Teachers’ strike
Dear Editor:
Teachers should not have to go through 2 years without a contract. It has come to my attention that the same 4 board members have been the ones with whom the teachers have had to work during the whole time. Certainly a wise thing would be to change to different board members because they might have a different outlook on the situation.
I am a retired teacher and the teacher’s job nowadays is much more challenging than when I taught. I don’t know how they manage.
There are those who feel that teachers are overpaid or don’t deserve raises. No one should judge a teacher’s pay unless he or she has actually taught school for at least one year and probably more. When I was on vacation, I would buy things that would support classroom activities and material. When teachers attend seminars, they often visit the displays and buy materials for their classes with their own money. Teachers almost always take work home with them-grading papers, planning projects, working on extra details that are not part of teaching, but paper work that administrators want done and may or may not ever be used.
In the classroom, teachers see children and youth who lack love and care and try to help them. (It’s too bad that teachers can no longer hug a student; sometimes a hug would go a long way to help.) Teachers have to help with disagreements that originate outside of school, but manifest themselves in school situations. Teachers deal with children who disrupt the classroom because of a lack of discipline in the home. Some even wake up in the night concerned with what has happened and anticipating what may happen. I could go on and on.
Employees of school districts primary responsibility is the children and youth. You would expect then that they all care about and hopefully love the children and youth. Thus the students should be the priority concern of all.
Teachers are the ones who are with the children and youth five days a week. They are the ones who see them at their best and their worst. They are the ones who take them home in their minds in the evening and on week ends.
Warren is primarily a rural, low income, retired community.
With that in mind, regardless of degrees and experience, NO ONE should need or expect a SIX FIGURE INCOME. I am not aware of the salaries of all those in administration, but it would seem those persons should be willing to take a cut in salary to help with the expenses of the school district. Also, why on earth did the school district hire another administrator, the person who will help with principals’ responsibilities? (I do not remember what that position is called.) It is my opinion that we should have fewer administrative positions and use the money for classrooms and teachers.
CARING DEEPLY FOR OUR CHILDREN AND YOUTH,
Mrs. Jane D. Balling
Retired Elementary Teacher
Youngsville
Teachers’ strike
Dear Editor,
This letter regards the recent announcement of the WCSD teacher strike. With the front page coverage of the strike in Wednesday’s newspaper, I was dismayed with the disclosure of the teachers’ salaries. I also have a problem with the term “average salary”, as I know numbers can be manipulated. I know and understand that with Right-to-Know anyone is privy to information that was previously denied to the public.
I am sure that the disclosure of teacher salaries will stimulate many different opinions regarding the strike. There are those who will feel that teachers are paid too much and they will say that we only work about nine months of the year. They were not present or observed me in my home correcting papers until 11:00 P.M. on weeknights and all day Saturday and Sunday while my family engaged in their favorite leisure time activities. Yes, I chose to be a teacher and became an English teacher knowing that I would be faced with correction of many reading and writing assignments. There are people who support teachers as they rightly believe that if it were not for dedicated teachers, they would not have the wonderful career they chose to pursue.
It saddens me that teacher salaries were the focus of the reporting tied to the strike rather than the fact that negotiations have not been fruitful and agreeable to all parties involved. It is very unfortunate that it has come to a strike to get the attention and support that teachers deserve. This is not a win-win situation for anyone. The strike will affect all people in the community. The economic impact will be felt as teachers will not have money to spend on groceries, gasoline, consumables, and entertainment. Businesses will be affected due to parents having to call off work in order to remain at home with young children. Day care facilities will be inundated with requests to take children who are usually in school during the day. Thankfully, churches have offered a lunch program to help feed hungry children. The bottom line and the folks most impacted will, of course, be the children. They will suffer from lost opportunities, lost education, lack of progress; many children in our community will go hungry and may be left at home alone to fend for themselves.
I imagine that many people in business and industry breathed a sigh of relief that their salary was not published on the front page of the local newspaper for all of the county to digest. Just think before you become critical of teachers based on your new knowledge of their salaries, that this is not an ideal situation and should not have come to the forefront in the form of a strike which affects all people in the community.
Sincerely,
Barbara T. Scott, retired teacher
Warren