A teacher's rant

How is this possible in public education?

As of April 24, 2024, the average salary of a public school teacher here in TX is $56,857 (according to salary.com). School boards are publicly elected and they appoint the Superintendents as well as approve their salaries. The Cy-Fair ISD budget has been in a deficit since 2019 and yet here they were paying their top man over half a MILLION per year. Oh by the way, he worked 2 years then decided to retire so they just picked up a new one...

Insane.

Several of the districts mentioned in the article are N of Houston. I worked at one of them in one of the poorest campuses and we got very little recognition, let alone acknowledgement from the District. My first week there (was also my first week as a teacher) we were on lockdown due to an active shooter in the vicinity. Our socioeconomic population was in the 70% range (kids eating free or reduced lunch). I don't think I ever saw the Superintendent step one foot in the building.

It was named a Blue Ribbon school last year. You can bet the Super was there for that PR opportunity.

I didn't become a teacher to live the life of luxury, but when the leader of your district is pulling in $300-500k and the bulk of your professional staff is making $50k then says no raises are coming because the state or federal gov't won't pay up, it's gonna pique my curiosity.


/rant

Article here.

 

That's a really large gap. Sups in California public schools are sitting at upper 200s to mid 300s, but teacher salaries top out well over 100k. My wife teaches in a district where teachers top out at $141k and she deserves every penny. She puts up with a lot of entitled crappy kids and parents. Don't get me wrong, there are parents that care and discipline their kids, but many don't and let their kids do whatever they want. Parents are responsible for raising their kids, not the teachers. Even that is enough to want to make her quit despite her salary.

 

Teaching these days turned out to be a babysitting position and it hampers the ones that really want to get smart,,,er. It’s a dang shame what some parents are doing with or not doing with their children. Anyone can make a child!
I like the ones that sit there and lie to ya with a straight face that their child can do no wrong!

 

I believe they have really powerful, active unions for teachers there so that definitely helps. We have unions too but they're basically "associations".

 

Sounds like you should aim for Superintendent.

 

I love the stadiums they build for these football games in high school!! These huge schools have massive stadiums for high school football! It boggles the mind!

 

Oh and by the way God bless the good teachers we still have! Thank you for what y’all do and have to put up with!

 

I want to teach kids not pander to some board of assholes.

 

Same in my town in MA. Teachers get paid very well. You can tell that by looking at the housing prices sky rocketed in recent years ahead of schedule and smart people moving in en masse.

Oh, I discipline my kids. I'm essentially growing up adults, not kids.

 

I hate bureaucracy more than the next guy but there’s no changing it without getting seriously into the fray. It’d be different if those supers offered some great value to the system but as far as I can tell they generally stifle reason.

 

They do. It's good and bad. They're great at fighting for teacher pay, but that seems to be about it. So my wife chose not to be a part of the larger union in her district and opted to be a part of the smaller one that isn't so politically involved.

 

I don't know about your union, but being in a right-to-work state, they don't have the strength they have in other parts of the country..

 

It cost $60 million in 2012..
I'm sure there are bigger, and probably not better, stadiums now..

Eagle Stadium (Allen, Texas) - Wikipedia

 

That's a high school stadium???

 

Yes, in Allen, Texas.
We used to go there for the kid's band competitions.
The Allen band was so big they took up the entire field..

 

Yup, hence their "association" titles. I sometimes wonder why I pay annual dues.

 

I think we've discussed unions.
I'm only a Teamster on a national level.
My local is worthless..

 

For teachers, we look at them as allies should we get an overbearing administrator or unruly parent. Supposedly, they are also sources of legal aid.

 

I see what happens in my local ISD, God Bless you for even being a teacher..
For many the skill of parenting no longer exists...

 

If the public truly knew what elementary kids are capable of, society would be afraid of what the future holds.

 

HA!

You should see the vehicles some of these kids drive at these bigger high schools.?

 

@WBW drive's a shool bus in AZ.
One of their drivers was attacked by a parent(?) a couple of weeks ago.

 

The kids act the way they do for a reason.....it's definitely learned.

 

This is certainly true. Most of the time I can handle the little discipline issues within my bus without getting school administrators involved. I do have to watch my junior high (7th and 8th grades) pretty closely and immediately address issues. Parents can suck. Video cameras on the buses are the driver's friend and insurance against false allegations.

Mrs. WBW also drives a school bus with me and last week had a boy becoming unruly on the bus. She referred him in writing to the principal. The boy was suspended from the bus for a week. The boy's mom called s meeting with our superintendent and threw the race card. Video was watched. Allegations squashed.

My elementary kids are really incredibly nice. I have 2nd and 4th grade boys on board last year and this year who's mom rode my bus from the same school. She is now the PE teacher at that school.

I love my job.

 

Come work for us! Never heard someone say they love driving the bus!

Elementary is all I know. I have seen 3rd graders throw desks, chairs, and punch teachers. In the face. Closed fist. I've been spit at, cussed at, kicked, and scratched. We have runners who will bolt out doors, vault over fencing and run for the highway. We have had 1st graders destroy a classroom. Destroyed. All the teachers personal stuff tore up, broken, smashed. Laptops and PC monitors smashed. Drywall kicked in. Pee on the floor in protest of punishment. Doors slammed so hard repeatedly that walls shook.

We had one kid, who is now in a state school, crouch at a corner in the wall and wait for a specific aide to walk by. When she did, he jumped her, knocked her to the ground, got on top of her and close fist hit her like he was in the Octagon.

 

Unfortunately in large organizations it’s the HR staff and middle managers that advise the decision makers on salaries and budget, and they are relatively untouchable with no incentive to change the status quo.

 

Katy has one too. They wanted to spend something like $90million and got shot down by the vote. So they proposed a revised $70million offer but got smart and packaged it with $15 or so million for classroom expansion (which was badly needed) and basically forced voters to approve it by refusing to split the stadium proposal from the new classrooms. Basically bent the community over a barrel and said "if WE don't get our golden football stadium, YOU do not get classrooms for your kids!" Oh yeah, then they conveniently needed another $10 million or so for road improvements around the new stadium which they "forgot" to include in the stadium proposal.

Slimy bastards. Colleges and NFL should pay for these extragavant training facilities to support their feeder system. I know I'm likely to get run out of Texas for saying this, but football ain't that damn important. Kids can play in a field with wooden bleachers and those with talent will still stand out.

It's ridiculous that a school system runs out of money every year when they "only" get $5k of taxes from every average priced home, every year, but the city can run the entire infrastructure (streets, courts, police, fire, water, etc) for less than $1k per home. Wouldn't be so bad, except I went to the bank today to withdraw some cash... younger guy working had to plug in a machine that counted the bills to make sure he got the right amount. No counting it out to me. Computer screen said he should have 20 5's, he put them in the counter and it shuffled the bills and said 20. Computer said he should have 20 10's, put them in the counter and it said 20. Did the same with the 20's. And this f**ker is in a BANK handling MONEY and doesn't know how the F to count it!! Where is all the money I'm spending on "education" going? I WANT A REFUND!

OK, old man rant over. I'm done yelling at the clouds.

 

I don't work in a bank but it doesn't mean they can't count. It means someone can't argue they were not given the right amount and keeps a teller from pocketing money. It's more of a accountability/ liability deal.

 

Don't get me started on the ample funding for athletics vs academics............................

 

Maybe. This is the regular branch I use and they've always counted back to me the "old" way. This guy had the machine wheeled out on a chair and had to plug it in with an extension cord. It was not a permanent/professional set up. This is what makes me think this particular person at least doesn't know how to count back change.