"Apologies to Our Nation's Teachers"...Plus other kind thoughts for teachers and unions.

madfloridian

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Wed Mar-23-11 05:33 PM
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"Apologies to Our Nation's Teachers"...Plus other kind thoughts for teachers and unions.

The last couple of days many bloggers took time to write positive things about teachers and unions. It was nice because there is not much of that going around right now.

A DUer shared this column from Buzzflash with me, and it deserves to be noticed. Someone is paying attention to what has happened to teachers in this country lately, and they realize they may have unwittingly contributed to it.

Apologies to Our Nation's Teachers

First they came for your integrity. They did it subtly and over time as they obfuscated our textbooks to reflect a narrow ideology rather than the whole truth.

Next they attacked the integrity of your profession. They did it by devising embarrassingly shallow and mandatory testing in order to hold you accountable for outcomes over which you have minimal control, all the while ignoring the many inadequacies of the society that contribute to student stress.

I wish I could post more of this article, but I needed to save it for the end of the op ed. It is powerfully said.

Then, finally, they seek to destroy all that our founders advocated by eliminating public education altogether. They do it by trumpeting the ill-conceived merits of privatization while ignoring the absence any record of its greater success or efficiency.

So I apologize for those of us who have not fought hard enough along side all of you as you struggle to mentor and inspire our children and grandchildren. Please forgive us for our inattentiveness and neglect. You deserve our utmost admiration and respect.

You see, they have done much of this to those of us in the private sector. And too many of us, duped by their stooges and know-nothings, have lashed out at you because we envy what you still have that we have lost. Arguably you are the last bastion against the corporate tyranny and selfish elitism that threatens our nation.

Very kind words. I thank him. Here is more about the man who wrote this.

Robert Barkley, Jr., is a counselor in Systemic Education Reform, retired Executive Director of the Ohio Education Association, served as Interim Executive Director of the Maine Education Association, is a thirty-five year veteran of NEA and NEA affiliate staff work, long-term consultant to the KnowledgeWorks Foundation of Cincinnati, Ohio, one time teacher, coach, and local union president. He is the author of Quality in Education: A Primer for Collaborative Visionary Educational Leaders and Leadership In Education: A Handbook for School Superintendents and Teacher Union Presidents.

Here are two more bloggers who had some good things to say about their profession, and yes it is a "profession."

From Accountable Talk:

Why I Support Unions

My father was a dock worker. He spent about ten years loading and unloading ships. It was punishing work for paltry pay. Then one day, a minor miracle happened. He landed a job with a utility company--a unionized job. Despite the fact that he never finished high school himself, my father was able, thanks to the decent pay and benefits his union job offered him, to raise our family. He didn't make that much, but it was enough to pay the rent and for him to retire with dignity once his health began to deteriorate. He spent only two months in retirement before he passed away. Nevertheless, my mother received his pension benefits and was able to keep the house together. I was even able to go to college and become a teacher, all because my dad was treated like a human being as a result of his union membership and benefits.

That's what unions are about. No one gets rich in them, but everyone who puts in a good day's work can rest assured that he or she will be entitled to a little piece of the American Dream. Union members work with dignity in the knowledge that they won't be assigned to the garbage heap should they be injured on the job or fired by the capricious whims of a vengeful, racist, or sexist boss. Unions allow regular people to build their lives without fear of those lives being destroyed for no good reason.

This country was built on the middle class, and the middle class was built on unions. While the millionaires and billionaires pride themselves as the masters of this country, it is the union workers who built it, protect it, and serve it.

There are those who would like to deny us the most basic of rights: to organize so that we can speak with one voice in the halls of power and wealth. The powers that be would love to strip us of that right because it would allow them to reduce this country to two classes: the uber-rich and the voiceless, working poor. Not content to have the vast lion's share of this country's wealth, these million and billionaires would love to get even richer by dismantling the pension and health benefits that workers have negotiated for over the last century. They'd like nothing better than to privatize every public institution--especially schools--so that they can get their paws on public money. Unions are all that stand in their way.

I told someone recently that hubby and I were probably of the last generation to have pensions and good retirement. I am more and more starting to believe that. We are two lucky people. We planned for our retirement, but we could not have done so without our unions.

There is also a very nice piece at the NYC Educator blog.

Why Teachers Like Me Support Unions

As well, due process is a crucial right for which teachers' unions have fought. At one time, teachers, like many people in this country today, could be fired at any time, for any reason. Teaching sometimes requires trying new things, which then sometimes involves needing to try again; and, teaching is a job into which the people who do it invest enormous amounts of personal effort and energy. Knowing that the job at which I work hard to excel won't be pulled out from under me without warning is very valuable to me.

For teachers whose unofficial work days run ten or twelve hours on a regular basis, the idea that just because our official work days run out at seven hours, we're slacking, is laughable to us. Teaching is an emotionally and physically stressful occupation. Rules that say we're entitled to a lunch break and a limit on our official contact-with-kids hours help teachers to manage their time and stress, making the teacher who comes to your kid in the morning fresh, attentive, and energetic. It's important to note that, even with some union protection, teachers in the U.S. spend far more of their time with your kids than teachers in most other countries, who spend more time engaged in common planning. That can be tough. Unions demand that teacher time be at least somewhat balanced.

Teachers who feel secure in the jobs, who don't fear arbitrary firing because of political or other beliefs, and whose time is respected are better teachers. Kids can feel confidence and comfort from adults, and they respond to it in kind. That makes for a better experience in school and a better education for kids. So as someone who, yes, loves children, I continue to support unions for myself and for all teachers who hope to make teaching their lifelong careers.

I believe Diane Ravitch, former assistant Education Secretary for George HW Bush, would agree with Mr. Barkley above. Teachers and public workers are one of the last segments of society to have unions that work for them. Too many find that intolerable.

I quote Ravitch:

Quoteworthy

"As for pension and health-care envy, it is a sad thing when working Americans complain that someone else has benefits, instead of agreeing that everyone should have coverage for their health and old age. It reminds me of an old Soviet joke where a peasant says, "My neighbor has a cow and I have none, I want his cow to die." We should not join in this race to the bottom."

-Diane Ravitch

I was proud to be a teacher, a union teacher, for over 30 years. I am more and more talking to teachers I once taught with. Many of them are still teaching. They are having to hold their heads high in spite of the way they have been targeted for the last two years. It is not easy. Those who feel the pain too deeply are having to get out of the field if they can. Those who can't are for the first time being made to feel like failures....when in reality most of them are heroes to their students.

This is a sad time in history.