Two Things That Bothered Me Today
Another post in an on-going series of irritants...
1) Teachers. More specifically, BC teachers' demands for a "fair deal". I am pro-education, and pro-teacher. Society has made teachers custodians of our children, and in BC at least, has put sometimes insane demands on them. Funding in public education is a problem in BC (and elsewhere, of course), because the tax burden on the general Joe Citizen is extremely high, and the costs associated with public anything are extreme. Teachers want a fair contract, but really, teachers are completely out of touch with society in the 21st century. (To a large extent, so is government.) I have seen my own children go through the system, and seen broken pedagogy along the way - more than I've seen good teachers.
I am self-employed. I have no pension. I have no health benefits. I have no paid vacation. I get paid (sometimes) for the work I do. I also do not get paid for work that I do. I feel a moral responsibility to make sure what I provide my clients is top quality service, and when I fail in some regard, I react to rectify it, often at no cost, because what my clients paid for did not work. If I take vacation, I earn nothing. If I am sick, I earn nothing. I have had no salary increase in 13 years. Gone are the days of rampant gazillion dollar consulting contracts where independents could just say "pay me $300 an hour". Economics has changed the landscape for everyone. Sure, saddling teachers with kids who can't speak a word of English and not charge parents for the privilege of free language lessons is wrong. Sure, integrating severely disabled children into classrooms and not having enough education assistants to go around is wrong. These are things that are wrong with the way our Ministry of Education has set up the playing field. And class sizes? Adding teachers does not in itself fix things.
I spent, as a parent of elementary and high-school aged children, hours of after-school time teaching them what teachers were not teaching them. My kids had teachers who said, when asked questions, things like: "Look it up on the web", or "It's in the book". My kids had teachers who castigated kids for copying text from web pages into essays (plagiarism) and then handed out articles from newspapers and claiming them as their own work (also plagiarism). They had teachers who gave extra marks for bringing in snacks. There are more sinners than saints, more abusers of the system than true educators, more lazy public servants than dedicated professionals.
The system is wildly broken. More wages and benefits for teachers without some kind of performance review is completely wrong. You want a better contract? Step up and take responsibility for the quality of teaching you provide. And Ministry of Education? Putting children in a classroom just so as to not deny them access to public education is not the same as actually educating them. Make it possible for teachers to do their jobs first.
2) Clients who won't pay, and then react when you withhold services until they do pay. Enough said.
1) Teachers. More specifically, BC teachers' demands for a "fair deal". I am pro-education, and pro-teacher. Society has made teachers custodians of our children, and in BC at least, has put sometimes insane demands on them. Funding in public education is a problem in BC (and elsewhere, of course), because the tax burden on the general Joe Citizen is extremely high, and the costs associated with public anything are extreme. Teachers want a fair contract, but really, teachers are completely out of touch with society in the 21st century. (To a large extent, so is government.) I have seen my own children go through the system, and seen broken pedagogy along the way - more than I've seen good teachers.
I am self-employed. I have no pension. I have no health benefits. I have no paid vacation. I get paid (sometimes) for the work I do. I also do not get paid for work that I do. I feel a moral responsibility to make sure what I provide my clients is top quality service, and when I fail in some regard, I react to rectify it, often at no cost, because what my clients paid for did not work. If I take vacation, I earn nothing. If I am sick, I earn nothing. I have had no salary increase in 13 years. Gone are the days of rampant gazillion dollar consulting contracts where independents could just say "pay me $300 an hour". Economics has changed the landscape for everyone. Sure, saddling teachers with kids who can't speak a word of English and not charge parents for the privilege of free language lessons is wrong. Sure, integrating severely disabled children into classrooms and not having enough education assistants to go around is wrong. These are things that are wrong with the way our Ministry of Education has set up the playing field. And class sizes? Adding teachers does not in itself fix things.
I spent, as a parent of elementary and high-school aged children, hours of after-school time teaching them what teachers were not teaching them. My kids had teachers who said, when asked questions, things like: "Look it up on the web", or "It's in the book". My kids had teachers who castigated kids for copying text from web pages into essays (plagiarism) and then handed out articles from newspapers and claiming them as their own work (also plagiarism). They had teachers who gave extra marks for bringing in snacks. There are more sinners than saints, more abusers of the system than true educators, more lazy public servants than dedicated professionals.
The system is wildly broken. More wages and benefits for teachers without some kind of performance review is completely wrong. You want a better contract? Step up and take responsibility for the quality of teaching you provide. And Ministry of Education? Putting children in a classroom just so as to not deny them access to public education is not the same as actually educating them. Make it possible for teachers to do their jobs first.
2) Clients who won't pay, and then react when you withhold services until they do pay. Enough said.
Only 2? Just to cheer you up. My favourite art gallery is the Musee D'Orsay in Paris http://caroleschatter.blogspot.co.nz/2011/12/musee-dorsay.html
ReplyDeleteNo, not just two, but I try to limit myself.
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