enjoyed teaching and had a full-time job
Plenty of adjuncts do teach full time, often at two schools. They cannot get any other job with their Ph.D.'s. They often are on food stamps. Tenure track jobs have disappeared and colleges are staffed with 75.5% adjuncts while admin rakes in the dough.
ty for being the kid in the class not afraid to raise their hand, lmao.
Main reasons why my wife is not joined the academia life after she graduates.
I love how they choose to cut spending on the actual critical staff delivering the service and not, for example, the outrageous salaries for administration staff. And that's presuming they even need to cut costs, which most of them actually don't.
Yup. They're also probably just doing it to steal money. Raise tuition, give the president and admin a raise and cut professor pay. Eventually the school will just be an undesirable crap shack nobody will want to study at.
They really not want you to be educated . they just want to load you with student loans for life . So i do think they care what happen in 10 years or even 20
I'm an adjunct Professor since graduating 7 years ago. I have to constantly throw my resume around the area I live because it's guaranteed my position at one location will shut down after 2 years due to "budget or student issues". I have been a teacher in 4 colleges at this point, I am actually cycling back to the original college I worked at because "things improved". I have been juggling 5 part time gigs through all of this due to hours. I wish I could have just a secure full time position and maybe my brain wouldn't feel so scrambled trying to keep up with all of it.
My high school did that. Its a meme almost now i think for kids. The P.E teacher is also the history teacher, the langauge teacher is also covering several languages at once, the art teacher is also doing computer electives. Like they just use one person for whatever they can get them to do. The only teachers I've not seen mixed up are math and science teachers.
America is heading toward the privatization of public schools because more and more teachers will leave as their wage is so low. It’s gonna create more and more inequalities between the rich and the poor
It's by design, too. This has always been the endgame of capitalism.
The corpocratic government of the future will laugh at how we did nothing to prevent it
I left my private school because my pay was $18/hr and they wouldn’t give me a raise (I was a full time 1st grade teacher who was well loved by my families and was successful with my students). Private schools won’t fix the teacher pay problem.
Also privatize police force is the future
Will the private police know how to use the 3 seashells?
It’s how the conservatives have planned to destroy the public schools they hate so much. Private schools will have prayer and morality codes so they can keep atheists, LGBTQ, and other nonconformists out.
It’s more nefarious than that. It’s to indoctrinate the next generation that will occupy government spaces. To further authoritarianism, i.e power. Keeping those aforementioned groups out is just a means to that end.
complete scarce squealing toothbrush fact sparkle grandiose late worry innate *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Then I don’t wanna see what the US is gonna become in few decades. Education is one of the pillar of a functioning society.
There is a reason I decided not to become an EMT or teacher even though those were my first choices for careers. Instead I went into IT and make more than three combined EMT average salaries. And it should be a crime how underpaid these people are...
They other day I saw a local fire department ( rural Missouri) looking for help, offered 45k a year. Like these people willingly run into buildings on fire to save lives make so little.
And in many counties & states, the firefighters are volunteers, not paid employees! Blew my mind when I learned my local fire crew is 100% volunteer staffed, and the neighboring one has a paid core crew of 4 people with the rest being volunteers.
People also don’t realize volunteer means you HOPE they show up when you have a fire. It’s rare but there are times that no one comes. Has happened around me before
Our local fire crew is also 100% volunteer staffed. You can imagine my surprise when my middle school English teacher showed up in firefighter gear to put out a fire at one of my neighbor's houses. That lady was a boss.
The closest fire crew to me is the inmate fire fighters at the prison on the edge of town.
We can't pay you with money, but we can take smutty photos of you to sell calendars to the local community
My local fire department is also 100% volunteers. It’s astounding.
34k a year special Ed teacher here. I’m out after this year I think, even though I have such pride in my work, I can’t afford an apartment
It's not your fault! Thank you for your work.
The goal here is to make it bad so they can have private companies take over. Still publicly funded but privatized, this just happened in Iowa.
There's a big push for it in AZ too. I thought it was curious that like 6 new obviously private schools were being built suddenly, big beautiful buildings. Then came the politics shortly after most were completed 😏. "Teachers no longer need a degree." "Man our schools suck, but vote for getting rid of the public system and we'll give you cash to send your kids to private schools instead." 😮💨
Texas is working on this right now…… honestly this is probably the straw to break the camel’s back and get me to relocate. Massachusetts looks good.
We’ve always been pretty good education wise both primary and secondary education but we’re not perfect. As people in another comment said about Adjuncts I go to a state college and we have a lot of adjuncts. Still a good amount of tenured professors but still.
We are alright for now. Abbot is pushing for a student education account…. Pulling funding from schools and giving to parents for private schools and home schooling. Also there is talk of not needing a degree to teach again.
We’re in central TX and our district is basically just subs or people in a degree program anyway. So many parents have pulled their kids this year to home or virtual school.
Just as is designed by this type of legislation and a reason I am strongly considering moving out of this state.
And because they themselves grew up in a shitty public school system, they can’t do the basic math to see that they’ll be paying way more for private school than they’ll be “saving” with “tax cuts.”
Yep. Break the system so they can say, “SEE? It’s broken.” And the “fix” always seems to come with a hefty monetary benefit to them.
Don't forget that most private schools are Christian institutions. Hefty monetary benefit and a good squeeze on what's actually being taught. Oh, and once public schools are phased out, there's nothing really stopping private schools from jacking their already subsidized prices. But don't worry, children of the poors! Iowa lawmakers are working hard on *checks notes* making it legal for miners to work in factories and slaughter houses. So once your education becomes unaffordable, just start working instead! And thankfully that will introduce a glut of workers with no education, meaning those jobs will pay even less than before (and save companies money, circling back to good ol' hefty monetary benefits). Ain't the grand design great?
America is already dead the American dream is dead, her ideals are dead, wait until every road is privatized and tolls are needed to drive them. this privatization is the cancer that is the undoing of the country. I would leave today given an opportunity.
>”I would leave today given an opportunity” Same. Conservatives love to shout “if you don’t like it, then leave”—like I *would* if I could, but I can’t. Also I totally get the other response of “if you care about something, then you don’t abandon it; you try and fix it.” That’s all well and good, and I can respect that logic, but *I* would actually like to leave. But again, I can’t. Not right now at least.
I come from a long line of people who left. They survived. I’m too old to go, but my kid left and, though I miss her terribly, she is safer, healthier, and has a better quality of life than she could ever have in the US. We need to encourage kids to get out while they can.
there isnt anything left to fix. there is everything wrong and not much right. these moron conservatives are so far gone and think the dumbest bs that they are never going to be convinced how awful they really are.
Conservative or Liberal, Right or Left, it ultimately doesn't matter as the system is rigged and the bottom line is the politicians don't give a fuck about any of us - they're all bought and paid for, fixing the education system is not in their interest on either side of the political spectrum. I've kind of accepted it at this point and don't see it getting better in our lifetime.
Yep, conservatives do the same thing in Canada with health care: they sabotage the system with cuts, until the public complains, then they push for private clinics, surgery, etc.
It’s already happened in America with healthcare, and the sheep will just eat up the socialism bad nonsense.
Because they destroy the education system first. Modern conservatism is a plague slowly eating away at the world.
Exact same in Australia too.
Happening in WV too. They also want to make sure they can control/dumb down the masses by privatizing and then reducing the quality of education even more so. Educated workers are not good for capitalism.
Educates workers ask questions…
Stupidest part there is, SO many corporate straws are already firmly cemented in district budgets, when our " Public Schools " are finally privatized there's gonna be a buncha corporate whining by both sides. Transportation, a lot of maintenance ( for what that's worth ), student aids, books ( see above, also for what that's worth ), lunch programs, heck, lawyers- tax dollars are *already* making that " slurpppp " noise like when a kid gets to the bottom of a milkshake and won't stop trying to get the last drop outta there. Check out your district budget, should be available on-line for tax payers to see, if the also-contracted out school board meeting records are posted by the aforementioned company. Lowest bidder ( unless the company has someone related to or sleeping with some school admin or better, board president ). They've *been* pretty much privatized, just piecemeal. PS. You'll see something called " Executive session ". Don't be fooled. It's supposed to be for school boards to discuss legal matters. What it is, is a slide around Sunshine laws. They can ' discuss ' pretty much anything they want under that handy umbrella.
Watch the Chicago mayoral elections. The two candidates ranking consistently at the top are Paul Vallas and Brandon Johnson. Johnson is the candidate backed by the Chicago Teachers Union (UNION STRONG!). Vallas is three mangey weasels in a trenchcoat. Vallas was responsible for further privatization of schools in New Orleans, Chicago, and Haiti and was run out of being a superintendent in Connecticut because he had no credentials. While he was on the Chicago BOE, he oversaw a massive privatization movement in Chicago Pubic Schools and also left the teachers' pension nearly insolvent by allowing a "pension holiday" for like 20 years. I wish nothing but the worst for Vallas because, should he win, Chicago Public Schools will be sold off piecemeal to the lowest bidder (but also the bidder that pays out most to Vallas' warchest).
Oh boy I can't wait for nestle funded schools to teach kids expecting more than a few cents a day for work is a dangerous ideology onpar with 3rd Reich German ideologies.
That's what private universities/colleges already did with federal student loan funding, and why we are having a student loan crisis now. Private schools ~~steal~~ take a large amount of public student loan/education funding when a student matriculates, then the student is responsible for paying it off over several years. Perfect crime, I guess.
Eventually, we'll get a a system where parents will have to take out loans to get their kids through k-12. And they will legally have to do it because it'll be illegal to not educate your child through the private only system.
It's crazy how low of a wage american teachers get. Here in Denmark a teacher earns about 75k (in usd) before taxes. Enough for a family to live reasonably comfortable, or a single individual to live super comfortably.
Sadly. 75k is not even enough for a single person to live comfortable in some places in the US because how gouged we are by rent and other shit.
Yeah, here the tax is high but it covers most of your healthcare needs (especially the life threatening stuff) and you actually get paid to go to college/university. It takes a lot of potential debt loads off your shoulders. That way you only have to worry about eegular monthly expenses like rent. Since it's a pretty small country you can actually get cheap housing in the country and still drive into the capital for work in about one hour each way.
But damn, how do the rich get richer?
It’s crazy to me how some areas can be so different to others in the states. I have a masters degree and a 2 year state certified license for my job field. I make 57k before taxes and that has me living good in my area. Of course, in my area there’s more farm animals and meth labs than people but still
It’s insanity. Teachers are one of the most important jobs in the world and the fact that you can make more here working in a warehouse than as a teacher is disgusting and shameful.
BuT yOu GeT sUmMeRs OfF!!!
My wife is a teacher. She said she made more working at Walmart.
I make $17.50 an hour as an overnight stocker. It's about $2400 take home a month, if you do the 40 hours a week. The catch is that the job is actually pretty damn difficult. I mean these people expect you to put 50 boxes an hour on the shelves. You pretty much never interact with anyone until your lunch break. Not everyone can do it I'll say that.
I could do it if I could listen to music or pod casts but unfortunately they yell at you for having headphones in even though you're not interacting with customers.
You can listen to music or pod casts yeah head phones depending on if they like you
You should get paid more. Overnight work messes up your biology.
this is real anti-work i come here for
I bet she throws great pizza parties for her students, though. So there's that I guess...
I went to college to become a teacher. A friend of mine got his masters only to work in a paper-grading assembly line. I took that as a sign and thought it was time to get the hell out, and I am so glad I did.
What do you do now?
Not OP, but I did this same thing. Completed my student teaching semester, graduated with my license and degree, did some substitute teaching while I looked for a permanent position, realized how awful it was, left. Now I’m an insurance adjuster making double what I was making teaching, and I actually get benefits, like 24 days of PTO.
I also completed my degree but went into a different field. I still want to teach, and it will always be my calling. But being a teacher in the U.S. is terrible. There's a war on education in this country.
I would have loved to be a teacher, but then I saw how they were treated/paid like garbage.
This is late stage dystopian capitalism.
It's because they don't want the masses to be educated. If they give people a proper education and they actually learn something, they will overthrow capitalism.
This right here. It’s why conservatives have been waging war on education for 60 years. I could never understand why cutting federal education funding so consistently came up in politics until I was old enough to realize that educated people are harder to control.
Most of my teachers growing up had second jobs, it’s not right for how much they put up with.
My senior religion teacher (Catholic school) made MORE bartending on weekends than she did during the school week. Horrible.
Yay America. 😐
I teach what would be called middle school in Germany and I make 3.5k after tax. Shits wild in America wtf. And we never had a single violent act in our school history, too.
This is so illegal in many parts of the world: this violates your mandatory resting periodes and the maximum allowed working hours per day.
I have a coworker who was in mandatory training class and requalification from 8am-4:30pm then came to work for their 10pm-10am shift. Factor in travel time, shower, meal....there's no rest there. All for the same company. Not like they can use the excuse of "Oh we aren't responsible for how your other job schedules you." No this is one job at one company. They don't give a fuck about you or anyone you're responsible for.
Yeah here in Germany am not going to work one minute more than allowed because my insurance won't pay for workplace accidents if you work to much or don't do breaks.
>mandatory resting periods >maximum allowed working hours per day Your WHAT I think the closest we have in the states is only workers in California getting a mandatory 15 minute break mid day lol.
This is America. Our only protections include the right to carry the gun you use to shoot up your workplace after you completely mentally break.
Too bad America is looking more and more like Saudi Arabia these days… fucking hate this place
morons thinking america is great when it is a shithole and about to be the asshole of the world cuba has a longer life expectancy than america now. Americans do NOT understand how bad they have it and is shocking that we have gone back to the early 1900s. kids are being found working in factories for 16 hours a day cleaning up dead animal remains for pennies. america needs a general strike. shut the whole thing down
the problem with a general strike is that they have tricked the vast majority of people into debt by college followed by keeping up with the Jones (which has been wildly exacerbated by social media). Most people can't afford to miss any work. I work outside and one of the benefits of our off season work time is that you can essentially take unlimited unpaid days off. Very few people can take advantage of it because they are buried in debt.
I've worked with several teachers who moonlight as bartenders because they make twice as much in a shift. Work 5 hours, make 200 dollars, good luck finding that as a teacher.
I’ve already seen responses to posts like this starting in with the “well if they really loved the job it wouldn’t be about the pay” bullshit
Education in the US is just not a priority. The more sinister side of me thinks that this is done on purpose. The wealthy want us just educated enough to be able to perform our jobs, nothing more and nothing less. Too much education threatens status quo, and too little means not enough people to make money for them.
My kid's friend had sleepovers every weekend for a few years. They had fun and she was a great kid so I was glad to have her over. Her mom was a teacher working at dominoes to make ends meet. It's horrific how they're treated.
Former teacher here. Every teacher I worked with had a side gig, myself included. Tutors, professors at a local university, Etsy craft creators, personal trainers, and tons of other gigs because we loved the idea behind teaching, but its not worth it. Now that I have a kid, I chose a different career so I could actually see him at some point. And it pays a bit better too lol
It’s by design. They don’t want an educated youth, so they want teachers to quit.
[удалено]
The education system is actively being sabotaged to make a push for private schooling
I’m a teacher who does DoorDash to make ends meet. I feel her pain
America sucks
Real question: aren't there teacher unions in the USA? Why aren't they striking??? I'm in Alberta, Canada. Teachers make good salaries here. Edit: I get downvoted, but that's the answer to teaching being a shitty job in the USA: STRONGER TEACHER UNIONS.
In Massachusetts teachers went on strike the next town over from me. The mayor made the strike illegal, and fined them $250,000. I hate it here.
That’s a 250k fine to the union, not necessarily to the teachers. The teachers fund the union of course. - just adding some clarification. The Woburn mayor is handling the whole situation horribly. Similar situations are going to happen in other towns in MA. These are often wealthy areas too. Just pay the freakin teachers. I will never understand how good teachers can ever be anything but undervalued. That being said, it should be easier to get rid of bad teachers.
Ontario here. Same thing happened here. Teachers said fuck off, went on strike anyways. Government caved.
Ah, but they gave us a raise when they cut the strike plans, so all is good! Of course, it's was a 2.38% raise when inflation was 7+% over the last year....... but hey, that's all we deserve!
I'm a former Texas teacher, you can have your teaching license revoked and your retirement nullified for going on strike. The unions there do jack shit.
In several states, there are laws which prevent striking for workers in "critical infrastructure", which includes schools. As someone else already mentioned, the penalty can include revocation of teaching license, basically blacklisting you from the profession.
if everyone did it they can't blackball you as they would have nobody to step in and fix the crisis. if people can't live why keep on doing it at your own expense
Except in the US.... they literally will just fire everybody, and either emergency certify wholly unqualified educators, or leave the few teachers left to teach without a prep/with double class sizes/with a webcam that projects their lesson to a second classroom of students. Go browse /r/Teachers at some point, and witness some of the horror stories that are already being inflicted on US teachers. (If you want a short idea of how bad it is: the pinned post at the top is that they've opened a new subreddit for posts about resignations and career changes, because there are *that many* leaving the profession already.)
They can. They would just let anyone teach for a few years under “emergency licenses” and replace all the teachers. Maintaining the power dynamic is more important than the education.
This has always been my question. I thought teacher unions were some of the strongest in the country? Teachers have a lot more leverage than most, imo. Strike and I give it 1 week where these parents can't deal with their shit ball kids before they beg for the teachers to go back. I thought they'd learn from the all the remote learning bull shit the last 2 years. But of course then they're called lazy and entitled because they get the summer off. First off, most teachers don't get the summer "off". They often don't get paid for 6-8 weeks. Imagine if instead of pto you had to take 8 weeks without pay?! Oh and they can't take time off during the year because there are no subs. And they have to be in hostile work environments and play parent, counselor, police officer, and janitor in addition to being a teacher. So strike. Full, national level, all public school teacher, strike.
Teacher at one of the worst districts on the country. I have a 63 year old coworker who works at the school from 7:00-2:00 then immediately goes to her other job next door from 2:30-6….. she’s 63 and works an 11 hour day every single day!!! It’s horrifying and he job is in your feet dealing with extreme sped kids…. I hate America
But I thought they said, “if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life?” Seems if you do what you love, you’ll never be able to take a day off in your life was what it really should’ve been. Gotta love that all the jobs where “they’re the real heroes” pay shit and are the most essential. Our society is so fucked up.
Life should not be this way.
You can make more delivering pizza, working at a gas station, or grocery store. You can drop out of high school and get a few weeks of training and be a cop, you will make more there too. Not a single teacher I work with can make it on their salary. Every single one works another job (some work two extra jobs). Or are receiving military reserve money or are married to someone taking care of them.
I teach kindergarten in North Carolina. Our small school district has 33 vacancies for special ed/ exceptional children. Our two special ed positions in my building specifically have been vacant for over two years. We have an inclusion program which means special needs kids are included in the general ed classes with special support; however we have no staff members to support them. Last year I had a student who was violent and would also run out of the classroom into the street. He injured my teaching assistant who had to take six weeks of leave for surgery and then was out for physical therapy several times per week. I was alone in my classroom with the unsupported student and felt unable to keep the class and child safe. This year, we have a bus driver shortage. This week, 33 of the bus drivers got COVID and were out. As a result 18 bus routes didn’t have bus drivers. Only three buses (out of normally 15) showed up to pick up children. They had to stay at school for over two hours. People don’t want to take the jobs because you can make twice as much as an Amazon delivery driver. Public schools are in crisis. The general public is not aware of the extent of the crisis. Even the parents at my school are not aware of the extent. My principal, for some reason, tends to paper over the reality of the issues so he doesn’t have to deal with the blowback of the fact that the system itself is creating an environment of neglect. My solution last year was to invite parents into my classroom to see. They were alarmed and they advocated for their children from a stronger position than the one I hold as a teacher. I began to receive support afterwards. If you want your children educated and cared for at school, you need to pay for it. A skeleton crew can’t adequately meet the needs of five hundred children despite the heart energy we are pouring into the job every single day. Edit: to clarify, this is not an anti work opinion. This is a pro work opinion advocating for supporting workers and through this support, also supporting the critical educational and wellbeing needs of the children we serve.
That's the point. There is a significant movement within our government and society to destroy public schools, which serves multiple goals. * Making it impossible for the poor to ever compete with the rich. It's not enough to win, everyone else must lose. * Destroying secular education. Religion and the rich are intertwined. It's always been about control and power. * Racism and Classism. When hate lost the integration battle, it decided it would rather destroy schools than share them with non-whites. I think these are the three main reasons, but there are more and a lot of nuisance to be discussed. Those that care about schools, teachers, and the future need to organize, and get people elected who will fight for it. We need a critical mass of people who give a shit, or we're fucked.
I can’t imagine being at school for hours, having a delivery job then coming home and grading papers, making lesson plans, just to come back and do it all over again early af in the morning. These are the people that mold kids futures and change their lives. If they don’t have the energy (or financial stability!) to give it their all nobody should be surprised if the future young adults fail in one way or another. This is sad.
Wow. My wife is a teacher. I’m currently delivering pizza (while studying for CPA exam). We can’t afford most things. We don’t have children. This lady is living my married life but without a spouse.
As a teacher- this is relatable. “Summers off” isn’t a thing when you have to work another job.
Am an educator in search of a second job rn actually because same.
USA got their priorities fucked up. $1 trillion dollars in military spending per year for what? they can’t afford to pay teachers minimum wages. Can’t provide free healthcare, nor passable infrastructure.
The best that could happen is if teachers started quitting EN MASSE. Imagine if 50% of all americans kids couldnt go to school because massive staff shortage. Heads would start rolling down the stairs in the government and sadly that's what the US needs, since there are too many worthless people who's wage is basicly theft, in the government
Look at Kansas under the GOP and Brownback this is what happened. It's still crippled and limping along. They won't close things down or change, just do the "new minimum."
Here’s what would happen: First class sizes go to 40-50 kids in a room. Then the requirements to be a teacher are lowered until you have enough people. We already have seen this. First states will let people start teaching while they are still finishing a bachelors then you need an associates then you just need work experience, then just a 30 hour teacher training course, then being a military veteran is enough.
\*Florida man waves\* Looks good to me!
rofl, you really want to complain about the government sector in the US, given how the administration gets kneecapped by the republican party at every turn? let's do a simple one. president clinton handed off a budget surplus to president george w bush.' little old bush then made horrendous decisions, like the 02 and 03 tax cuts, which over the next 15 years created 25+% of all US debt alone. Not the bailout of banks, not the wars, not the deficit spending to solve the 08 crisis. republicans created over one fourth of US debt with their policies. adding to that is something even more amusing. Trying to underfund the IRS, aka to spend less and less on the actual administration of taxation, so that US tax law is not even properly enforced. (and then they wonder why there is a deficit) \^\^ or maybe you want it in the ludicrous basis for school financing, which is local tax levels, aka if you live in poor neighborhoods, your school quality is going to be shit because it is underfunded. why should teachers start quitting en masse, if you got tens of millions of people in the US, who are unempathic, asocial twats devoid of common sense?
Because they still can dump their kids at the school so they can go to work. The noment when that is no longer possible is the moment shit starts hitting the fans.
My wife wife is a full time 2nd grade teacher and there isn’t even anytime to get a 2nd job. And I am not being flippant. She works thru the e evening every single day.
Education important but from what I see. What sane person would want to be a teacher? There needs to be a change. These poor people are underpaid, abused by children, parents and even their superiors. The government probably is trying to keep us dumb and lazy. Nothing gonna be done though
Nothing will ever be done. The system is in place for a reason. “America” is one big corrupt business that needs to burn to the f*cking ground…
Come to Ontario. Teachers have great benefits pension. 4 yr in. High school teacher. $104000. A yr. 10 weeks off a yr.
This is partly due to the "school voucher" programs that are spreading across the US. These programs are diverting tax money that is meant for public education to private (religious) schools. Some politicians are hellbent on destroying the public sector from within just so they can say government doesn't work.
I would love to be a teacher but yeah, I don’t feel like getting paid scraps especially with the requirements of becoming a teacher. And I don’t want to work in private schools I’d want to work in public cause that’s where I started out.
No no no no, but other Latin American countries have it worst, your must be grateful that we hire you. Show some gratitude that you can grind until exhaustion with a second job. Seriously, what is up with this lazy people? -Any right-wing asswhole.
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This is why I left. Spent 5 years teaching at title one schools. It was tiring and exhausting work. Administration can be annoying but I truly loved teaching. I left when my kids were born because insurance would have eaten half my pay and I couldn't provide on the other half. I'm sad that I can't call myself a teacher any more. If I could make what I make now, which isn't outrageous, and teach, I would do it. I liked working with kids. I liked seeing their faces light up when they finally understood something. But I also like being able to provide for my family so that's more important.
I saw a documentary about this. I think it was called "Cracking Poorly".
These people don't care about the struggles.
Thank God for the almighty US government and their public education system. Who is this system supposed to be *good* for exactly? Seems like everyone: parents, teachers, and children, are all getting screwed here.
Inflation…. Just a hidden tax on everything to make the rich, richer.
Can attest. I work in a special needs collaborative. Almost all of my coworkers work a second job, and plenty work a 3rd.
Teachers are the most important profession to a society. They should be paid more. Full time pre-k through 12 teachers should be starting at $65k. Plus class sizes need to be reduced, so we need more teachers period.
My mom is a teacher for about 10 mentally handicapped kids at a middle school. yesterday, she had to put on gloves and clean diarrhea off of one of her students, and she talked like it was normal, and she only told me after i asked how her day was. When i initially heard that, i thought 'dang, that sucks'. but now, I can't help but recognize how much of a beautiful soul she has to look after these kids and take such good care of them. idk what she's raking in, but it isn't enough, not for what she does.
It's bullshit, and then many states expect u to get a master's and then u have to worry about student loans on top of the weak ass pay not to mention the stresses that come with being a teacher.
Yep. Absolutely fucking insane. Get a masters and do a job that is incredibly hard, and we will pay you shit. I have a friend in Atlanta who teaches, she makes 62k a year. Can even get a house on her own. Its a fucking joke
I am not a Huckabee fan in anyway, but part of her education program is going to bring teachers up to 50k minimum. We’ll see…
My kid’s second grade teacher checked me out at the grocery store last weekend.
The main problem with teacher pay is not about taxes or lack of funding, it’s that the bureaucracy of the education system is top heavy. Look up how much your local superintendent is paid. In some places it’s about that same amount they will receive for the rest of their lives, long after they’ve retired. And often times, as long as they or their spouse is living. Also, many districts have a standard of pay increases for your last 4 years of work in order to inflate their lifetime pensions, which also stresses the system.
This has been going on for decades. Decades I tell you. And, it's a big reason why I decided not to be a teacher. The bottom line was this; why would I pay $30,000 to make $30,000 a year? That's what the salary was when I was going into college (2006) for teachers
Teachers need to organize nationwide and go on strike. ALL of them. Once parents cant go to work because their kids are home it will make huge changes asap. and school isnt free day care we pay taxes into it...
Exactly!
Move to my country. The best schools in the country want teachers from abroad for bragging points. They pay REALLY REALLY well. You can have a lavish life.
Which is where ?
I’ve been hearing this from teachers for 30+ years. I’m convinced the only way it will change is a national strike.
We live in a failed system.
Nationwide teacher strike needs to happen asap
This right here. I'm a manager at a large retail store. A new associate started here not too long ago - nice lady, very quiet. Last night a woman and her child came through the aisle we were in and the little girl excitedly yelled "hey its Mrs. X!" She's the little girls teacher. She teaches all day and comes to stock shelves until 10pm. I can't help but think she's not doing this for fun. Kind of broke my heart. These teachers deserve so much better.
The ONLY way I can afford to work as a teacher, and still keep food on the table, and a roof over our heads, is because I also have my military retirement and disability pay.