Huge teacher layoffs coming

[LiberalEsto]

Harold Meyerson's column in today's Washington Post lays out a grim picture for public schools in the near future. He writes about huge cuts in public school budgets that are forcing some systems to increase class sizes, shorten the school week and eliminate summer school.

"Nationwide, estimates of teacher layoffs range from 100,000 to 300,000, with some experts pegging the most likely number nearer the high end. Layoffs are likely to be hardest on the youngest teachers -- "probably the most tech-savvy teachers we have," says Rep. George Miller, the California Democrat who chairs the House Education and Labor Committee. Nor do many talented, young people elect to enter the profession, he adds, when the profession is shrinking."

Link http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/05/AR2010050503769.html

Despite all the sunny jobs forecasts I keep seeing in the media, this is going to have a serious impact on unemployment figures.

I've heard inside information that our county school district in Maryland may be laying off close to 500 teachers.

On a personal level, this news has hit my daughter, an elementary education major, pretty hard. After a few years of floundering around at various colleges, she had finally settled on a goal: becoming a 6th grade math teacher. From everything she had heard, math teachers were in demand. Now she doesn't know what to do. She's taken a year and a half of education classes at the community college, and will probably finish her associates degree in education by the end of the year.

But then what? Why should she rack up another $30,000 in student loans by transferring to Towson University for a 4 year degree in elementary ed? And what good is an AA in education?

I've been out of work for 19 months, and I simply do not believe the reports that say unemployment is decreasing.

This administration and Congress need to come up with a serious jobs program, and help for public schools.

[ixion]

1. 3rd world, here we come

:(

[aikoaiko]

2. I just brought my 4 year to a private school for an interview.

I don't see much of a future in the public schools around us.

[HillbillyBob]

3. Serfs and servants don't need to be able to read

write or do math unless it's to make sure the number of orders of fries is near the same number of burgers.

We have to do something about the fact that the dod gets 708billion$ and education, medicine, gets what 1/10 of that?

[RKP5637]

5. Yep, there's big bucks in killing people and nation building, where the money is, but not so much

in education for a better society and long term benefits for the 21st century. This county should really be renamed Dinosaur Nation IMO, bringing you the 3rd world ASAP.

[Peregrine Took]

4. I'm flabbergasted how the public is being turned agains teachers!

That was one group of public employees that was always held in high regard - now, even here on Progressive Radio, I've heard callers rail against the greedy teachers.

[tonysam]

6. It's deliberate. The World Bank WANTS this for this country

and all other industrialized countries, for it sees education for most people as a waste of money.

[earthside]

10. And this administration ...

... is cheer-leading the bashing, sad to say.

Here in Colorado the lust to win some 'Race to the Top' prize money has caused Repuglicans and Democrats in the state legislature to join forces to try and gut teacher tenure. Understand, Democrats are doing this because Pres. Obama and Arne Duncan are making "tenure reform" part of the formula for getting the money.

But to justify changing tenure necessarily means talking up the 'bad' teachers that allegedly need to be fired. Couple this with demands for more testing and more evaluations of students and teachers -- and the schools are going to be little but joyless and soulless institutions for creating nothing but the drudges of the future.

Oh, then there is the demand from Pres. Obama and Duncan that states need to allow and encourage even more (non-union) charter schools. So, the public schools will become repositories for troubled and challenged children, while charters cherry-pick the proficient students. (And there are all kinds of sneaky ways that they can do this, I know.)

The traditional melting pot/tossed salad public school in the United States is dying. You know, probably a lot of the teachers who are going to be laid-off would eventually quit anyway because of what is happening -- that said, however, it is just terrible that so many dedicated professionals are going to be joining the unemployment line because we have to occupy Iraq and Afghanistan.

[RKP5637]

11. I've known several very gifted teachers that have quit and gone into other professions. They are

just fed up with it all. More will also quit, I think, and this will further fuel the profound ignorance in this so called country. It will also play into the politicians hands, nothing like an ignorant populace to control for profit and war.

[LiberalEsto]

12. True

Our community paper -- which leans Republican -- has been blasting our "greedy" teachers union for many months.

What's so greedy about wanting a roof over your head, the means to raise a family, decent benefits, etc? We all want these things. We want to be able to pay back student loans.

I expect to see a lot of kids graduating from college this month and seeing their dreams of becoming teachers going up in smoke., along with their ability to pay back tens of thousands of dollars in student loans.

Another middle class career shot down the drain.

[AnArmyVeteran]

7. Low paid Hawaiian teachers were forced to take an 8% pay cut and furloughs.

Teachers in Hawaii who don't make enough to have a livable wage got a huge pay cut and furloughs last Fall. One teacher I know might have to sell the modest house she received as an inheritance from her parents. Native Hawaiians are being forced to leave their islands because of the huge cost of living.

And meanwhile, companies like Tesoro Oil in Honolulu are making billions, yet they couldn't care less about teachers or children. Their stock price went from $2 a share in Aug 2002 to almost $140 a share in just a few years during Bush's Iraq War. As soon as Cheney announced his war plans against Iraq in August 2002, Tesoro stock prices skyrocketed. Tesoro did nothing to deserve an increase in their price. No discoveries. No new inventive processes to process oil. No new technology. They used the blood from our dead soldiers and hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis to make massive profits. But while they become extremely wealthy, they flipped the bird at hard working teachers. And the republican governor of Hawaii is nothing but a whore to industry. It was the governor who threatened teachers with mass firings unless they agreed to the pay cuts and furloughs.

The wealthy who have 2nd, 3rd, 4th or 10th homes in Hawaii are driving up the cost of living and taxable property values. Anyone who is rich enough to own a 3rd or 4th mansion in Hawaii should be forced to pay a high enough property tax rate to pay teachers enough to live on. I'm sick of the rich getting a free ride and amassing their wealth off of the backs of the poor and dwindling middle class.

[progressoid]

8. Coming? It's already here.

I have yet to hear of a school around here that hasn't cut teachers and staff.

[Locrian]

9. the first step

I can GUARANTEE that this is the first step toward "privatization" coming in and "solving" the problem. Bust the unions, outsource education, make everything mandatory, private corporations rape us again.

[madfloridian]

13. And NY is going to pay 5 million to hire teachers from a private company.

NY's education dept wants $5 million to recruit new teachers while laying off 8,500.

And we are not really fighting back against the private companies taking over every aspect of education.

We are too accepting of it.

[LiberalEsto]

14. They're getting rid of highly paid teachers

who have put in a lot of years. The replacements will be newbies fresh out of college on starting level salaries. And probably fewer benefits.

Same thing happened at our Giant Food store in Gaithersburg. They fired all the older workers who were high up on the pay scale, and replaced them with low-paid beginners.

Seriously, what do they expect us older folks to do? Just starve?