Comments on: IP$ $alary $chedule

By: Local Teacher

Local Teacher — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 02:06:00 +0000

I don’t usually respond, but I would like to comment on our anti-teacher attitude.

Please don’t fool yourself that teacher’s do not put in the hours. My school year starts long before the doors open so I can write lesson plans, examine text books, and find unique resources that will inspire and engage a wide variety of learners. My school hours are from 8 to 3:30, but I am not allowed to leave until 4 (and rarely leave before 5:30). During those hours I conduct no less than 6 hours of meetings where I am the lead presenter. For each of these meeting, I must prepare notes, slides, and other interactive media which usually require at least 1 to 2 hours per meeting hour. In addition to leading these meetings, I am responsible for attending additional team meetings and ensuring the health and well being of each of my students.

When I have finished conducting my meetings, being sure to engage a variety of audience members with different needs and learning styles, I must then evaluate the audience member to determine my own effectiveness. This can be done in a variety of ways, but usually results in me taking work home. I spend, on average, 3-6 hours a night and at least one full weekend day evaluating student performance and developing a plan to ensure EVERY student (even those with extreme learning challenges) learns to the best of his or her potential.

I know that you, a non-teacher, may not realize this, but the teacher’s day does not end when the bell rings. In addition the the regular teaching hours, teachers are EXPECTED to DONATE their personal time to after school clubs and enrichment activities. One such club takes me out of state to tournaments for two weekends a year at my own expense and requires 2-4 hours of supervision time every weekday for 6 weeks and 6-8 hours every weekend. Did I mention that I do not get paid extra for this extra work? This extra work is just expected by the students, parents and administration.

All in all, my hours spent working far exceed 10 hours a day for 182 days and often result in comments from my industry employees peers to relax and slow down.

And, oh yeah, I have a master’s degree in science and choose to teach because I feel it is an important civil service. I have 6 years of experience as a teacher. I made $33,000 last year. Can you raise a child on $33,000?

By: mike3524

mike3524 — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 20:07:00 +0000

Re: IPS Budget;Where's Mayor Ballard on this? Thought we had a Unilateral Mayor?
All I ever hear about is, his Vagabonding around Town bolstering the Police and Golly Gee we need more Walking Zones.Farmers dont give a crap about walking thru Parks unless theres Fishing.

By: oscar

oscar — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 13:15:54 +0000

i do agree with you on the need for school police presence in the schools. I also agree with you on the man lieutenant doing it all

By: just sayin'

just sayin' — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 20:00:54 +0000

They can do this in 3 months because they can use methods that the teachers or the parents of the children are prohibited from using. Put those methods in the schools so that the teachers have backing and the students have consequence. Hold the children and parents as accountable for their educations as you do the teachers and see the difference.

By: just sayin'

just sayin' — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 14:00:54 +0000

By: kiramatalishah

kiramatalishah — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 09:08:54 +0000

1. There's a movement to radically change California government, by getting rid of career politicians and chopping their salaries in half. A group known as Citizens for California Reform wants to make the California legislature a part time time job, just like it was until 1966.

By: mary

mary — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 11:41:49 +0000

correction – no qualified people of color

By: Mary

Mary — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 00:48:00 +0000

Perhaps you should ask Dr. White about his response to Commissioner Bentley’s question last night. (Board meeting, section 9, Personnel) The hiring of the new CITO. (elementary principal/bright) He stated, “there were no qualified african american candidates”. He needs to publicly apologize! How many administrators did he totally disrespect district wide, and nation wide. AND should the community react…of course!

Remember he just hosted NABSE.

By: ABCteach

ABCteach — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 01:46:11 +0000

Just one comment about teachers not spending more time on work than other professions. I don't know many of my friends who spend 10-12 hours daily at their job, then bring home work not completed at their place of employment, and then going to their school to work 6-8 hours on Saturday. (Sometimes even going in on Sunday to complete things that couldn't be done on Saturday!)

By: Taxpayer 834512

Taxpayer 834512 — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 16:06:32 +0000

I'm coming to this party very, very late, but very glad it's taking place. Thanks for the work on this one, Abdul. I dearly hope you'll undertake something similar for Washington Township. If three of these got done, Land 'O Goshen, we could even have somewhat of a comparison.
.
This and Welsh's work on Wishard are exhibits A & B for proving if you want both sides of a story, you usually need to look beyond the Indianapolis Star to find it. Thanks again