WV teacher strke
- Thread starter tjebarr
- Start date
I know far more about PA and the education within it, but continue to spout off at the mouth. I never came close to saying that the pay should be almost identical for both states, but when the top of the pay scale for one state is almost double what it is in other state and attainable in less time, there is a major issue. No one wants to think outside the box for funding ideas in this state though. The politicians would rather keep the status quo as long as they’re still being extremely well compensated and continue to allow the people they serve to suffer.
That would be a massively large pill to swallow at once. Outside of PEIA, others have felt the rise over the time span of 3 years, which make it more palatable despite the horrible taste.
My brother teaches catholic school in rural NY and he doesnt get paid **** (luckily he married rich). Probably on par or worse than WV teachers. He does teach for the joy of it and has the freedom to educate as he sees fit. Common Core is crap. Not getting political here but was that Bush era? Didnt pay attention until I had kids.
From your lips, to a bunch of hospital bed’s ears.... it is the only way if I know my dear old state well.
Good lord. It's like you just flip a switch and become a political hate machine. Unreal.
Coomon Core was Bush. Why are the feds dictating educational mandates without a funding arm?
BTW, I have a friend who left teaching and now works at my employer. She makes squat at the new job (maybe 45k) for less stress and higher pay.
Are we making education a priority or not?
BTW, I have a friend who left teaching and now works at my employer. She makes squat at the new job (maybe 45k) for less stress and higher pay.
Are we making education a priority or not?
Even someone taught by low quality teachers knows that there are 12 months in a year. If you don’t work 3 of them....by definition you only work 9 months a year. Just about all salaried people work more than their prescribed hours. Several people have already pointed this out to you. You look foolish continually repeating it.
I can help you out with the compensation structure with pharmaceuticals and engineers and a lot of other industries. On the sales side; they work on Commissions, and the best ones sell a boat load and live like kings (and rightfully so, you eat what you kill) and the ones that can’t sell either live a ****** economical life or find a different job/career path. And on the home office side, people have a lower base salary and there is a bonus pool to be allocated. The top performers get the larger bonuses and live rather well economically and the low performers get smaller bonuses and A. Improve their performance to get a higher allocation the next time around B. Live on the crumbs they receive or C. Find a new career. The reason most people think they understand the compensation structure of a teacher is because it is very simple. The best math or science teacher receives the same pay as the worst physical education teacher and the next year it will be the same. Do you know why that is the structure? Because that is the structure the teachers and their union want.
In the past several years most people’s health insurance increased more than their pay. Do you think that is unique to teachers?
I would start a grass roots effort and ask that your taxes be tripled and a portion of it go towards increasing teacher pay. If you want teacher pay to be on par with the rest of the country, have your taxes be on par to cover it.
I tried to help a fellow northern panhandleer from making himself look like a fool, but continue on if you wish.
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I’m just curious, when you bring up salary disparity between states, are you factoring in cost of living between states, which include housing markets, property taxes, state and local taxes, etc. as well?
You keep bringing up that teachers will work summers and such? Do they not get additional compensation for that? Do you believe salaried employees only work 40 hrs a week in other professions? Do you realize/agree most salaried employees in industry routinely average 50-60 hrs a week? Teachers as Govt employees, do you believe they get comparable benefits packages to that of industry employees to include vacation, holidays, PTO, etc? What is your current understanding of rising medical insurance premiums on those in industry as compared to teachers? Comparable, better, or worse?
Would you be willing to agree to a merit based salary increase system and or the addition of charter schools? Why or why not? Thoughts on doing away with tenure? Thoughts on empowering administrators with the flexibility of terminating non-performing teachers? Installing performance based metrics?
You keep saying those who don’t agree with you are uneducated on this subject. Feel free to educate us. I’m curious as to your answer to these questions and how you believe this situation is unique to teachers vs that of industry.
I don’t think people realize the disparity in property taxes between WV and the neighboring states specifically designed for the purpose of funneling that money into the school systems for corresponding programs and teacher salaries.
I get that but why pay more property taxes just to funnel it into an education system that's broken from the top down? It's like feeding the rattlesnake under your front steps just because it's not as fat as your neighbors. Let's pay more money for universal indoctrination...no sir. I'm more than a little pissed off as it is that we're going to home school ours and still have to pay into the system that is destroying our country. Freedom!!!
My Dad drove school bus for 30 years in Wood County. Bus drivers only work for about 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the evening, plus summers off. This type of work schedule doesn’t lend itself to making much money. I’m not trying to be insensitive, but I’d be upset if bus drivers were making a bunch of money with those hours. My Dad ran his backhoe business when he wasn’t driving bus to supplement his income.
Look at how wonderful things are in Michigan. Everyone is highly educated and the economy is just booming.
I live in a district with a wonderful educational system. Sometimes you get what you pay for (pardon me ending a sentence with a preposition, but that is how the saying goes).
Didn't look up the education part, but having the 12th strongest economy is pretty impressive. Much better than WV which is sitting at 51.
https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-the-best-economies/21697/
Soaring healthcare costs drove West Virginia teachers to go on their (possibly illegal) statewide strike
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-west-virginia-strike-20180302-story.html
I'll stay out of the teacher debate but does anyone think a pervasive problem in WV, one that impacts nearly every political/social/economic issue in our state, is that we simply have too many counties leading to too much administration?
When I was in junior high WV History we were taught that the size of WV counties was based on the ability to get on one's horse and wagon in the morning, ride into the county seat to pick up your food/supplies and conduct official business, then ride back home before it got dark. Made sense back in the 17-1800's.
As a result, we are saddled with 55 counties and their burdensome administration. Automobiles have replaced the horse and wagon so it makes sense to use that mode of transportation as a guide and cut back to say 30 or 35 counties? Think of all the money it would save WV on education, DOH, HHS, etc., etc., etc.
When I was in junior high WV History we were taught that the size of WV counties was based on the ability to get on one's horse and wagon in the morning, ride into the county seat to pick up your food/supplies and conduct official business, then ride back home before it got dark. Made sense back in the 17-1800's.
As a result, we are saddled with 55 counties and their burdensome administration. Automobiles have replaced the horse and wagon so it makes sense to use that mode of transportation as a guide and cut back to say 30 or 35 counties? Think of all the money it would save WV on education, DOH, HHS, etc., etc., etc.
As a parent in Morgantown, its hard to see several of the really good teachers from my boys school leave to go to Pa. Its frustrating. I can't imagine how hard it is to attract and keep quality personal in places like McDowell or Logan counties.
WV is the oldest state in the country so this may be a hard concept for many state residents who's kids are adults but if you want quality personal you need to offer competitive pay. People in 2018 have no problems in moving/following the money. I have no idea why that's a hard concept for state leaders to grasp
WV is the oldest state in the country so this may be a hard concept for many state residents who's kids are adults but if you want quality personal you need to offer competitive pay. People in 2018 have no problems in moving/following the money. I have no idea why that's a hard concept for state leaders to grasp
What you're describing is a systemic problem that has existed in this state for a century. A strike harming parents and kids is an incredibly short sighted and ineffective way to address those issues. Of course the teachers need paid more, but unless the root issues are fixed you're always going to be taking money from one group and moving it to another.
What would you suggest teachers do then? You don't want the quality ones to leave, and you don't want them to strike to increase pay/benefits. Do you expect the state government to tackle this issue on its own without being pushed?? How else should they make their voices heard? Again I think these are hard concepts for the oldest and one of the most uneducated states in the country. Its not 1960 anymore and people aren't going to stick around and work in the place they were born. Twenty first century life is about mobility.
How do you attract quality personal to WV or are we just going to assume all teachers are the same and quality ones that leave can easily be replaced?
When I was in College getting an Education degree was by far the easiest major offered. If you couldn't get a teaching degree you went home and found a trade school. And many teachers that I know in West Virginia still can't conjugate verbs like seen/saw and was/were properly. There is a reason our national test scores are extremely low.
They could have put just as much pressure on the legislature with mass protests at the capital until they were heard. No need to harm parents and kids in the process.
Honestly, I’m not trying to stand on ceremony here. I’m ambivalent to it beyond one of my parents being an administrator in the system and an aunt being a teacher. I moved out of state long ago and despite living in one of the high property tax states, still send my kids to private school. I just think the talking points specific to the fiscal realities don’t line up. Beyond that, I’d love to see comprehensive reform that would enable teachers to be paid a fair market wage but also weigh that wage against a competitive and merit based system of quantifiable performance metrics.
Take a look at the actions of the WV senate the past few days and see if you still feel the same way. Stubbornness and incompetentence is a horrible combination.
Well, since they don’t have performance metrics and have established an equitable salary based on tenure, they basically say themselves that all teachers are the same. If I was a shithot teacher, I’d be pissed of some deadass was able to tenure themselves into a higher salary for subpar performance. That’s just me though.
If we don’t take into account holidays, someone who is employed 12 months out of the year works 261 days if they do not work weekends. Teachers in WV work on 200 workday contracts. Teachers do not work 3 months (~90 days) less than those working 12 months out of the year. The point I was trying to make is teachers do not get 3 full months off from work in the summer. It’s usually around 9 weeks. If they don’t get 3 full months off from school, then they don’t only work 9 months out of the year.
Did you factor in federal holidays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter breaks, PTO/Vacation, scheduled half days, and snow days? I’m not even going to count in-service days where they don’t teach but instead have paid professional instruction days?
I wouldn’t bother, he/she is obviously hell bent on making himself/herself look like more of a nimrod with each additional post.
The democrats had control of the legislature for 80 years and never properly addressed the PEIA issue. Just kept kicking the can down the road.
I was a 40 year registered democrat until May of 2016, when I resigned from the party. I even campaigned for democrat legislators and governors during those 40 years. Union member too at one point.
Then I watched the democrats pass a bill making the schools provide free breakfast and lunch for all school children, even the kids of wealthy parents in my community who can afford to pay for it themselves. But then I asked myself, what have I gotten from the democrats in 40 years? Nothing! So I switched to independent and voted for Trump.
So don't go on about how this problem suddenly appeared under a legislature now controlled by the republicans. Democrats had plenty of opportunity to fix the issue with PEIA. So when the teachers want to know why they can't get the pay raise they want, it's because the democrat legislature stole their pay raise to provide free breakfast and lunch to all the kids. It's called wealth redistribution. The irony is that even rich people got some of their pay raise.
I’m glad to see that was the main takeaway from my response. I’m finished with this thread. Good luck to you.
Ever since Obamacare, my employer has been facing and trying to fend off 25% increases in health insurance costs each year from BC/BS. The extra cost usually comes from the employees not getting a raise or 1% raise.
Why do I need to factor in holidays? That would just help my cause. I’m telling you that teachers in WV work 200 days out of the year including the holidays that school isn’t in session and someone employed year-round works at most 261 days if they work 5 days/week. If these individuals do not work 8 major holidays, they’d work 253 days out of the year, while teachers still work 200 days.
Dollar amount needs to be known too. 400% of very little is still relatively very little.