There has been a great many articles in Newsday and the NY Times on the Governor’s budget, the slashing of funding to education and the possibility of thousands of school employees losing jobs after June 2011. Politicians and frustrated taxpayers seemingly have become more focused on costs, and less focused on the principles and government funded services that built our great nation. I have a difficult time understanding how laying off thousands of teachers, administrators, and custodians, etc, will help our economy, but it seems to be the result of a strategy to balance NYS’s budget while not raising taxes. There is a lot to be frustrated about; spending is outpacing inflation, there has been an ever brightening spotlight on accountability in the classroom and public union contracts with provisions that are protected by legislative statutes and regulations. These provisions and laws are anachronisms from a time when abuses of management called for certain protections for educators. There is a great need for reform in public education and we have the technology to collect and analyze data that can be used to raise the level of accountability in the classroom. I think all industries and employees have seen the affects of increased technology and the raising of the bar on accountability in the work place. The days of abuses to public school employees are long gone, but would they return if reform repealed these legislated, contractual protections? I have to imagine this is the fear of our public union employees.
On the other side of the politicians and frustrated taxpayers are the employees of public schools, many of them who come to work every day, year after year and never think of himself or herself as a public union employee. They think of themselves as teachers, or administrators of a public school system. Most of them do their jobs with great dedication and an abundance of enthusiasm for their mission – educating the children in their classrooms.
School employees are also taxpayers, have obligations to their families, and feel the same financial difficulties of rising taxes, college tuition, gas, and utilities – just like everyone else. Moreover, the fact that they may have a job, even if you do not, should not be held against them. There has also been a great focus on a retirement system that is breaking the back of the taxpayer, another anachronism that needs further reform. Nevertheless, all the money that the taxpayer is putting into the futures of school employees does not pay their mortgage, or their taxes, utilities, or their grocery bill next month. While the money is significant and meaningful, I can understand how it may be difficult to feel the value of something that is perhaps a couple of decades into your future, especially when your bills are mounting today.
I have to imagine it is tough to be a teacher these days. Teachers and administrators have a critical job that affects the future of our children, their community, and the nation that our children will lead in the new age, global economy. It cannot be easy to see animosity building against an honorable profession that means so much to so many. The screams for shared sacrifice may be economically driven and the need of certain reforms are certainly necessary to raise the level of performance to best enable a competitive education for our children, but if you are a teacher, it must sound and feel like someone saying “I do not care about you and you are doing a lousy job with our kids.” Now, I do not know about you, but if someone said that to me, I do not think I would jump up and say I am willing to do my part for the cause. I would probably say something to the contrary and throw in a few expletives along the way.
Personally, I am growing tired of the extremist. For the people who would willingly decimate our public education services and sees little value in a competitive education for children, especially someone else’s children in order to lower taxes, shame on you. And, to those die hard union advocates that preach education, but will allow public education to implode because they are unwilling to embrace the changes that will align their profession to the global economic landscape and higher levels of accountability to children, not to mention sacrificing brilliant young educators, their colleagues, that will be losing their jobs - shame on you too!
On the other side of the politicians and frustrated taxpayers are the employees of public schools, many of them who come to work every day, year after year and never think of himself or herself as a public union employee. They think of themselves as teachers, or administrators of a public school system. Most of them do their jobs with great dedication and an abundance of enthusiasm for their mission – educating the children in their classrooms.
School employees are also taxpayers, have obligations to their families, and feel the same financial difficulties of rising taxes, college tuition, gas, and utilities – just like everyone else. Moreover, the fact that they may have a job, even if you do not, should not be held against them. There has also been a great focus on a retirement system that is breaking the back of the taxpayer, another anachronism that needs further reform. Nevertheless, all the money that the taxpayer is putting into the futures of school employees does not pay their mortgage, or their taxes, utilities, or their grocery bill next month. While the money is significant and meaningful, I can understand how it may be difficult to feel the value of something that is perhaps a couple of decades into your future, especially when your bills are mounting today.
I have to imagine it is tough to be a teacher these days. Teachers and administrators have a critical job that affects the future of our children, their community, and the nation that our children will lead in the new age, global economy. It cannot be easy to see animosity building against an honorable profession that means so much to so many. The screams for shared sacrifice may be economically driven and the need of certain reforms are certainly necessary to raise the level of performance to best enable a competitive education for our children, but if you are a teacher, it must sound and feel like someone saying “I do not care about you and you are doing a lousy job with our kids.” Now, I do not know about you, but if someone said that to me, I do not think I would jump up and say I am willing to do my part for the cause. I would probably say something to the contrary and throw in a few expletives along the way.
Personally, I am growing tired of the extremist. For the people who would willingly decimate our public education services and sees little value in a competitive education for children, especially someone else’s children in order to lower taxes, shame on you. And, to those die hard union advocates that preach education, but will allow public education to implode because they are unwilling to embrace the changes that will align their profession to the global economic landscape and higher levels of accountability to children, not to mention sacrificing brilliant young educators, their colleagues, that will be losing their jobs - shame on you too!
