Protecting Our Most Important Asset:
Teachers
By Jill Jenkins
A few years ago as
the department chairman of the Language Arts Department, it was my enviable job
to inform my English teachers that even though our school had nearly the
highest test scores in the state that all of their hard work developing
curriculum maps, lesson plans and teaching assignment all had to be scrapped
because the district was adopting a version of the Gates Language Arts
Units. The teachers were enraged, but
eventually acquiesced to the district demands despite the fact that the
district offered no money to purchase material or any compensation for the
teachers’ time to develop new lesson plans and new teaching materials. The price of this change was the loss of
several great teachers who chose to move to new careers.
In my 39 year
career as a teacher, I saw this kind of change occur countless times. Instead of analyzing what is working in
schools and having educators share their successes, political powers outside
the world of education decide the best reforms and teachers either acquiesce or
leave the profession. Still, the public
who demonize educators are surprised at teacher shortages. Those who enter the ranks of education are
optimists who want to change through education.
Education is not a lucrative career. No one enters the profession
expecting to get rich. No one stays in
the profession without knowing the sacrifices including personal time, lack of
respect and even the right to visit the restroom when nature calls. No one stays in education without expecting
to be vilified by some parents or the media without loving students and
believing teaching can make a difference. How can we ensure the quality of our
schools when we are losing our greatest asset: our teachers? Three methods of improving teacher retention
are: first, increase financial compensation including salary, benefits and
retirement pensions without increasing undue burdens; second, allow teachers academic
freedom to collaboratively create meaningful projects that include oral
communication, reading, writing, technology, team work and mathematics; third,
fairly evaluate teachers and schools and provide access to resources to
improve.
According to the
book, Addicted to Reform: A 12 Step
Program to Rescue Public Education by John Merrow, the average cost of
testing is 69 million dollars per state and according to Education
Weeks’ article from March 2018 article entitled “Standardized Tests Costs
1.7 Billion Dollars A Year Study Shows” a 2012 study shows a much higher expenditure
of 1.7 billion dollars. If the cost of
test preparation materials is added, one can see how frustrated teachers are on
the low pay allocated to them. Benefits
and salaries have been stagnant for decades and retirement plans and benefits
have been eroding. According to ABC
News, a teacher was removed from school board meetings for pointing out the
injustice of increasing the salary of the superintendent while teachers’
salaries remain unchanged for more than a decade in
Louisiana. Furthermore, salary increases always come
connected to added expectations. For
example in Utah when “career ladder” was eliminated the pay connected to the
program disappeared, but the added responsibilities did not. Many districts add pay to teachers by having
teachers work nine hours a day giving up their consultation period by teaching
seven periods a day. This saves the
district money for benefits and FICA.
It, also, increases teacher burn-out because these teachers now correct
papers for over 200 students lugging home piles of papers to correct every
night. Teaching requires 100% of the
teacher’s focus all of the time. Without
time to plan and reflect on teaching, the job can become stressful and
overwhelming. At the end of my career, a former student stopped by to tell me that I had inspired her to become a teacher, but after one year she felt so overwhelmed by the additional requirements, that she quit teaching, went to law school. She is now an attorney earning substantially more income and according to her with less stress and work. This is not a new problem,
when I began my career in the 1970’s I was teaching in an urban high
school. I taught English classes and run
both the debate and drama programs. I
was often rehearsing plays until nine or ten at night and spent the weekend
with the debate team at tournaments. My
frustration levels sometimes became so extreme that when I was driving to my
apartment with piles of uncorrected essays, I would imagine driving off the
road. When the vice principal asked me
to sponsor the yearbook as well, I began looking for a new teaching job. Furthermore, teachers are often lured by promises of new programs. For example, in Utah the legislature decided to invest in training two teachers in each schools to become reading specialists who would in turn train their respective faculties to teach reading across the curricular. For three years, one of my colleagues and I drove forty miles every Wednesday to spend three hours on Wednesday evening after teaching all day for training. We were compensated with a small grant months after we finished each year's training. As we finished our final year, the legislature dropped the program. Reading specialists were no longer needed. The state had wasted our time and energy and all of the funds used for all of the teachers training and the students never received any benefit. Not only underpaying teachers is destructive,
but so is over working them. Fair
compensation for reasonable expectation added to good benefit and a substantial
retirement plan would help retain more quality teachers.
Teaching used to
be a creative, collaborative activity where teachers worked together to design
interesting lessons and tests encouraging learning while engaging students in
fascinating activities. It isn’t
anymore. District no longer trust
educators as professionals, so they purchase on-line repetitive drills and
require frequent district and state tests. Before I retired, I spent one week giving state “SAGE” tests and three
weeks of test preparation. That is an
entire month that could have been used to teach an additional novel, more essay
writing and an entire unit on poetry, web design or anything else. A month of learning is lost because of
testing. The math department lost even
more time because they had more required district tests. Teachers are frustrated with the lack of
academic freedom. Teachers need to be
able to collaborate to create cross curriculum projects that engage students in
creative expression and critical thinking involving oral communication,
reading, writing, technology and math skills.
Students would learn more and they would be more engaged reducing
behavioral problems. Teachers would find
their jobs more stimulating and rewarding, reducing burn-out and increasing
teacher retention.
Finally using
student test scores to evaluate and compensate teachers is unfair. Teachers have no control over who is in their
classes. ESL students, students with
behavioral or learning disabilities and special needs students are more
difficult to teach and earn lower test scores.
Working in an urban school with many social economic and criminal
problems is a more difficult than teaching in affluent, suburban school. Teachers who accept more difficult teaching
positions should not be penalized for their students’ test scores. Improvements
of test scores should be part of the schools evaluations, not the teacher’s. Methods of teaching and students’ engagement
should be evaluated by frequent unannounced observation by administrators. Teacher leaders should help struggling
teachers improve by allowing them to observe their classes, sharing techniques
and lessons.
Our current
education system is bleeding talented teachers and talented students are
choosing more lucrative careers. By
returning to Lyndon Johnson’s Student Defense Loans that didn’t need to be
repaid if the student chose a career in education and worked in a low income
community for five years could attract new teachers. Retaining those teachers means that teachers
need to be compensated fairly with money, insurance and good retirement
pensions without over-burdening them with excessive hours and
responsibilities. Second, teachers need
the academic freedom to create engaging learning opportunities by collaborating
with teachers from other departments and time to share projects that work. Third, teachers need to be evaluated fairly and provided with resources
and experienced educators to guide them. Attracting and maintaining a quality
teaching force is essential to creating quality schools.