Oklahoma schools go to 4-day week so teachers can work at Walmart
Submitted by gjohnsit on Tue, 02/13/2018 - 6:01pm
Teaching was a noble and respected profession for centuries.
Not anymore. At least not for Republicans.
Teachers haven't gotten a raise in 10 years and the only way they can afford to accept the pay -- third-worst in the nation -- is by negotiating a four-day school week in 90 districts, freeing teachers up to take jobs at Walmart on Mondays to make ends meet.
...Teachers make ends meet with public housing vouchers and food stamps, and school food-bank drives sometimes give their leftovers to hungry teachers and their families.
Jeeesus Christ. Do people in Oklahoma have no pride at all?
Teachers are fleeing the state in droves.
Mott-Wright said she's heard from 12 teachers who said they'd stay through the school year but planned to leave the state.
Oklahoma just refused to raise teacher pay yesterday yet again.
Amazingly, this news article praises the idea of going to a 4-day week.
One place Oklahoma teachers aren't fleeing to is Kansas.
“The first time I tried to hire an elementary teacher 25, 26 years ago, we had over 100 applicants,” he recalled. “Now I can’t get five applicants.”
While there likely are numerous reasons behind that change, a new national report on rural teacher pay in the 50 states shows Kansas ranks lowest. That report follows another Kansas-specific study noting evidence of a teacher shortage in some rural areas of the state, particularly in the southwest corner.
It's amazing to think that teacher pay in Kansas is even lower than Oklahoma.
It appears that Republicans are actively trying to collapse the public school system.
Kansas has entered the Chase Teachers Out of The State derby, joining states like North Carolina and Arizona in the attempt to make teaching unappealing as a career and untenable as a way for grown-ups to support a family. Kansas favors the two-pronged technique. With one prong, you strip teachers of job protections and bargaining rights, so that you can fire them at any time for any reason and pay them as little as you like. With the other prong, you strip funding from schools, so that teachers have to accomplish more and more on a budget of $1.95 (and if they can’t get it done, see prong number one). The result is predictable. Kansas is solidly settled onto the list of Places Teachers Work As Their Very Last Choice.
Comments
the
Robert E. Yahweh wing of the Americans has been deliberately, doggedly working to destroy the public school system since Brown v. Board of Education and Engel v. Vitale. They would rather have no schools at all, than schools where children of melanin can mingle with their pale frail wildwood flowers, schools where the day does not begin with the tots sobbingly beseeching Jesus. Their goal is to transform the public schools into bankrupt ghost towns, while meanwhile showering State funds on "private," "charter," etc. schools—certified yeehaw compounds where loud klaxons sound if anyone enters who violates the "one-drop rule," where the children ecstatically handle snakes while learning that Adam and Eve rode dinosaurs to church.
kansas and Oklahoma
Don't have many non-white kids.
This is about ideology not race
uh-huh
Sure.
I understand why you would think it
Historically it's been local racial discrimination in public schools (i.e. white school gets more money). That's a well-established systemic racism in this country.
But that's NOT what is happening here.
This is statewide in largely white states (Kansas is less than 6% black).
It looks a whole lot more like class war.
oklahoma,
however, is down to 54% white people, and they are Scared. Which explains Piltdown Men like Jim Inhofe, Scott Pruitt, Tom Coburn.
Here is a Canadian grousing about the racist snake-handling school-stabbing of the Americans rampaging north across the border.
As is evident in that link, and the previous one, and pretty much the whole of the literature on the subject, racism and religiosity initially drove the school-gutting backlash to Brown and Engel, but incubi like Friedman, the Kochs, the Mises creatures, etc., then climbed hotly on to hump their own dementia—bizarre preversions involving money. Such brain damages are not primarily concerned with hating melanin, or fellating Jesus, but are instead cave-dwelling cargo cultists with a fetish for getting the government out of the way of everything except protecting the rich white people and their preciouses. So, yes, it's about melanin, Jesus, and class, all at once. Quantum.
It is about religion and privatization.
My daughter teaches in a public school district that is a mostly white and very affluent and Republican suburb of Michigan. It is 89% white. 3% black. The superintendent is ex-miliary, ex-cop.
My daughter is K8 certified with a Masters in Reading and an Early Childhood endorsement. They have her teaching 8th grade english to 5 classes of 140 students. She has none of the advanced students. Her kids are special ed (full inclusion) and regular students. You have no idea how many extra and unpaid hours she puts in grading the papers of kids of who can't write, attending parent-teacher conferences, making parent phone calls, doing EPIs on her special ed kids so she and the school don't get sued, and working on Michigan's new and insane teacher evaluation tool. Just the teachers written part requires about 40 hours of work to respond to a 10 page list of skills and functions that will be scored and awarded points based on the teachers claims as documented by attached documents and videos. Her husband works at GM Onstar. He gets a huge financial bonus based on his evaluation, and he can't believe all the bull shit a teacher has to go through for absolutely no reward except to comply with some stupid ass Republican law so she can keep her thankless and underpaid job. Teachers in this district have had nothing but pay cuts, reductions in benefits, loss of pension benefits, and unpaid increases in the number days and hours required to work. She HATES her job so much she is going to quit it with 27 years in and only THREE YEARS to go to be eligible for last of the full retirement packages available. She can't go to another building or district. If she changes buildings, it is frowned on and a black mark against her in a system that has a useless union and no employee protection. If she changes districts, her pay will go back to entry level. This means a 50 - 60 percent pay cut, which will also be used to calculate the dollar amount of her retirement.
This has nothing to do with race. This is a take over of public education by the Betsy DeVoses and Bill Gates of the fucking world.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
Republicans must think that Dickens'
'Hard Times', is a guide for governing in the 21st Century.
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
Prelude to privatizing?
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
Partial maybe but essentially yes.
Some European countries had a system where the government paoid 1-to-6 but after that schooling was totally private. So in the case of my relatives, some did not go beyond sixth grade. Literate enough but no more.
If we see Bernie's free tuition policy in terms of education being the great leveler, we will see that the objections are not so much about cost as really about maintaining the social and class order. Giving access to the sons and daughters of the poor is a direct threat to the ruling classes.
Indeed it is.
And why he should pound that message loud and proud.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
What else could the end game be?
Starve public schools until the system is an obvious failure. Leave nothing but private for-profit schools.
Then roll the states back to 19th Century schooling, except with taxpayer subsidies, with most of the poor illiterate and in permanent poverty.
I didn't realize when I worked in the Dominican Republic in the Peace Corps that I was witnessing the future of our public school system.
I could rant about it all day, but my fingers would fall off.
Michigan is experiencing a severe teacher shortage like
many other states. The Michigan politicians just can't imagine why. They're sure it has nothing to do with the vicious political attacks on the profession and compensation.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
Most defintely.
With Trump and Betsy DeVos cheering them along the way. Sickening. The gutting of the country, brought to you by a bunch of....well, never mind, I need not say it.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
Teachers are the foot soldiers of the Enlightenment. Destroy.
When a people wants to move beyond Medieval systems of thought and governance, teachers are sent it. They essentially teach subjects beyond the immediate experience of people, but in a framework of logic and rationality. They do not indoctrinate into unchallenged religious beliefs. Education undermines class boundaries as knowledge and skill is available to everybody. Education has rightly been seen as the great leveler.
What I call the Medievalist see education in terms of indoctrination and faith and the enforcement of a class based system of governance. It is no accident that in pre-revolution Czarist Russia that something like 87% of the entire population was illiterate. What did Lenin do? Pick essentially an Education Minister to go forth and first make the peasant soldiers literate. Almost universally, communist regimes have been very good at mass education of rural and peasant societies given their beliefs of a classless society. By the way, this included equal education for females.
So it comes as no surprise to me that Medievalists (counter reacationaries to the Englightenment) would look for ways to undermine and destroy public education. Add in teacher unions and doubly urgent. But from your posting, it does not seem that those in power see that they are undermining the education of children by going after teachers. Why? children should only be educated to their proper social and class status.
Decades and decades of right wing vile and propaganda against public education have taken their toll on the profession of teaching.
No doubt about that.
And the south largely decides curriculum for the rest of the nation because publishers don't want to be bothered to release multiple versions of textbooks.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQx_2j5nXuc&list=PL5107337C20B37B0A&inde...
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.
yep, sadly.
Which is one of the ways Jim Crow
is maintained, and the Civil War portrayed as "the war of northern aggression." Sherman had the right idea.
But once they offed Lincoln, they soon reclaimed all they lost in the war.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
Union Busting
Republicans have been trying to bust the Teachers Unions for decades because they hate unions. Private-sector union workers is at 6.5%, but public-sector union workers is 34.4%. The Republican plan is to corporatize schools but I don't think they will succeed because most Americans feel positive toward their public schools and have fond memories of them.
And the Porky Dems are all to happy to help the Repigs.
After all, Arne Duncan was Charterizer/Privatizer in chief when he was running things at the DOE. DeVos is just that SOB on steroids, really.
And besides, even if they can't bust the unions or privatize the schools, the Porky Dems and Repigs will just test them to death. Or automate them via online charters...yeesh.
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.
Public-Sector Unions respond to the Dems
Wow! That deserves it's own front page story!
Is it bad of me to be laughing merrily at how the folks over at DKOS are going to explain this? Seriously, they have now officially lost labor. Are they going to call labor "purity ponies"?
Wait wait! I know! It's Putin's fault. He's clearly infiltrated the labor unions! Quick everyone! Check under your beds!
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
Yes, they will call labor
greedy for not just rolling over for our Corporate masters. Anything to keep their meritocracy and neo-liberal hell in place. They DO NOT CARE about anything but money, and they prove that to us every day.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
Sure, but no matter what they say
... they will absolutely be declaring they are no longer on the side of labor. It's not like that's a surprise to any of us but it should be illuminating even for the DKOS crowd (insofar as anything can illuminate their minds) and even more clear to actual labor voters.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
third party
green / peace / labor. It is time for this consolidation. Fight back.
Doesn't matter what Americans
want, "They" will continue to do what they're doing in Oklahoma, which is legislate Public Schools out of existence.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
The non-stop pounding
of the poor and middle class by these futhermuckers is getting old. As in long past old. And, short of people standing up and getting in their face, well, we can guarantee the beatings will continue until morale improves. How we do that, how we get in their face, is the question. That lady in West by God Virginia kinda found a way by addressing the state Legislature, publicly calling out those in the committee that sponsored a bill that allows for fracking practically anywhere in the by God state, including her backyard, without the need for permission from land owner. We need more efforts like that one in all 50 states - especially those where both houses or chambers are controlled by the Oligarchs. And as far as I'm concerned all elected Repubs are members of the Oligarchy, are oligarchs. As such are traitors, and should be treated as same. We're out of time. Daily "they" pull stunts like this one in Oklahoma. Daily. And, daily we fall further back toward the stone age. The constant pounding by these futhermuckers must end sooner rather than later.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
the window is closing
And the window for accomplishing that without violence is closing, too. We're approaching the point that Jackson Browne described as: " the people who finally can't take any more
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone". And if the USA in that condition doesn't scare the living crap out of you, you're not paying attention.
It scares the living crap out of me, at least!
[video:https://youtu.be/j3YcZ233MIs]
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
educate this
We won’t become a banana republic because bananas
won’t grow here. /s
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
Oranges grow in some places here
Orange republic?
Beware the bullshit factories.
Hey, we know what to do with orange groves. We tear ‘em
down and build theme parks with lots of bs infotainment.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
JFC this country.
I'm sorry, but public housing vouchers and food stamps, and school food-bank drives is not 'making ends meet'!! And good luck getting hired for one day a week with Wally World's new 'Customer First scheduling'! Honestly... *grumbles incoherently*
This shit is bananas.
looks to me like a win-win solution
the teachers can make enough to not have to sleep in the schools classrooms, the students get free time off to work at McDonalds and get enough to eat, teachers are prevented from teaching crap to their students and students have not to eat their crap but instead get 'real life' education. Bingo./s
Curiosity killed that cat.
Learning is a bad thing. Ignorance is much more malleable.
Beware the bullshit factories.
Reading this late . . . damn . . . meanwhile in Texas
https://www.texastribune.org/2018/02/01/federal-assessment-cap-texas/
They got caught with their pants down. A federal report sites them for denying services to thousands of special ed children.
The author of this article is next writing one on dyslexia. She is calling me tomorrow morning to chat. Wish me luck.
Marilyn
"Make dirt, not war." eyo
you'll do fine M
truth is on your side