Posted on Fri, 01/11/2008 - 00:47 — by O2kayak
To those of you with children in the Pittsburg Unified School District: You need to be aware that your children’s' teachers are once again being forced to work without a contract.
As I understand it the district is not even honoring its previous stated stance of continued funding for healthcare up to Kaiser levels. Health care including Kaiser went up this year and the district is only covering to last years funding levels.
If you want to do more please speak with some of these teachers to find out what kind of support you can lend to their cause. Simply showing up at the right meetings can make a huge difference for you, for them and most importantly for the children.
Teaching isn't just an 8-3 or 8-5 profession, it doesn't end when the bell rings and every year they are asked to do more and more for less and less. THIS IS IMPORTANT AS EVERY MINUTE ADDED OR EXPECTED OF TEACHERS THAT IS NOT ACTUALLY TEACHING TAKES AWAY FROM YOUR CHILDREN'S EDUCATION.
Most teachers have higher degrees to teach 3rd grade than most business professionals ever attain. For instance a Masters Degree is REQUIRED in order to teach at the grade school level. Required! A Masters Degree is not even a requirement to be the President of the United States nor is it a requirement to be Governor of the State of California. Almost all other public servants in California receive higher pay for less education with less governmental involvement in their jobs.
One last thing: TEACHERS DO NOT GET PAID FOR SUMMER VACATION. - The truth is that if a teacher does actually get a check for the summer it comes from a program called the summer fund. Much like a Christmas fund, money is taken from their regular paychecks all year and held aside for this so called vacation check.
Everything else aside for a minute screwing the teachers doesn't hurt the teachers as much as it hurts the children and eventually our society as a whole. With a Masters degree most teachers could go anywhere else and get the respect and pay they have earned getting that degree. BUT THEY DON'T - MOST TEACHERS TEACH BECAUSE THEY LOVE AND CARE FOR YOUR CHILDREN ALMOST AS MUCH AS YOU DO!
Jeff
"The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else." T. Roosevelt May 7, 1918
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