The Daily Show

Jon Stewart had Diane Ravitch on the Daily Show last week. She's just written a book about the educational system that I need to read. She was originally for some of the high stakes testing but has since reversed her position. The interview with her is only a few minutes long but the show leading up to her appearance is hysterical. He compares the wall street bailout to what they're trying to do to teachers now, particularly in Wisconsin. The average pay for a teacher there is $51,000 by the way. In Arizona it's more like $41,000. Everybody's getting rich with a school teaching gig, don't you think? They never mention that it takes 20 years to get to the top of the scale, either. Or, as in Indiana, you have to continually renew your license, practically mandating an advanced degree. So you have a Bachelor and Master degrees with 10 years of experience, you're making 40 some grand a year and people say you're overpaid because you have a retirement plan or health insurance? As Jon Stewart so succinctly put it: "Shut the f**k up".

In today's NWI Times there was an article about the teacher's contracts including silly things like in East Chicago where the contract states: "Teachers lounges will be attractive, comfortable and spacious". As a former employee of the School City of East Chicago I feel qualified to comment on that. When I first started my teaching career in 1976, it was at Washington High School. Across town there was Roosevelt High School. I believe Washington was built in the '30's. There were actually two teacher's lounges in the building. One upstairs and the one I frequented, in the basement. It was not exactly attractive, comfortable or spacious. It was pretty much a rathole, actually. It had a coffee machine - think it was a dime per cup - and the cups allowed you to play your poker hand. There was always a pinochle game going on and the place had that musty, dusty basement smell. It wasn't a factor in the education of the students except that I got an opportunity to meet and learn from some great educators. People doing their best in spite of the condition of the building, the poverty affecting many of the students, drug problems, etc. Some of the most dedicated and interesting people I've ever known, in fact. If you want some kind of an idea what it was like, check out Cooley High. They consolidated the two high schools a few years later and if a item showed up in the contract about wanting a decent teacher's lounge it was because they didn't want to end up down the basement again. Likewise another school corporation contract limits the length of faculty meetings. Having sat through an hour and a half meeting after school, putting limits on the length or frequency of meetings might not be such a bad idea. These type of things enter negotiations most of the time as a result of someone abusing the previous policy, or lack there of, or as a throwaway item in negotiations. Both sides put things on the table and then you haggle about what goes and what stays - I'll give you a nice spacious teacher's lounge but we meet twice a month for faculty meetings instead of once, that kind of thing. Now that they have a nice teacher's lounge, I'm sure no one would object to removing it from the contract. It damn sure doesn't keep the kids from learning. If you want to treat your people like professionals and keep them around for awhile, you might want to give them decent working conditions, however.

And so the saga of educational reform continues. Where will it end? Who knows. Just remember that in the State of Indiana the politicians just revamped the tax system, and now they can't balance the budget or fix the potholes. So did they forget the lessons taught to them in high school economics or were the schools remiss in teaching checkbook balancing 101? Balancing the budget on assumed future growth is like betting on filling that inside straight. It can be done but it's always a risk. If you get a few minutes to kill, check out the Daily Show link above. It's pretty funny regardless where you stand on the issues.