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Post by coachks on Mar 26, 2023 7:15:58 GMT -6
19deltaWell said. I think a lot can be traced back to when we became concerned about graduation rates. Give the kids whatever they need to pass over a low bar, so that 10-15% who would be dropouts can now graduate. It detracts from the rest of the schools culture and hurts the experience of the rest of the students - but when funding and your evaluation is tied to this metric, it’s the only logical thing to focus on. The secondary focus being on ACT scores, which is largely tied to getting kids into 11th grade , it amplifies the problem. The easy way to look at it for us is if they evaluated us as coaches solely on the size of our roster. We could remove all barriers to kids - reduce physicality, never condition, don’t force lifting, never practice in the summer, let kids miss practice, play everybody- and try and get as many kids to dress on a Friday as possible. We would be a terrible football team, and eventually it would backfire (as you lose, kids will lose interest no matter how little the expectation). But if you only plan to do it for 1-2 seasons and parlay that success to a new job - you can game that metric and never deal with the real consequences. As to the push for IEPs/504. Some of this is a reflection of the above - some of these kids would not normally be in school. But more importantly, it’s a lot easier to have a kid in the 30th-80th percentile and rock a 2.7 GPA, but make a long winded post about how much he (and by extension the parent) had to overcome to achieve such levels of mediocracy.
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Post by wingtol on Mar 26, 2023 7:30:26 GMT -6
I think we are on the verge of special education laws being appeased by having all teachers take some mandatory training sessions to be certified in special education services instead of trying to train and incentivize hiring to get enough qualified candidates. Everyone will be worse off but it will look good on paper to lawmakers. It’s purely speculation but I just don’t see any other way for the compliance of laws for delivery accommodations will be met. When I first started teaching, I could count my SpEd students on one hand. And they were SpEd for something like dyslexia, which is a real thing. Now, I have dozens of kids with IEPs and 504 plans. And, by a large margin, they are mostly for behavior issues. Parents really push hard to get an IEP or 504 for their kid. I don't get it. I don't understand why a parent would want their kid labeled. When my youngest was in grade school, a teacher thought he was ADHD. Told my wife and I that he needed to be medicated and wanted him evaluated for SpEd. We said no. Our argument was that he needs to figure it out. We told her that if he was being a dope in the classroom and wasn't doing his work, she should contact us and we would handle it on our end. And you know what? He figured it out. He had an Associate's in Engineering before he graduated high school and is now about halfway through the US Navy nuke program down in South Carolina. I have to wonder if things would have been different if we had crippled him with an IEP. For a lot of parents, it's like some weird contest to have the most messed up kid. It used to be that the kids who were celebrated were the ones who had some special skill or ability. They were really smart. They were great at sports. They were good artists or musicians. But they had something special about them that they worked at and they excelled. Now, it seems that if you have a kid who is just average, that's not good enough for parents. They have to come up with something to make the kid "exceptional" even if it is something bad. We have kids in our school with ridiculous accommodations. They can take breaks whenever they want. They can leave class and go down to the gym to shoot hoops. They have an aid who writes for them. They get candy or prizes at the end of the day if they actually manage to trip over the hilariously low bar for their daily behavior goal. They are exempt from doing work or having consequences for misbehavior. Eligibility usually gets waived if they are out for sports. Those kids and their parents run the school and they know it. I used to take solace in the fact that the real world is going to come for those kids fast. And they are going to end up in some dead-end job or living with Mom and Dad because they can't function in the real world without all the propping up to which they have become accustomed. But, even that might be ending. And when these kids can't function in the adult world, it might end up being our fault anyway (LINK). Since I have moved the dark side and became an AP I can say SpEd has become an out of control monster that no one has any clue what to do with. My district is way stricter on discipline of SpEd students around even though we have the most, shall we say at risk population in our county. We had a huge problem with kid wandering the halls last year, which is a whole other post about policy and discipline etc that I'm not going into, we would try and clear them out or move them along and kids would say "I got an IEP what are you gonna do!" and sadly they were right. We joke that when being an a**hole becomes a "disability" it's over for education. And we are closer than people think... |
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Post by coachd5085 on Mar 26, 2023 7:58:16 GMT -6
My wife's school was so desperate for SpEd, they paid for her to get certified and gave her the job before she even enrolled in classes. She was the only applicant. I think we are on the verge of special education laws being appeased by having all teachers take some mandatory training sessions to be certified in special education services instead of trying to train and incentivize hiring to get enough qualified candidates. Everyone will be worse off but it will look good on paper to lawmakers. It’s purely speculation but I just don’t see any other way for the compliance of laws for delivery accommodations will be met. d@mn you. Delete this now before someone else reads it and thinks it is a good idea. Because that seems EXACTLY like what BOEs and state dept of educations would think is a good idea. Currently our state did something similar specifically focused on dyslexia. |
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Post by coachd5085 on Mar 26, 2023 8:20:09 GMT -6
When I first started teaching, I could count my SpEd students on one hand. And they were SpEd for something like dyslexia, which is a real thing. Now, I have dozens of kids with IEPs and 504 plans. And, by a large margin, they are mostly for behavior issues. Parents really push hard to get an IEP or 504 for their kid. I don't get it. I don't understand why a parent would want their kid labeled. When my youngest was in grade school, a teacher thought he was ADHD. Told my wife and I that he needed to be medicated and wanted him evaluated for SpEd. We said no. Our argument was that he needs to figure it out. We told her that if he was being a dope in the classroom and wasn't doing his work, she should contact us and we would handle it on our end. And you know what? He figured it out. He had an Associate's in Engineering before he graduated high school and is now about halfway through the US Navy nuke program down in South Carolina. I have to wonder if things would have been different if we had crippled him with an IEP. For a lot of parents, it's like some weird contest to have the most messed up kid. It used to be that the kids who were celebrated were the ones who had some special skill or ability. They were really smart. They were great at sports. They were good artists or musicians. But they had something special about them that they worked at and they excelled. Now, it seems that if you have a kid who is just average, that's not good enough for parents. They have to come up with something to make the kid "exceptional" even if it is something bad. We have kids in our school with ridiculous accommodations. They can take breaks whenever they want. They can leave class and go down to the gym to shoot hoops. They have an aid who writes for them. They get candy or prizes at the end of the day if they actually manage to trip over the hilariously low bar for their daily behavior goal. They are exempt from doing work or having consequences for misbehavior. Eligibility usually gets waived if they are out for sports. Those kids and their parents run the school and they know it. I used to take solace in the fact that the real world is going to come for those kids fast. And they are going to end up in some dead-end job or living with Mom and Dad because they can't function in the real world without all the propping up to which they have become accustomed. But, even that might be ending. And when these kids can't function in the adult world, it might end up being our fault anyway (LINK). Since I have moved the dark side and became an AP I can say SpEd has become an out of control monster that no one has any clue what to do with. My district is way stricter on discipline of SpEd students around even though we have the most, shall we say at risk population in our county. We had a huge problem with kid wandering the halls last year, which is a whole other post about policy and discipline etc that I'm not going into, we would try and clear them out or move them along and kids would say "I got an IEP what are you gonna do!" and sadly they were right. We joke that when being an a**hole becomes a "disability" it's over for education. And we are closer than people think... The issue is that school has becoming a "proving ground" instead of an "improving ground". The small but EXTREMELY POWERFUL lobby of special interest that is the Sped Lobby has latched on to major laws (ADA and IDEA) and that is that. Bringing this back to the topic, another reason that uniolns generally favor the salary scale structure is that they recognize that management is in an impossible position on things like this. UNLIKE the private sector though, the idea of labor taking a pay cut to shore up the company does not apply. So unions want to benefit the workers as best they can. There is a government watchdog group in my area that constantly points to our local system (55 schools) and constantly insinuates that management wastes $$$ by pointing out the system budget is roughly $500 million a year. What that watchdog never seems to mention (because it undermines their position) is that roughly 80% of that is already allocated to salaries and benefits. |
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Post by Defcord on Mar 26, 2023 8:45:02 GMT -6
I think we are on the verge of special education laws being appeased by having all teachers take some mandatory training sessions to be certified in special education services instead of trying to train and incentivize hiring to get enough qualified candidates. Everyone will be worse off but it will look good on paper to lawmakers. It’s purely speculation but I just don’t see any other way for the compliance of laws for delivery accommodations will be met. d@mn you. Delete this now before someone else reads it and thinks it is a good idea. Because that seems EXACTLY like what BOEs and state dept of educations would think is a good idea. Currently our state did something similar specifically focused on dyslexia. The university a buddy of mine went to made all education majors go co curricular and get certified in a content area and special education. They claimed it was to make them more whole in their pedagogical practices but really it was when it was hard to get a teaching job in some areas and certifications so they could report that their education majors were being hired at a higher rate. The only problem was that they were getting hired in jobs they didn’t want. Great way to set up your alumni… Once I had heard this, I figured at some point we are all going to be “certified” sped teachers. |
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Post by 19delta on Mar 26, 2023 14:42:24 GMT -6
d@mn you. Delete this now before someone else reads it and thinks it is a good idea. Because that seems EXACTLY like what BOEs and state dept of educations would think is a good idea. Currently our state did something similar specifically focused on dyslexia. The university a buddy of mine went to made all education majors go co curricular and get certified in a content area and special education. They claimed it was to make them more whole in their pedagogical practices but really it was when it was hard to get a teaching job in some areas and certifications so they could report that their education majors were being hired at a higher rate. The only problem was that they were getting hired in jobs they didn’t want. Great way to set up your alumni… Once I had heard this, I figured at some point we are all going to be “certified” sped teachers. About 15 years ago, I thought about getting certified in SpEd to make myself more marketable. Fortunately, I never did it. If I did, I would have been put in a SpEd classroom and would have never been allowed to leave.  |
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Post by larrymoe on Mar 26, 2023 16:52:21 GMT -6
We joke that when being an a**hole becomes a "disability" it's over for education. And we are closer than people think... It already is a disability- oppositional defiant. |
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Post by Defcord on Mar 26, 2023 18:39:04 GMT -6
When I first started teaching, I could count my SpEd students on one hand. And they were SpEd for something like dyslexia, which is a real thing. Now, I have dozens of kids with IEPs and 504 plans. And, by a large margin, they are mostly for behavior issues. Parents really push hard to get an IEP or 504 for their kid. I don't get it. I don't understand why a parent would want their kid labeled. When my youngest was in grade school, a teacher thought he was ADHD. Told my wife and I that he needed to be medicated and wanted him evaluated for SpEd. We said no. Our argument was that he needs to figure it out. We told her that if he was being a dope in the classroom and wasn't doing his work, she should contact us and we would handle it on our end. And you know what? He figured it out. He had an Associate's in Engineering before he graduated high school and is now about halfway through the US Navy nuke program down in South Carolina. I have to wonder if things would have been different if we had crippled him with an IEP. For a lot of parents, it's like some weird contest to have the most messed up kid. It used to be that the kids who were celebrated were the ones who had some special skill or ability. They were really smart. They were great at sports. They were good artists or musicians. But they had something special about them that they worked at and they excelled. Now, it seems that if you have a kid who is just average, that's not good enough for parents. They have to come up with something to make the kid "exceptional" even if it is something bad. We have kids in our school with ridiculous accommodations. They can take breaks whenever they want. They can leave class and go down to the gym to shoot hoops. They have an aid who writes for them. They get candy or prizes at the end of the day if they actually manage to trip over the hilariously low bar for their daily behavior goal. They are exempt from doing work or having consequences for misbehavior. Eligibility usually gets waived if they are out for sports. Those kids and their parents run the school and they know it. I used to take solace in the fact that the real world is going to come for those kids fast. And they are going to end up in some dead-end job or living with Mom and Dad because they can't function in the real world without all the propping up to which they have become accustomed. But, even that might be ending. And when these kids can't function in the adult world, it might end up being our fault anyway (LINK). Since I have moved the dark side and became an AP I can say SpEd has become an out of control monster that no one has any clue what to do with. My district is way stricter on discipline of SpEd students around even though we have the most, shall we say at risk population in our county. We had a huge problem with kid wandering the halls last year, which is a whole other post about policy and discipline etc that I'm not going into, we would try and clear them out or move them along and kids would say "I got an IEP what are you gonna do!" and sadly they were right. We joke that when being an a**hole becomes a "disability" it's over for education. And we are closer than people think... If being an assshole becomes a disability than our IEPs will double immediately from the adults that will have to get them. |
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Post by larrymoe on Mar 26, 2023 18:46:52 GMT -6
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Post by wingtol on Mar 27, 2023 5:00:26 GMT -6
 Sadly this is now non-fiction. |
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Post by wolverine55 on Mar 27, 2023 7:20:17 GMT -6
The university a buddy of mine went to made all education majors go co curricular and get certified in a content area and special education. They claimed it was to make them more whole in their pedagogical practices but really it was when it was hard to get a teaching job in some areas and certifications so they could report that their education majors were being hired at a higher rate. The only problem was that they were getting hired in jobs they didn’t want. Great way to set up your alumni… Once I had heard this, I figured at some point we are all going to be “certified” sped teachers. About 15 years ago, I thought about getting certified in SpEd to make myself more marketable. Fortunately, I never did it. If I did, I would have been put in a SpEd classroom and would have never been allowed to leave. I have an English/Language Arts certificate and am endorsed in Special Education. Due to this, the school has me teach some reading classes for lower achieving students and I have a small SPED roster of 5-7 students depending on the year. A few years ago, I was going to apply as an in-house candidate for a fulltime ELA opening in our district. Before I even applied the principal came and, in a professional way, told me to not bother. I asked him why and he said, "Because then we would have to find someone with the dual certification to replace you..." |
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Post by Defcord on Mar 27, 2023 9:56:44 GMT -6
About 15 years ago, I thought about getting certified in SpEd to make myself more marketable. Fortunately, I never did it. If I did, I would have been put in a SpEd classroom and would have never been allowed to leave. I have an English/Language Arts certificate and am endorsed in Special Education. Due to this, the school has me teach some reading classes for lower achieving students and I have a small SPED roster of 5-7 students depending on the year. A few years ago, I was going to apply as an in-house candidate for a fulltime ELA opening in our district. Before I even applied the principal came and, in a professional way, told me to not bother. I asked him why and he said, "Because then we would have to find someone with the dual certification to replace you..." That’s frustrating. In that situation you should get an automatic pay incentive to show their appreciation. I had a buddy in a similar situation and he told the principal, he was going to have to replace him one way or the other so they gave him dept chair or debate club or something to give him a little more money. |
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Post by coachcb on Mar 28, 2023 12:14:40 GMT -6
Our district is going through contract negotiations. The BOE and administration want us to give up the salary schedule for a different compensation system. To my knowledge, every time a school district has got rid of the salary schedule, the pressure to do that has always come from the BOE and the admin and not from the teachers. So, my questions is, why do BOEs and administrators generally oppose salary schedules while teacher unions support them?
Your admin and BOE must not want to retain the staff they have... Not a smart call given the massive teacher shortage the entire country is seeing. And, a merit-based system isn't going to be attractive to new teachers that understand it's pitfalls. Right now, I'd be fighting tooth and nail over a merit based system as I teach a section of pseudo-SpEd/remedial math. I'm not going to lose money because those 20 high schoolers can't do 5th grade math, much less pass the ACTs.
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Post by CanyonCoach on Mar 31, 2023 6:48:35 GMT -6
Our district was pushed hard towards a single lane pay scale with no incremental movement for experience. A nearby district went that direction and within 5 years had to go back due to teachers using the higher starting pay for the first few years and then leaving for greener pastures.
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Post by CanyonCoach on Mar 31, 2023 11:31:05 GMT -6
About 15 years ago, I thought about getting certified in SpEd to make myself more marketable. Fortunately, I never did it. If I did, I would have been put in a SpEd classroom and would have never been allowed to leave. I have an English/Language Arts certificate and am endorsed in Special Education. Due to this, the school has me teach some reading classes for lower achieving students and I have a small SPED roster of 5-7 students depending on the year. A few years ago, I was going to apply as an in-house candidate for a fulltime ELA opening in our district. Before I even applied the principal came and, in a professional way, told me to not bother. I asked him why and he said, "Because then we would have to find someone with the dual certification to replace you..." ELA spot opened up in district again. |
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Post by blb on Mar 31, 2023 11:37:45 GMT -6
I have an English/Language Arts certificate and am endorsed in Special Education. Due to this, the school has me teach some reading classes for lower achieving students and I have a small SPED roster of 5-7 students depending on the year. A few years ago, I was going to apply as an in-house candidate for a fulltime ELA opening in our district. Before I even applied the principal came and, in a professional way, told me to not bother. I asked him why and he said, "Because then we would have to find someone with the dual certification to replace you..." ELA spot opened up in district again. Administrators don't hire you to to help you. They hire you to help them. |
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Post by CanyonCoach on Apr 4, 2023 7:55:03 GMT -6
The university a buddy of mine went to made all education majors go co curricular and get certified in a content area and special education. They claimed it was to make them more whole in their pedagogical practices but really it was when it was hard to get a teaching job in some areas and certifications so they could report that their education majors were being hired at a higher rate. The only problem was that they were getting hired in jobs they didn’t want. Great way to set up your alumni… Once I had heard this, I figured at some point we are all going to be “certified” sped teachers. About 15 years ago, I thought about getting certified in SpEd to make myself more marketable. Fortunately, I never did it. If I did, I would have been put in a SpEd classroom and would have never been allowed to leave. I teach Social Sciences (US History, World History, Psychology and International Relations). However, the only openings were in special education and because of my spastic college credits (athletic training, social work, nursing, juvenile justice) I was only 12 credits from getting a master's in special education in the area of ED. My first 4 jobs, I was the only applicant. One of them I became a director of Special ED., When our district had a cohort group all retire together in social studies (4 positions) I was able to move into a classroom. After 7 years in special ed, I have spent the last 16 in regular ed. I had some crazy assignments in special education: 1/2 LD, 1/2 ED and 1/2 alternative program all in the same year- no extra pay. Moved between 3 location one year. Had all corrections kids with no support staff for a semester (felt like I should have been coaching wrestling). Had a semester that I had a half day of 1 on 1 with a behavior kid, he smelled so bad that I started putting Vick's vapor rub up my nose before our afternoon started. GOOD Times. |
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Post by 19delta on Apr 4, 2023 8:12:08 GMT -6
About 15 years ago, I thought about getting certified in SpEd to make myself more marketable. Fortunately, I never did it. If I did, I would have been put in a SpEd classroom and would have never been allowed to leave. I teach Social Sciences (US History, World History, Psychology and International Relations). However, the only openings were in special education and because of my spastic college credits (athletic training, social work, nursing, juvenile justice) I was only 12 credits from getting a master's in special education in the area of ED. My first 4 jobs, I was the only applicant. One of them I became a director of Special ED., When our district had a cohort group all retire together in social studies (4 positions) I was able to move into a classroom. After 7 years in special ed, I have spent the last 16 in regular ed. I had some crazy assignments in special education: 1/2 LD, 1/2 ED and 1/2 alternative program all in the same year- no extra pay. Moved between 3 location one year. Had all corrections kids with no support staff for a semester (felt like I should have been coaching wrestling). Had a semester that I had a half day of 1 on 1 with a behavior kid, he smelled so bad that I started putting Vick's vapor rub up my nose before our afternoon started. GOOD Times. Oof. That’s rough. There is no other smell that can compare to stinky kid. I’m a driver ed teacher. I had a kid once whose smell was a combination of fast food fryer grease, BO, and dirty laundry. Every time he had a driving lesson, I had to leave the window open and then Febreeze the heck out of the car when we got back. |
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Post by 44special on Apr 15, 2023 8:36:35 GMT -6
been out of coaching/teaching for 10 years, but after 34 years of it, i would be pretty skeptical of the change.
maybe i'm kind of cynical, but in my experience, those in charge rarely have your best interests at heart.
just my 2 cents, which apparently is no longer worth 2 cents.
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Post by larrymoe on Apr 16, 2023 19:26:55 GMT -6
been out of coaching/teaching for 10 years, but after 34 years of it, i would be pretty skeptical of the change. maybe i'm kind of cynical, but in my experience, those in charge rarely have your best interests at heart. just my 2 cents, which apparently is no longer worth 2 cents. Agreed. Also, in my experience, your union doesn't have your best interests at heart either. They're their for themselves and their buddies. |
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Post by 44special on Apr 17, 2023 6:49:54 GMT -6
there is no union in texas.
but i'm sure you're right.
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Post by larrymoe on Apr 17, 2023 6:51:02 GMT -6
there is no union in texas. but i'm sure you're right. It's been that way with every union I've ever been involved with. And there's been 3. |
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Post by coachdmyers on Apr 17, 2023 13:16:58 GMT -6
there is no union in texas. but i'm sure you're right. It's been that way with every union I've ever been involved with. And there's been 3. Maybe, but unions demonstrably = higher pay than no unions. |
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Post by fantom on Apr 17, 2023 20:00:01 GMT -6
It's been that way with every union I've ever been involved with. And there's been 3. Maybe, but unions demonstrably = higher pay than no unions. Not to mention benefits. |
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Post by freezeoption on Apr 17, 2023 20:52:43 GMT -6
Once had a girl in class that smelled so bad I had to close my mouth and nose by her. She also has a nasty mouth. I would have her sit by me so she couldn't say crap but I would get up and move so I didn't have to smell her. We went on a field trip and I told everyone we were leaving at 730 sharp. The time on my watch said 730. So I told bus driver to leave. She pulls into parking lot and gets out of her car and chases us on foot out of parking lot. I told bus driver to keep going. I didn't want her nasty mouth and smell on the bus. Now,I caught he'll for it when I got back to school. Superintendent and principal were waiting for me. I somehow explained myself out of that one. That was a f up school district.
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Post by larrymoe on Apr 18, 2023 6:35:21 GMT -6
It's been that way with every union I've ever been involved with. And there's been 3. Maybe, but unions demonstrably = higher pay than no unions. Yes you get paid more, but you also pay a heck of a lot more in taxes in union states. In the end, it isn't as much more as you probably think. Imo- unions are just ways for politicians to divert tax money into their campaigns. Especially in public service unions like the one I'm in now. |
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Post by larrymoe on Apr 18, 2023 6:40:19 GMT -6
Maybe, but unions demonstrably = higher pay than no unions. Not to mention benefits. Our retirement system in Illinois is severely in trouble. They've already drastically raised retirement ages and benefits for newer workers. Teacher's insurance is absolutely horrible and expensive too. A few districts in my area have even weaseled out of paying anything into the retirement fund. They give employees a "raise" on the amount their making, like $4k but stop paying into retirement. Teachers walk around all happy because they screwed the man until they find out they're personally on the hook for the $5k contribution into their retirement. And unions keep on agreeing to it. |
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Post by coachdmyers on Apr 18, 2023 8:41:09 GMT -6
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Post by larrymoe on Apr 18, 2023 16:43:13 GMT -6
Are the highest taxed states not big union, left leaning states- New York, Massachusetts, California, Illinois, etc? |
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Post by coachdmyers on Apr 19, 2023 10:01:28 GMT -6
Are the highest taxed states not big union, left leaning states- New York, Massachusetts, California, Illinois, etc? So maybe I misunderstood, but the way I read what you were saying is that the higher tax rates more than negate the higher pay. So you're better off in one of the lower tax states. Is that correct or did I misunderstand what you were saying? |
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