Teachers…the good and the bad

This will be an unpopular post but its one close to my heart. My son has ADD and his school years were a struggle. It was a very special very new and young Special ED Teacher who helped him begin to read in the third grade. In Junior High he had and equally special Special Ed Teacher. In High School — I filed a State complaint against the school for poorly handled Special Ed accommodations and I did it not just for my son — because I didn't want other kids to experience the discouraging incompetence mine did.

Here is my issue with Teachers Unions. They provide tenure often after a few years. Bad teachers CANNOT be fire. I mean 99% impossible. These are not the teachers I want eating up state budgets and teaching my kid. Is it the the one's you want teaching your kids or the future leaders of our country?

This is a great article about teacher tenure HERE

If there is a layoff — the teachers with tenure stay. The teachers with bad reviews STAY. The good young new teachers like that one I cried with over my son's first read words, would GO. I would fight for those good teachers — I would picket by their sides and charge the capital. But I cannot fight for a structure that allows the bad eggs escape. That isn't fighting for the ones who deserve it. It's not fighting for our educational system which if failing for a reason.

If you want to tax someone to pay for the educational system — WH WHY WHY would you want to spend you money or theirs on a failing system?

So sure the teachers are fighting. Wouldn't you?

I beg of people to look at the big picture. And this collective bargaining thing is over benefits. It's not over pay. It doesn't even take away their promise a job forever than none of us get. I think people think its taking away pay or security that it is not. But it SHOULD. I say FIGHT FOR THE GREAT TEACHERS who deserve to be fought for. And thank you — including to Diego's DAD — who is a lifetime teacher who loves his job. BUT just say NO to teachers who have a free ticket to not care for the rest of their lives.

I'm passionate about this because I cried so many tears over my son's learning disabilities and I saw inside the school system in ways that were so disheartening. But again — there are jewels out there that deserve so much — something has to change though to be sure we are taking care of the jewels not the rocks.

Lisa