It's not that I haven't been thinking about anything. I have.
Lots of things.
Budget cuts. State testing. Never-ending wind. Books I want to read. Family.
And I've wondered about things.
--Why would someone leave a smutty comment on my last post?
--Why are teachers responsible for getting the budget to balance?
--Why is it so easy to miscommunicate with those we love?
--Why won't the wind stop so I can ride my bike and blow these blahs away?
--Why don't we have curb side recycling?
--Why aren't I blogging about these things?
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5 comments:
And a smutty quote in an Asian dialect! Some things in the blogosphere are head scratchers. Dooz, you and I appear to be on the same trolley with stuff in the head and a writing blockage. Let's have a virtual meeting in a place with perfect weather. You ride, I'll walk. We'll meet up for lunch, talk until we're emptied and then do it again. This is a wonderful way to spend a day! I know these things. I do it for pleasure quite often.
Limes, I love being able to use google to translate just about any language. Usually the comments in Chinese are very friendly and sweet, but that one surprised me. Let's meet for lunch in a place where the wind isn't blowing. I've just about had my fill!
I'm going to post this comment here and on your blog, as well, because I wanted you to know how deeply I *GET* you. I understand that the pressures now are hard-driven by *REAL* budget constraints. (Remember, I'm going to come from the labor angle rather than the teacher angle, specifically. I don't care if it's nurses or factory workers, it's all the same to me.) Workers forced to open the contract and give back hard-won rights because the employer didn't live within its budget makes me ill. We know in a school setting, your work - the "product" you produce - will not be reduced commensurate with what you have to give back. The expectations of your labor output will not be modified. It is a tragedy. It is the stuff that makes laboe representatives beg of their members, "Work to the rule." Meaning arrive when you're supposed to, work your heart out, and go home when you're supposed to. Only when employers see that happen will they shift their dynamic and spend their money on what matters.
A longstanding heartbreaker to me (I never came to peace with it): The employees I represented were the classified employees - bus drivers, school secretaries, health clerks, food service workers, instructional assistants, maintenance workers. When the hard times came, I fought like a tigress for them, but I always knew the district (whichever one of them) would throw any five of mine out to save any one teacher. I had a lot of difficulty dealing with the fairness issues in that.
You're right, Limes. It isn't fair at all. My program is losing our half-time assistant who is so very good with the rough and tough kids. Her wage is a pittance and cutting her will be a drop in the bucket towards reducing the deficit. My preference would be to start cutting at the top--get rid of an extra administrator. Will that happen? When pigs fly. I wonder what it's going to take for our country to value and fund education again. The Russians beating us to outer space did it in the 60s!
@ Doozyanner ~ Aw, Dooz, I'm not surprised by this, but it pleases me that you value the classified staff who support you. And we MUST be twin sisters from other mothers, because you and I KNOW how to fix the education system, and why won't they just listen to us? :~{ I can only be grateful that my long exposure to school districts occurred in California, where I experienced both halcyon years and grim ones. At least California has some regard for the value of education. I couldn't do that job here in Nevada where we rank 49th in the quality of education we provide students. All the money in this state, all the fine new schools springing up at a shocking rate . . . but we just don't educate. You're very good on the WV! It is a piallah shi**.
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