Actually, I tend to walk around while playing the banjo.
When you sit, you tend to stiffen up.
If I, and other retired public school teachers happen to have a pension, it came at a serious financial cost for us along the way.
At least two thirds of our careers, we lived with abysmal salaries, and spent, not only as much time, or more, as so many business people did in college, but also needed to go back to college at our own expense, in order to re-certify.
(And by the way, our retired medical, vision and dental expenses are certainly not freebies, either)
Now that business is down, outsourced, or offshore, the crying towels have come out.
If we had been paid those six-figure salaries that so many similarly-trained business people received for the past 30 years, there might be reason to complain about teachers.
As for those "summers off" that teachers supposedly had? Don't even go there. Spending so many of those summers with extra jobs to make up for those low salaries, or spending so many long summer hours in those hot college classrooms....and while not being paid for it either, except in highly rare cases...teachers have certainly sacrificed, so that your children can learn.
For what may be the zillionth time, I repeat that teachers are paid a daily rate for days worked. They are not paid for the summer days when they are not on duty.
Hopefully, readers of this thread will see why unions are so important to the working person. If you look for any sympathy from certain people, you'll probably be looking for a long time...
And by the way, Stan is certainly on point. Performance and accountability does indeed rest with the student, as does teacher oversight rest with the school boards.
A union's responsibility rests with its membership.
Back to STROLLING with the banjo...
(as well as volunteering with the schools, the senior citizens, writing for the paper, and trying to make a better world, whenever I can)
