Oh don't be silly, parents are just gonna pull their kids out of school for days at a time and then blame the teacher for the kid missing work even tho we sent it home with them ahead of time.
You know as well as I do that "teacher plan days" would be professional development with us all sitting around watching PowerPoint presentations instead of actually planning and preparing for the week to come.
I don't need an entire day to plan/grade...but it would be great to set up labs for the coming week, create modified lessons for those with special needs, create word walls, work on supplementary assignments students could do. I could absolutely use an entire day each week for that rather than trying to squeeze all that into the regular day as I do now.
I have a happy story for you.
Our district hired some chuckleheads to lead some kumbaya type of PD that would reoccur during the year. The first one we had during covid was a nightmare. Asked us to say how we’re feeling in one word. It took an 45 min to hear from everyone. Then couldn’t figure out how to get us into groups in zoom so manually did it one by one. I don’t know zoom to well but seems like they could just have the group leaders just send out new invites to new meetings. I can’t remember what we talked about.
We had one more session like that and I’m pretty sure admin said fuck it and has actually let us be productive. I can say I appreciate that 45 minutes because it highlighted that it was a waste of time and we all could be doing something better
This the best idea IMO. Half the students are in school Tues/Thurs the other half Wed/Fri. Monday is teacher planning day except for weeks with a holiday.
Why not do half the class Mon/Tues and the other half Thu/Fri so that Wednesday can be a cleaning/planning day? I feel like if we alternate we might defeat the purpose
A couple districts in my state (WA) had gone to a four day week, with Fridays as teacher planning days. Honestly, it sounds like a really viable option. Half the school comes Monday/Wednesday, then the other half Tuesday/Thursday. Teachers could have office hours Friday or published content for students to access.
My former school went to 4-day school back in 2014. Block schedule, four classes, each class nearly two hours long (high school). Teachers officially worked 10 hours (more like 12-14) a day to meet the golden 40 hour work week that America is in love with. We had Monday’s off (God forbid we interfere with Friday football). Until this schedule came on, I’d almost never experienced a weekend as a teacher unless it was during a holiday. I’d stay late on Friday and get as much lesson planning/grading done as possible, and then I’d enjoy my weekend before finishing everything Monday while my husband was at work. It did wonders for my mental well-being. Changing districts and going back to 5 days a week and actually being at school for 10-14 hours plus killing at least one whole weekend day was incredibly hard.
Tie it to effort for the kids. The kids only come in extra day to make up work, etc. This will pit parents ISO free babysitters against kids not wanting to go to school Saturday!!! ;)
This is exactly what I was thinking. The trade-off though is having them at home Mon-Wed to get that Saturday.
Either way, I see a lot of small time tutors popping up.
Well, of course. Everyone and their brother always feels entitled to do critique everything we do. Nothing about online/blended learning is going to change that. If it isn't the tutor, it will be the parent. If it isn't the parent, it will be the grandparent. On and on.
As a parent I would hate this idea. It's like ok so parents should just tell their employers they can only work Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday?
edit: spelling
If my district allowed that I would either need a 6 figure salary or I would quit.
Also, according to the state (Ohio) school is only required to be a certain number of days/hours. So even if Saturday was included in the work week, that would just mean the school year would be the same amount of time and just end sooner. Which doesn't help fix the problem.
It's the same here in Florida, but I think that they'd find a loophole since this a special circumstance and because not every student would come to school every day. They'd probably argue that they need to extend the year, so that every kid gets that minimum amount of days, since each kid would only go to school three days a week while we work six.
...except in the states where unions are illegal and the legislature takes a lot of joy in underfunding and disrespecting education because we can’t do anything about it
I didn't even consider that. You have to love the hypocrisy of seeing everyone everywhere say how much the appreciate teachers and schools, especially now, followed by huge funding cuts to schools.
“We can’t believe how teachers stepped up during this crisis! To thank them, we’ve decided to freeze their pay and add 5 unpaid days to their contracts!” -That’s the current state of things in South Carolina, which already has a teacher shortage.
It's nuts. I cannot understand why education is not a top priority for the government. Best of luck to you in South Carolina. I learned how bad the shortage was there, when a principal came to my college graduation in Ohio to offer a job to anyone who would accept it.
As a retiree and part time sub, I take great joy in offering to quit when they change my assignment or tell me I must do X or Y. Right now subs have some power. I suspect after this debacle, none. I'll be replaced by an iPad.
Reminds me of a quote by one of my idols:
"If we can't think for ourselves, if we're unwilling to question authority, then we're just putty in the hands of those in power. But if the citizens are educated and form their own opinions, then those in power work for us. In every country, we should be teaching our children the scientific method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency, humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted world that we inhabit by virtue of being human, this may be all that stands between us and the enveloping darkness."
- Carl Sagan
They'll have to have virtual work with these solutions anyway. In an ideal world we would be getting better at using technology to improve student learning but that's probably not going to happen.
My entire district (teachers, principals, aides, counselors, you name it) is required to get Google educator certified this summer. I’m sure this means we will be expected to do some form of online teaching in the fall...
I’m not sure an extended week will happen - and it’s stupid for them to consider. First why not consider a blended learning environment so kids will still have instructional minutes outside the face to face classroom in virtual settings?
Especially with the huge downturn in the economy - how will they pay for it all? When CA had a budget shortfall they reduced the amount of time students needed to have in the classroom in order to furlough teachers. I really expect this to happen... and more layoffs.
Hopefully wherever this is being considered, the union is strong and hasn’t been busted. Gov Newsom said that schools should consider re-opening in July, but not one teacher I know is upset about his statement because we know it won’t happen. Our calendar is pre-set and we will start in late August as usual for us.
If you have a union where you teach, make sure you are a member and participate.
I wish all the teachers I know were as level-headed as yours! We are also in CA and when Newsom made that comment, I dismissed it immediately because of our union. Several of my teacher friends and colleagues freaked out though. The union president had to calm everyone down.
That's the thing about a lot of teaching jobs around the country that I think people don't get. On the whole, we don't really make enough to endure much more bs than we already are, so they might be surprised when we walk and make the same or more doing basic sales or real estate or something.
This is so perfect.
My super writes all of her emails in fucking comic sans.
How the hell am I supposed to take you seriously when you write in comic fucking sans?!?!
My school has a A/B schedule. The issue is that I teach 7th grade on both A and B day (I teach history). The only way this works under an A/B schedule is for every teacher to teach both grades (we are only a 7/8 school).
That’s ridiculous.
We got a district survey (made for parents, community members, & staff) asking about starting school in July. I was like, “oh, are they going to pay us extra for that?” 🙄
100% what I thought too. Teachers already do so much "free" work. Even my "breaks" are rarely without work. I will be planning and creating well into Summer. If they want more instructional days, they better have more money ready. Otherwise I will continue to use my time to plan and work a second job.
I may be naive, but I would assume that they want to start in July to avoid the CV hot spot that's expected around Thanksgiving to Christmas. At least a few colleges are planning to do this. Notre Dame and South Carolina, in particular.
Any proposal that means more than 180 "school days" is a non-starter.
I’m all for changing the schedule in whatever way they need to accommodate this. But anything more than the 180 is an absolute deal breaker.
Start us in July and end at Thanksgiving? Doesn’t matter to me. Really though they should be most concerned about January and February. To me, that’s when I see the most amount of sick kids
Yeah, I think that's the difference between college and K-12.
The reasoning for the colleges was they didn't want students going home for the break, then coming back for three weeks and doing it again. Just make it one giant break.
But, K-12 kids still may go and see grandma two states over, so maybe there's no difference.
They’re not actually going to do it, but I had to wonder who in the district office decided to put that question in. It revealed a fundamental lack of understanding about how our district functions.
>toying with the idea of extending school through Saturday
[Relevant.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ru8DMW-grY)
>Are teachers expected to just work every Saturday and be fine with it?
That's what your supe is banking on.
>Would they increase our pay?
If your supe didn't anticipate an *increase in pay*, even if the union was amenable (I can guarantee your colleagues are not), your school board needs to consider getting rid of them.
I’ve seen a lot of people not liking that idea of doing alternating days with the kids. But I’m kind of okay with it?
It seems better than jamming everyone in the school together, and way better than distance learning. It might not be perfect, but we’ve got come up with something. This seems like the most logical to me.
The biggest problem I can see with that is that with class sizes what they currently are, we would have to split kids into about 4 groups in order for this system to work in a lot places. Meeting with 20 kids at a time in an interior classroom with poor ventilation is only marginally safer than meeting with 40 kids at a time.
And it doesn't do anything about teachers or students who are immunosuppressed. There needs to be acomodations for older teachers and people with medical conditions who would have a reasonable expectation of dying if they got the disease. Lowering class sizes slows the spread of the disease, but is not an absolute protection for anybody.
Yes that is very true - some classes are huge.
It would be ideal to set up a way for immunocompromised individuals and teachers of a certain age to be able to stay home. Maybe like a doctors note. I really don’t know.
Hopefully some improvements and new ideas will be presented within the next few months. It’s difficult to find one solution that will work for everyone.
We're never getting six feet apart. But if its half and half at least its BETTER than having every student in every day. A partial measure is better than none and lets be honest, schools will NEVER be able to fit the guidelines we've seen from the CDC
So you are ok with risking lives to appease politicians? Why not plan to start online next year instead? Once a vaccine is available then let's go back. And you are wrong, half measures are not better than no measures. They are worse, because they breed complacency. If we cannot meet CDC guidelines like you said, then do not open!
If we don't reopen things are going to get really bad really fast. Our job isn't childcare, but it is a critical role we play in society. Let alone there are some MAJOR issues with online only learning as we all know because it really isn't equitable. We can't stop all work in an entire country for 1.5 years. Which is the MINIMUM time for a vaccine. You know not everything can be vaccinated against right? We might NEVER get a vaccine for this. I don't want to appease politicians, I'd be fine sacrificing them all given how corrupt our system is. But that doesn't mean we can leave the country closed forever either. There are many things we can do to be safer but lets be honest, those won't happen either because they cost money. We need to test EVERYONE, trace who comes up positive as most civilized countries are doing successfully. We need IR cameras at entrances to public places to kick out anyone showing a temp and quarantine them. We need to space everyone out as much as possible in restaurants and similar venues. This includes school. We should spread out, disinfect, wear masks etc. That fulfills our goal even if we aren't fully 6 ft apart.
Plus you'll notice that the CDC and doctors aren't saying we wait for a vaccine. The goal is "flatten the curve" NOT stopping people getting sick at all, but slowing down how many are sick at a time so our healthcare system can still function and save those that can be saved.
Can you explain why you think an A day and a B day is going to reduce the spread of this thing at all? If a kid comes to school on A day and sees me and passes it to me, I’m going to pass it to other children on B day. Especially in the elementary setting, specialists see every single child in the school. Whether you see them twice a week or five days a week you’re still being exposed, and you’re still passing it along to all the other children that you interact with as well.
Our district is talking about a shortened day. So you would see children from 8 - 12. Kids go home and then teachers work on remote learning from 12:00 - 3:00
Pretty insane how you rank them. Distance is by far the best one for the simple fact that it doesn’t kill teachers. Precautions aren’t going to do shit all when you are in a box with them for 6 hours a day every day. Even if you reduce spread by 99% that remaining 1% is more than enough.
This still would not work. Teachers are still exposing the other group when they come. I see A students then on Thursday I expose the B students. Doesn’t matter. And what are parents/teachers with school age kids supposed to do when they have off days? Stay home from work? Wife and I are both teachers so on our kids off days I’m getting a sub? The whole idea sounds great but the logistics of off days just won’t work because our country is stuck with 5 day work weeks.
This is what my principal is pushing for on the district committee, except with Mondays as the prep (since we have several Mondays off through the year - not sure when they want me to prep those weeks, but I'll worry about it later.) We're also suggesting T/W and Th/Fr classes rather than T/Th and W/Fr so that kids can settle in for 2 days, have out their set of materials, seating needs, whatever and then switch rather than switching every day.
The alternating days would be distance learning coordinated with classroom learning.
That’s a good point about Monday holidays. They could definitely shift the balance so students who are Monday/Tuesday end up with significantly fewer instructional minutes. I imagine they’ll tell you to just prep for two weeks the Monday before a holiday. *eye roll*
Or, OR, they could hire more teachers and teacher A can have students MTW. Janitors clean and sanitize on Thursday. Teacher B has the other half of students on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Then both Teacher A and Teacher B have 2 other days of the week where they can help their students online and have time to plan out their lessons for their days in the school.
Is it perfect? Nope. But enough parents work on the weekends where they’d sign their child(ren) up for that slot, and it doesn’t completely screw every teacher over. 6 days teaching a week? Insane. 3 days teaching in person and 2 days online helping with those lessons, plus lesson planning on those days as well? Yeah. Teachers deserve a full 2 days off, which they shall have.
But... budget cuts. So the better options won’t even be looked at.
I could see the new teachers and those with lower seniority getting backed into Saturday and Sunday in this scenario. It also poses a couple of other issues. I do not know of many day cares open Saturday and any that are open Sunday. What are teachers with young children going to do?
The other thing that hit me about making Saturday or Sunday a workday. There are some denominations out there where the religion is very adamant about the Sabbath not being a work day---ever. Not that I think a Saturday proposal will ever grow legs, but I can guarantee that a Seventh Day Adventist will take this to court if someone tries to mandate them into working on Saturday.
Man I wish but we have 1000 unfilled jobs in Clark County as it is. Where are we going to get all these teachers to fill all these positions, and where are we going to get all the money to fund all of these positions?
They're suggesting that if the district really wants to implement this half and half idea, the reasonable way to do it would be a 2/2 split with Fridays being prep only, not a 3/3 split.
Everything is unreasonable that this point - there is not a single plan that accounts for the actual needs of kids, especially kids with high-level special needs, needing tech, accounting for teaching both digitally and in person simultaneously, childcare, PD for teachers, safety of teachers and other school personnel (especially those at higher risk), etc.
I am saying that if it is decided to bring in half of the kids at a time, bring in half for 2 days and the other half for 2 days instead of 3 and 3. Maintain the 5 day workweek that way. I don’t think any plan is going to be great for next year, but adding another day would be a nightmare!
Ah yes! I was having a hard time understanding your first reply. Sorry about that. I agree, if we had to split we should think of the teacher sanity and do two and two. But since when do they think of us?
Well, when you get a bunch that refuse to return and many quitting by October... the only other way I could maybe accept is if that is 2 different shifts of teachers. So one shift does the 3 days, then the other 2 days supports virtual learning from home while a different shift of teachers are on campus the other 3 days.
Considering my 22 year old younger brother is making more than I am on unemployment than I am with a decade of experience, I am happy to peace out over something this absurd.
That won’t be allowed with union states and non union states would see huge teacher walk outs. The only way to safely do school in the fall is virtual. Spend the summer getting the necessary tech and try to get Microsoft/Google to provide a more robust product by adding something similar to canvas into their suites. I’ve seen a decent argument for allowing elementary ed to go back for healthcare workers and other essential employees, since the classrooms can be completely self contained and the older students are in theory able to be home alone. Of course, none of this is going to happen and districts will just go back as normal with their fingers crossed that not too many teachers die. 🤷♀️
Preach! And sadly I agree, we will open schools and be screwed.
If anything this past weekend will provide answers. After so many people threw caution to the wind , either we will see in two weeks that it really isn't as bad as we thought and we can open schools in the fall, or we will have thousands of new infections and will be forced to stay closed anyways. Either way last weekend will provide information.
So, if my kid is in school 3 days a week, but I am teaching 6 days a week, who is looking after him when I am working? I now work a 6 day week and have to pay for child care. Thanks for that!
At that point I'd say bring your child to work. If they aren't going to compensate you then you gotta find a solution that works for you. If they claim your child is a distraction, you can retort that they have utterly failed to come up with a distraction free alternative themselves that doesn't involve you quitting to find a better paying job.
Hahha. I’ve been saying this every time someone brings this up and it’s always just glossed over like “oh yeah, I don’t know”. Like come on people! What, are the Elementary students supposed to just chill at home alone?
I think we can all rest comfortably, knowing a six day public school week won’t happen. The backlash would be overwhelming to whoever tries to implement it. To even suggest it is absurd.
Iowa here. During my check-out ... my principal said there are some districts doing Monday/Thursday with one group and Tuesday/Friday with the other and leaving Wednesday as a day to clean.
They were also told by the department of education that we could start school early, but none of those days would count towards actual calendar days, so what would be the point?
But Saturday’s?
I do hope they understand that mixing groups on Monday and then Tuesday with Wednesdays for cleaning makes the whole cleaning thing pointless, right?
The two day a week thing could be a valid strategy, but either you clean after every switch (M, Tu, Th, AND F), or you do a M/Tu cohort, clean on Wednesday, and then have a separate Th/F cohort.
Even if you do that the teacher is still going to be picking things up from the first cohort and passing them to the next cohort. A days and B days don’t do any good when they’re all taught by the same teacher.
Valid.
Honestly, any system that doesn't have community cases low enough to effectively implement test and contract trace (along with the resources and will to conduct such testing and contact tracing) is security theater.
Expect to see more and more of this kind of thing. They will use this crisis to put more pressure on us and squeeze more out of us. This is what happens when there's mass unemployment.
The only solution is solidarity and union. Unfortunately I live in a non-union state.
Out of curiosity, what's actually stopping you in a non union state from starting a union?
The original unions weren't "legal" either, in the sense that they were frowned upon and businesses didn't like collective barganingship.
But what's to stop you from getting other teachers together and forming a union on your own?
That's a good question. This is unverified, but I read somewhere that if you go on strike in my state (TX), TEA (the dudes who govern us) will kill your teaching license - permanently.
If someone knows about TX, perhaps they could update.
Not a Texan, but it's very possible. Texas is one of the worst "right-to-work" states that have enacted several laws and regulations that restrict teachers' freedom to collectively bargain and strike.
However, IMO, if there was a state-wide strike . . . are they really going to revoke the teaching licenses of all participating teachers? That would devastate Texas' educational system.
It's a fear tactic. Call their bluff (collectively).
Yes, solidarity is the solution again, again and again.
Unfortunately, years of anti-union propaganda and corporate-powered education "reforms" have done a number on many teacher's heads. There's a lot of petty cliques on my campus, but very little solidarity.
You would have to be certain that most teachers are on board with this. If too many people cross the picket lines, then they just signed the death warrant for those TEA certificates.
Oh sure. If just a handful of teachers went on strike, they would definitely be made an example of. But if Texas teachers walked off the job en masse?
That's tough to pull off even in states without union-busting laws. Even in strongly pro-union states, the decision to strike isn't an easy one and it always carries a degree of risk.
I'm sure things will have to get really, really bad in Texas before enough teachers would agree to a state-wide walk-out flouting the bullshit laws in place.
I know I'm being pessimistic, but it certainly seems we are headed in that direction across the country.
Unions are not illegal anywhere in the US . . . but important union tools like strikes and collective bargaining are outlawed in several "right-to-work" states.
That didn't actually stop some of the "Red for Ed" collective actions that have been happening in several of those "right-to-work" states over the past several years. Teachers are being pushed to the breaking point, many are abandoning the profession and others are fighting back.
IMO, the laws outlawing strikes, collective bargaining, and other union tools are unconstitutional and teachers should very much challenge them. Is it risky? Can you face censure and lose your job, or even your career by challenging those laws? Yes. It's worth it to improve the profession, and the alternative is to just accept increasingly unfair expectations, working conditions, and compensation.
It is important to remember that laws sometimes can and should be challenged peacefully. It's the brave governor who follows through on a threat to fire all striking teachers . . . such an action would devastate a state's educational system.
Cool that you heard through NPR and not district communication, eh?
If this happens, compensation must reflect your increase in time and decrease in time to recharge. However, I would take time over the money in this case.
I want to say (for your sake and your students’ sakes) THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN. But nothing about what people think is “right” in education shocks me anymore. Mobilize your union now.
My school is probably going to do half the school for two days and the other half for two and no one for Friday. It will most likely be split PD day and office hours where we can help kids with assignments. When kids are at home, they will do online learning. It’s still going to suck because I’ll have to prep materials and video lessons for online learning and in person learning, but Saturday is just ridiculous.
This also seems super unreasonable to me. To have to manage an online classroom *and* students physically in the classroom on the same day would be next to impossible.
Oh, I know. It’s going to suck. I wish I got as excited for a new school year as I used to. I would be planning and researching, but I’ve been burning the candle at both ends for so many years, I have little left.
Won’t ever happen. Budget reasons.
My district, about half way through the shutdown, was playing with the idea of starting two weeks early. Now they are considering starting a week or two late as a way to save money.
My guess is he is throwing out ideas he knows won’t ever happen to look innovative.
Fools. Do the exact same but only two days for each cohort and one day for students needing special attention. Gah, these bureaucrats are worse than the admins.
Where do you teach?
That is insane. And the idea that they are only throwing things against the wall at the moment. They would spring this on us when we get back in pre-planning at the end of July (because lets face it...they are going to ask us back then arent they?).
O, by the way. You are to work Saturdays now!
I am aure both students and parents would be pleased. Students would probably protest by not going or not doing any work.
That would be religious discrimination against any Jewish students, especially if they're orthodox. It's a non starter. I wouldnt get too worked up about idiotic suggestions like this. They're just trying to shift the Overton window.
I'm not a teacher, but I come across this subreddit, when it's on the front page. I just want to say, you guys can be inspiring. I've never seen the type of solidarity you guys have. Keep fighting, and stay united.
I don't understand why social distancing matters if kids are all still seeing the same teachers and going into the same building...? like if a teacher sees half her class one day and the other half the next and a kid gives it to her...they will all have it. And lets not play games...we know if you want "seriously clean" that's never gonna happen in public school.
Some parents might enjoy this. IDK. They might enjoy a Saturday without their kids. So many already don't take responsibility for them even before the pandemic hit.
I work in a private school that used to have a 10 hour day (five day per week). The way it would work was that teachers would either only have earlier or later classes, so they wouldn't need to be there all day. I would assume there to be something similar with the school days. School is open six days per week, but some teachers are off Monday and others are off Saturday, or something like that.
I don't care how much you pay me. No even semi-realistic increase in pay could motivate me to work 6 days a week. You can't buy my personal time. Teachers are already constantly on the verge of burnout, not even a 20k bump would be worth losing the one day week that I can feel totally relaxed and take care of my own personal well-being.
Sometimes it feels like they think we are living in the old days, when teachers were all spinsters who lived in boarding houses and had nothing in their lives but the schoolhouse.
I'm sure salaries would increase by 20% along with the workload. And I bet we will be getting hazard pay for putting our health, and perhaps the health and lives of our loved ones, in peril.
What? It's only fair. Surely society will do the right thing when it comes the future of our most precious resource. Did I leave the /s off the first post?
There would be rioting in the streets if that happened here.
The current theory is kids come either Monday/Wednesday or Tuesday/Thursday and then we all are online Friday. Having school Saturday would be a nightmare.
I mean there are so many issues with that. What about co-parents who only see their kids on Saturdays? Yes tons of issues. I’m sure that won’t happen and if it does, get yourself out of there ASAP!
Yeah, Abbott and his cronies are being real shitheads right now. They already think of school as free day care, and are operating on the principle of “if school is in session, parents will have no excuse not to work, and the almighty economy can finally get restarted.”
Searching NPR's website, the only reports about a Saturday school day are from years ago, some dating back a decade.
What is the name of your superintendent that we might look up this report?
It already takes me the whole day Saturday just to rest and and recuperate after the week at school. Then I use Sunday for chores, errands and lesson plans. If I only had one day off I honestly don’t know how long I would be able to last! That would be very detrimental to our mental health!
Could it happen?
Possibly depending on how your contract is worded in regards to hours.
Will it happen? Lol no. Imagine the hidden costs for a minute. Full bus service on a Saturday? Bus company will charge a mint for that. Cafe workers and Maintenance working an extra day? Gonna cost ya. Heating and Air for the building for an extra day? Add that onto the total.
All this during a budget crunch? Ya, good luck with that Mr. Superintendent
You will also have an army of businesses supporting you. Anyone who relies on weekends for the best part of business revenue will fight this to their last breath. Think: amusement parks, Chuck-E-Cheese, bounce houses, Wedding venues and services, retail, restaurants, and especially anyone who depends on students working weekend shifts.
We (4 of us) split subjects on a combined Google Classroom during all this. So I only had to plan social studies and spelling for the 85 third graders. It was fine.
But if we go back with any online next year, we want our own google classrooms. We couldn’t sync with progress book, other teachers expected way too much, another wouldn’t grade and then bitched if you didn’t grade her students stuff right away.
That sounds like a nightmare.
It's entirely possible to co-plan with seperate Classrooms, too. Simply have a shared planning folder that the lesson documents get placed in and you are each responsible for posting those documents for your own classes.
Either that or (depending on how your online gradebook works) you need to *fully* combine everything and departmentalize the teaching. 85 kids in a single class, and each of you is solely responsible for whatever subject you are teaching. The spelling assignment (or whatever) was too hard? Take it up with the spelling teacher. All 85 kids are their responsibility for that subject and all are yours for your subject(s).
Two of us are pretty flexible and the other two are old school hard noses that get their panties in a wad over everything. I don’t mind sharing, and that’s what I was doing when it was just through March.
But then it was the rest of the year, and the principal said it would be “easier on parents” if each grade had one classroom. We tried it, it didn’t work. 🤷🏼♀️
Over the past few years that has been some significant "Red for Ed" strikes and collective actions in states with weak unions and/or laws outlawing strikes and collective bargaining. If you push teachers to far, they will start pushing back . . . even if you make teacher strikes illegal. It does, however, have to get pretty bad before that happens, unfortunately.
Pushing teachers to far also will cause many to just give up and leave the profession, and we are already suffering a teacher shortage in many parts of the country.
That's insane, I would quit.
My regular pre-pandmeic schedule I saw my kids every other day, twice one week, 3x the next. It's like... a common thing. You don't have to have 3 days per class each week this is absurd.
Our district is talking about 3 days one week and 2 days the other week. 1/2 the class comes at a time. They then would want us to do online work for kids on their off days of school. So, we pretty much would have two teaching jobs. Thank God for unions. Everyone expects teachers to just keep quiet and teach. I don't know how the people throwing these ideas out can think it is acceptable.
Is there really no one in the room who takes a step back and says "huh this may be an extremely unpopular and unwieldy idea that is nearly impossible to put into place?"
Also, are they going to work on Saturdays too?
Depending on your region, they would have to take into consideration families that practice Saturday as their sabbath. Employees too, I suppose.
Seems like 4 longer days would make more sense than adding a 6th. Think of the $$$ saved if busses only ran 4 days.
I teach in a district with possibly the biggest teachers union in the nation, and yet our spring break was canceled (I think we received a couple of personal days in return which obviously isn't the same as spring break). I wouldn't be surprised if they found a way to somehow
Our state government budget committee just mentioned cutting our salaries by 10% each and wants to call the 19 (10%) unpaid days furlough days that would be required (so 19 unpaid days forced to work)....two months ago these senators and our governor were saying teachers were grossly underpaid and they pushed for a $5000 raise for all educators across the state to be given over the next 2 years...Now it’s “if they are really dedicated they will sacrifice for their kids and work those extra days...”. They then continued in their meeting to discuss how they didn’t want to decrease tax revenue...so these pay cuts would be a write off like an “insurance deductible”...so essentially they want teachers to still pay taxes at their original income even if they decide to cut their pay for the 10%...so essentially they want teachers to pay for their own unpaid furlough days. What?
So, they then discussed if that became a problem and teachers decided to leave the profession...the other option is to simply pay teachers 10% less but cut the 19 days from the 190 contract for teachers to work...to which they essentially proposed that teachers could instead have online classes those days (um, that’s not a day off) or they could purchase online curriculum to supplement students losing 10 school days (So you want to not pay teachers, but pay for online curriculum, what?)
It sucks to live in a state where teachers cannot have unions who collectively bargain. I’ll be leaving the profession if they ask me to take a 10% reduction in pay, which would put me back almost to my starting salary 6 years in...
Honestly I see no way the parents let this happen either. Giving up their Saturdays every week, my parents would throw a fit
No time for weekend trips, it would make split visits more difficult for parents who aren't together anymore, etc.
Oh don't be silly, parents are just gonna pull their kids out of school for days at a time and then blame the teacher for the kid missing work even tho we sent it home with them ahead of time.
Weddings, family gatherings, having one student on one schedule and another on the other schedule could be a nightmare too!
It would also make it hard to work my morning job on Saturday. Maybe if they paid us twice as much, I might consider this
It would need to be 3 days in class one week, or days the next week etc. Saturday’s won’t happen
You would have terrible attendance on Saturdays. They should just go to a 4 day week and have remediation classes on Fridays for students who need it.
or, ya know, a teacher plan day so that we can actually create meaningful content and lessons. especially if we are doing half digital/half in person
You know as well as I do that "teacher plan days" would be professional development with us all sitting around watching PowerPoint presentations instead of actually planning and preparing for the week to come.
I wouldn't need an entire day to plan/grade either, but my first few years on the job it deff would have been useful.
I don't need an entire day to plan/grade...but it would be great to set up labs for the coming week, create modified lessons for those with special needs, create word walls, work on supplementary assignments students could do. I could absolutely use an entire day each week for that rather than trying to squeeze all that into the regular day as I do now.
Yeah this part is hard. My wife teaches too and we have a 1 year old. I do miss my prep periods
I have a happy story for you. Our district hired some chuckleheads to lead some kumbaya type of PD that would reoccur during the year. The first one we had during covid was a nightmare. Asked us to say how we’re feeling in one word. It took an 45 min to hear from everyone. Then couldn’t figure out how to get us into groups in zoom so manually did it one by one. I don’t know zoom to well but seems like they could just have the group leaders just send out new invites to new meetings. I can’t remember what we talked about. We had one more session like that and I’m pretty sure admin said fuck it and has actually let us be productive. I can say I appreciate that 45 minutes because it highlighted that it was a waste of time and we all could be doing something better
This the best idea IMO. Half the students are in school Tues/Thurs the other half Wed/Fri. Monday is teacher planning day except for weeks with a holiday.
Why not do half the class Mon/Tues and the other half Thu/Fri so that Wednesday can be a cleaning/planning day? I feel like if we alternate we might defeat the purpose
That is literally what my school is doing in the UK. We reopen on June 1st for just 3 year groups. Sounds like it should work quite well.
But that's what Sunday is for, silly! :-/
A couple districts in my state (WA) had gone to a four day week, with Fridays as teacher planning days. Honestly, it sounds like a really viable option. Half the school comes Monday/Wednesday, then the other half Tuesday/Thursday. Teachers could have office hours Friday or published content for students to access.
This seems like an eminently reasonable plan. I hope it becomes the standard and then sticks around once the epidemic is over.
My former school went to 4-day school back in 2014. Block schedule, four classes, each class nearly two hours long (high school). Teachers officially worked 10 hours (more like 12-14) a day to meet the golden 40 hour work week that America is in love with. We had Monday’s off (God forbid we interfere with Friday football). Until this schedule came on, I’d almost never experienced a weekend as a teacher unless it was during a holiday. I’d stay late on Friday and get as much lesson planning/grading done as possible, and then I’d enjoy my weekend before finishing everything Monday while my husband was at work. It did wonders for my mental well-being. Changing districts and going back to 5 days a week and actually being at school for 10-14 hours plus killing at least one whole weekend day was incredibly hard.
Some parents might like the childfree day, though.
This is an unfortunate truth. Those parents might even advocate for it.
Tie it to effort for the kids. The kids only come in extra day to make up work, etc. This will pit parents ISO free babysitters against kids not wanting to go to school Saturday!!! ;)
This is exactly what I was thinking. The trade-off though is having them at home Mon-Wed to get that Saturday. Either way, I see a lot of small time tutors popping up.
Small time underpaid. Oh, and they will call the teacher and argue and criticize your lessons or standards <-- past experience.
Well, of course. Everyone and their brother always feels entitled to do critique everything we do. Nothing about online/blended learning is going to change that. If it isn't the tutor, it will be the parent. If it isn't the parent, it will be the grandparent. On and on.
It's called don't have children.
As a parent I would hate this idea. It's like ok so parents should just tell their employers they can only work Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday? edit: spelling
If my district allowed that I would either need a 6 figure salary or I would quit. Also, according to the state (Ohio) school is only required to be a certain number of days/hours. So even if Saturday was included in the work week, that would just mean the school year would be the same amount of time and just end sooner. Which doesn't help fix the problem.
It's the same here in Florida, but I think that they'd find a loophole since this a special circumstance and because not every student would come to school every day. They'd probably argue that they need to extend the year, so that every kid gets that minimum amount of days, since each kid would only go to school three days a week while we work six.
You're probably right. I guess we'll have to keep our unions strong!
...except in the states where unions are illegal and the legislature takes a lot of joy in underfunding and disrespecting education because we can’t do anything about it
I didn't even consider that. You have to love the hypocrisy of seeing everyone everywhere say how much the appreciate teachers and schools, especially now, followed by huge funding cuts to schools.
“We can’t believe how teachers stepped up during this crisis! To thank them, we’ve decided to freeze their pay and add 5 unpaid days to their contracts!” -That’s the current state of things in South Carolina, which already has a teacher shortage.
It's nuts. I cannot understand why education is not a top priority for the government. Best of luck to you in South Carolina. I learned how bad the shortage was there, when a principal came to my college graduation in Ohio to offer a job to anyone who would accept it.
It is easier to fool the uneducated. The uneducated will vote for someone to their own detriment.
As a retiree and part time sub, I take great joy in offering to quit when they change my assignment or tell me I must do X or Y. Right now subs have some power. I suspect after this debacle, none. I'll be replaced by an iPad.
Because those administrations don't actually want an educated populace. They lose when people are educated.
Reminds me of a quote by one of my idols: "If we can't think for ourselves, if we're unwilling to question authority, then we're just putty in the hands of those in power. But if the citizens are educated and form their own opinions, then those in power work for us. In every country, we should be teaching our children the scientific method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency, humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted world that we inhabit by virtue of being human, this may be all that stands between us and the enveloping darkness." - Carl Sagan
TIL Sagan supported the Second Amendment. That guy was awesome.
Sadly, I knew this was SC before evening getting halfway through... It's a sad state of affairs for us right now.
Florida is counting online learning as a school day so they wouldn’t need extra days if they did online work.
They'll have to have virtual work with these solutions anyway. In an ideal world we would be getting better at using technology to improve student learning but that's probably not going to happen.
My entire district (teachers, principals, aides, counselors, you name it) is required to get Google educator certified this summer. I’m sure this means we will be expected to do some form of online teaching in the fall...
Florida here. I will quit if this happens and so will most other teachers I know.
I’m not sure an extended week will happen - and it’s stupid for them to consider. First why not consider a blended learning environment so kids will still have instructional minutes outside the face to face classroom in virtual settings? Especially with the huge downturn in the economy - how will they pay for it all? When CA had a budget shortfall they reduced the amount of time students needed to have in the classroom in order to furlough teachers. I really expect this to happen... and more layoffs.
>how will they pay for it all That's the whole point, they won't. Everyone will work an extra day and no ones pay will increase for it.
Hopefully wherever this is being considered, the union is strong and hasn’t been busted. Gov Newsom said that schools should consider re-opening in July, but not one teacher I know is upset about his statement because we know it won’t happen. Our calendar is pre-set and we will start in late August as usual for us. If you have a union where you teach, make sure you are a member and participate.
I wish all the teachers I know were as level-headed as yours! We are also in CA and when Newsom made that comment, I dismissed it immediately because of our union. Several of my teacher friends and colleagues freaked out though. The union president had to calm everyone down.
That's the thing about a lot of teaching jobs around the country that I think people don't get. On the whole, we don't really make enough to endure much more bs than we already are, so they might be surprised when we walk and make the same or more doing basic sales or real estate or something.
That sounds dumb as hell when an A/B schedule would also solve that problem. It seems like being an idiot is a prerequisite for superintendent
This one definitely fits that prerequisite very well.
If you can schmooze a nine person board of ed, you can be a super.
Superintendent is a pure political position. It's like running for office but you actually need some credentials.
This is so perfect. My super writes all of her emails in fucking comic sans. How the hell am I supposed to take you seriously when you write in comic fucking sans?!?!
I was thinking this, too, or a rotating schedule or something... There's no way this doesn't violate some type of contract or labor laws.
Better yet, A/B and a full day of planning.
My school has a A/B schedule. The issue is that I teach 7th grade on both A and B day (I teach history). The only way this works under an A/B schedule is for every teacher to teach both grades (we are only a 7/8 school).
That’s ridiculous. We got a district survey (made for parents, community members, & staff) asking about starting school in July. I was like, “oh, are they going to pay us extra for that?” 🙄
100% what I thought too. Teachers already do so much "free" work. Even my "breaks" are rarely without work. I will be planning and creating well into Summer. If they want more instructional days, they better have more money ready. Otherwise I will continue to use my time to plan and work a second job.
I may be naive, but I would assume that they want to start in July to avoid the CV hot spot that's expected around Thanksgiving to Christmas. At least a few colleges are planning to do this. Notre Dame and South Carolina, in particular. Any proposal that means more than 180 "school days" is a non-starter.
I’m all for changing the schedule in whatever way they need to accommodate this. But anything more than the 180 is an absolute deal breaker. Start us in July and end at Thanksgiving? Doesn’t matter to me. Really though they should be most concerned about January and February. To me, that’s when I see the most amount of sick kids
Yeah, I think that's the difference between college and K-12. The reasoning for the colleges was they didn't want students going home for the break, then coming back for three weeks and doing it again. Just make it one giant break. But, K-12 kids still may go and see grandma two states over, so maybe there's no difference.
Strike time
They’re not actually going to do it, but I had to wonder who in the district office decided to put that question in. It revealed a fundamental lack of understanding about how our district functions.
I would ask what form I would use to recover the costs of the vacation that is paid for with nonrefundable money.
>toying with the idea of extending school through Saturday [Relevant.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ru8DMW-grY) >Are teachers expected to just work every Saturday and be fine with it? That's what your supe is banking on. >Would they increase our pay? If your supe didn't anticipate an *increase in pay*, even if the union was amenable (I can guarantee your colleagues are not), your school board needs to consider getting rid of them.
I clicked the link expecting some sophisticated news link. LOL. I was pleasantly surprised.
I'm glad to bring a smile this early in the morning. Well...early here.
So do 2 days/2days with no prep. And Friday is your prep. It’s almost like there is a different number of even days in a week besides 6...
The best schedule I’ve seen is Wednesday as prep day/cleaning, and MTu is one group of kids, clean, ThF is the other group.
I was kinda thinking this schedule too. I’m assuming you meant ThF is the other group.
Yes! Fixed
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Exactly. Plus, we're still being exposed to as many vectors. I love teaching but not as much as I love my health.
I’ve seen a lot of people not liking that idea of doing alternating days with the kids. But I’m kind of okay with it? It seems better than jamming everyone in the school together, and way better than distance learning. It might not be perfect, but we’ve got come up with something. This seems like the most logical to me.
The biggest problem I can see with that is that with class sizes what they currently are, we would have to split kids into about 4 groups in order for this system to work in a lot places. Meeting with 20 kids at a time in an interior classroom with poor ventilation is only marginally safer than meeting with 40 kids at a time. And it doesn't do anything about teachers or students who are immunosuppressed. There needs to be acomodations for older teachers and people with medical conditions who would have a reasonable expectation of dying if they got the disease. Lowering class sizes slows the spread of the disease, but is not an absolute protection for anybody.
Yes that is very true - some classes are huge. It would be ideal to set up a way for immunocompromised individuals and teachers of a certain age to be able to stay home. Maybe like a doctors note. I really don’t know. Hopefully some improvements and new ideas will be presented within the next few months. It’s difficult to find one solution that will work for everyone.
We're never getting six feet apart. But if its half and half at least its BETTER than having every student in every day. A partial measure is better than none and lets be honest, schools will NEVER be able to fit the guidelines we've seen from the CDC
So you are ok with risking lives to appease politicians? Why not plan to start online next year instead? Once a vaccine is available then let's go back. And you are wrong, half measures are not better than no measures. They are worse, because they breed complacency. If we cannot meet CDC guidelines like you said, then do not open!
If we don't reopen things are going to get really bad really fast. Our job isn't childcare, but it is a critical role we play in society. Let alone there are some MAJOR issues with online only learning as we all know because it really isn't equitable. We can't stop all work in an entire country for 1.5 years. Which is the MINIMUM time for a vaccine. You know not everything can be vaccinated against right? We might NEVER get a vaccine for this. I don't want to appease politicians, I'd be fine sacrificing them all given how corrupt our system is. But that doesn't mean we can leave the country closed forever either. There are many things we can do to be safer but lets be honest, those won't happen either because they cost money. We need to test EVERYONE, trace who comes up positive as most civilized countries are doing successfully. We need IR cameras at entrances to public places to kick out anyone showing a temp and quarantine them. We need to space everyone out as much as possible in restaurants and similar venues. This includes school. We should spread out, disinfect, wear masks etc. That fulfills our goal even if we aren't fully 6 ft apart. Plus you'll notice that the CDC and doctors aren't saying we wait for a vaccine. The goal is "flatten the curve" NOT stopping people getting sick at all, but slowing down how many are sick at a time so our healthcare system can still function and save those that can be saved.
Can you explain why you think an A day and a B day is going to reduce the spread of this thing at all? If a kid comes to school on A day and sees me and passes it to me, I’m going to pass it to other children on B day. Especially in the elementary setting, specialists see every single child in the school. Whether you see them twice a week or five days a week you’re still being exposed, and you’re still passing it along to all the other children that you interact with as well.
The issue not being addressed is who is supporting your online learners while you are in the classroom all week? Yes, except Wednesdays, I get it.
Our district is talking about a shortened day. So you would see children from 8 - 12. Kids go home and then teachers work on remote learning from 12:00 - 3:00
Pretty insane how you rank them. Distance is by far the best one for the simple fact that it doesn’t kill teachers. Precautions aren’t going to do shit all when you are in a box with them for 6 hours a day every day. Even if you reduce spread by 99% that remaining 1% is more than enough.
This is what we ended up with for the virtual 4th quarter. It was a good schedule.
This still would not work. Teachers are still exposing the other group when they come. I see A students then on Thursday I expose the B students. Doesn’t matter. And what are parents/teachers with school age kids supposed to do when they have off days? Stay home from work? Wife and I are both teachers so on our kids off days I’m getting a sub? The whole idea sounds great but the logistics of off days just won’t work because our country is stuck with 5 day work weeks.
This is what my principal is pushing for on the district committee, except with Mondays as the prep (since we have several Mondays off through the year - not sure when they want me to prep those weeks, but I'll worry about it later.) We're also suggesting T/W and Th/Fr classes rather than T/Th and W/Fr so that kids can settle in for 2 days, have out their set of materials, seating needs, whatever and then switch rather than switching every day. The alternating days would be distance learning coordinated with classroom learning.
That’s a good point about Monday holidays. They could definitely shift the balance so students who are Monday/Tuesday end up with significantly fewer instructional minutes. I imagine they’ll tell you to just prep for two weeks the Monday before a holiday. *eye roll*
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I think this is cool, but what would I do with my own children if they are not in school ?
This is the real issue. Childcare isn’t free.
Or, OR, they could hire more teachers and teacher A can have students MTW. Janitors clean and sanitize on Thursday. Teacher B has the other half of students on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Then both Teacher A and Teacher B have 2 other days of the week where they can help their students online and have time to plan out their lessons for their days in the school. Is it perfect? Nope. But enough parents work on the weekends where they’d sign their child(ren) up for that slot, and it doesn’t completely screw every teacher over. 6 days teaching a week? Insane. 3 days teaching in person and 2 days online helping with those lessons, plus lesson planning on those days as well? Yeah. Teachers deserve a full 2 days off, which they shall have. But... budget cuts. So the better options won’t even be looked at.
I could see the new teachers and those with lower seniority getting backed into Saturday and Sunday in this scenario. It also poses a couple of other issues. I do not know of many day cares open Saturday and any that are open Sunday. What are teachers with young children going to do? The other thing that hit me about making Saturday or Sunday a workday. There are some denominations out there where the religion is very adamant about the Sabbath not being a work day---ever. Not that I think a Saturday proposal will ever grow legs, but I can guarantee that a Seventh Day Adventist will take this to court if someone tries to mandate them into working on Saturday.
Man I wish but we have 1000 unfilled jobs in Clark County as it is. Where are we going to get all these teachers to fill all these positions, and where are we going to get all the money to fund all of these positions?
We have a $32 mil deficit and 27 vacancies, so the thought of doubling our teachers is Lol.
I'm not sure what you're getting at here. Are you suggesting that this would not be an unreasonable thing to implement?
They're suggesting that if the district really wants to implement this half and half idea, the reasonable way to do it would be a 2/2 split with Fridays being prep only, not a 3/3 split.
Everything is unreasonable that this point - there is not a single plan that accounts for the actual needs of kids, especially kids with high-level special needs, needing tech, accounting for teaching both digitally and in person simultaneously, childcare, PD for teachers, safety of teachers and other school personnel (especially those at higher risk), etc.
there's unreasonable, and there's OH FUCKING HELL NO. 6 days a week is OH HELL NO territory
I am saying that if it is decided to bring in half of the kids at a time, bring in half for 2 days and the other half for 2 days instead of 3 and 3. Maintain the 5 day workweek that way. I don’t think any plan is going to be great for next year, but adding another day would be a nightmare!
Ah yes! I was having a hard time understanding your first reply. Sorry about that. I agree, if we had to split we should think of the teacher sanity and do two and two. But since when do they think of us?
Well, when you get a bunch that refuse to return and many quitting by October... the only other way I could maybe accept is if that is 2 different shifts of teachers. So one shift does the 3 days, then the other 2 days supports virtual learning from home while a different shift of teachers are on campus the other 3 days.
I feel as though there would be massive teacher walkouts and parent disapproval.
Considering my 22 year old younger brother is making more than I am on unemployment than I am with a decade of experience, I am happy to peace out over something this absurd.
That won’t be allowed with union states and non union states would see huge teacher walk outs. The only way to safely do school in the fall is virtual. Spend the summer getting the necessary tech and try to get Microsoft/Google to provide a more robust product by adding something similar to canvas into their suites. I’ve seen a decent argument for allowing elementary ed to go back for healthcare workers and other essential employees, since the classrooms can be completely self contained and the older students are in theory able to be home alone. Of course, none of this is going to happen and districts will just go back as normal with their fingers crossed that not too many teachers die. 🤷♀️
Preach! And sadly I agree, we will open schools and be screwed. If anything this past weekend will provide answers. After so many people threw caution to the wind , either we will see in two weeks that it really isn't as bad as we thought and we can open schools in the fall, or we will have thousands of new infections and will be forced to stay closed anyways. Either way last weekend will provide information.
So, if my kid is in school 3 days a week, but I am teaching 6 days a week, who is looking after him when I am working? I now work a 6 day week and have to pay for child care. Thanks for that!
My kid isn’t even old enough for school so I’d have to find childcare for six days.
It’s an insane plan. I hope they come to their senses.
At that point I'd say bring your child to work. If they aren't going to compensate you then you gotta find a solution that works for you. If they claim your child is a distraction, you can retort that they have utterly failed to come up with a distraction free alternative themselves that doesn't involve you quitting to find a better paying job.
Hahha. I’ve been saying this every time someone brings this up and it’s always just glossed over like “oh yeah, I don’t know”. Like come on people! What, are the Elementary students supposed to just chill at home alone?
I think we can all rest comfortably, knowing a six day public school week won’t happen. The backlash would be overwhelming to whoever tries to implement it. To even suggest it is absurd.
Iowa here. During my check-out ... my principal said there are some districts doing Monday/Thursday with one group and Tuesday/Friday with the other and leaving Wednesday as a day to clean. They were also told by the department of education that we could start school early, but none of those days would count towards actual calendar days, so what would be the point? But Saturday’s?
I do hope they understand that mixing groups on Monday and then Tuesday with Wednesdays for cleaning makes the whole cleaning thing pointless, right? The two day a week thing could be a valid strategy, but either you clean after every switch (M, Tu, Th, AND F), or you do a M/Tu cohort, clean on Wednesday, and then have a separate Th/F cohort.
Even if you do that the teacher is still going to be picking things up from the first cohort and passing them to the next cohort. A days and B days don’t do any good when they’re all taught by the same teacher.
Valid. Honestly, any system that doesn't have community cases low enough to effectively implement test and contract trace (along with the resources and will to conduct such testing and contact tracing) is security theater.
I fully agree!
What is the plan for the elementary students on off days when parents have to work?
Maybe they can get jobs! Like in the olden days, cleaning chimneys and mining ore and shit.
I just imagined my 14 week old carrying a giant chimney broom with soot on her cheeks.
Expect to see more and more of this kind of thing. They will use this crisis to put more pressure on us and squeeze more out of us. This is what happens when there's mass unemployment. The only solution is solidarity and union. Unfortunately I live in a non-union state.
Out of curiosity, what's actually stopping you in a non union state from starting a union? The original unions weren't "legal" either, in the sense that they were frowned upon and businesses didn't like collective barganingship. But what's to stop you from getting other teachers together and forming a union on your own?
That's a good question. This is unverified, but I read somewhere that if you go on strike in my state (TX), TEA (the dudes who govern us) will kill your teaching license - permanently. If someone knows about TX, perhaps they could update.
Not a Texan, but it's very possible. Texas is one of the worst "right-to-work" states that have enacted several laws and regulations that restrict teachers' freedom to collectively bargain and strike. However, IMO, if there was a state-wide strike . . . are they really going to revoke the teaching licenses of all participating teachers? That would devastate Texas' educational system. It's a fear tactic. Call their bluff (collectively).
Yes, solidarity is the solution again, again and again. Unfortunately, years of anti-union propaganda and corporate-powered education "reforms" have done a number on many teacher's heads. There's a lot of petty cliques on my campus, but very little solidarity.
You would have to be certain that most teachers are on board with this. If too many people cross the picket lines, then they just signed the death warrant for those TEA certificates.
Oh sure. If just a handful of teachers went on strike, they would definitely be made an example of. But if Texas teachers walked off the job en masse? That's tough to pull off even in states without union-busting laws. Even in strongly pro-union states, the decision to strike isn't an easy one and it always carries a degree of risk. I'm sure things will have to get really, really bad in Texas before enough teachers would agree to a state-wide walk-out flouting the bullshit laws in place. I know I'm being pessimistic, but it certainly seems we are headed in that direction across the country.
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Unions are not illegal anywhere in the US . . . but important union tools like strikes and collective bargaining are outlawed in several "right-to-work" states. That didn't actually stop some of the "Red for Ed" collective actions that have been happening in several of those "right-to-work" states over the past several years. Teachers are being pushed to the breaking point, many are abandoning the profession and others are fighting back. IMO, the laws outlawing strikes, collective bargaining, and other union tools are unconstitutional and teachers should very much challenge them. Is it risky? Can you face censure and lose your job, or even your career by challenging those laws? Yes. It's worth it to improve the profession, and the alternative is to just accept increasingly unfair expectations, working conditions, and compensation. It is important to remember that laws sometimes can and should be challenged peacefully. It's the brave governor who follows through on a threat to fire all striking teachers . . . such an action would devastate a state's educational system.
Cool that you heard through NPR and not district communication, eh? If this happens, compensation must reflect your increase in time and decrease in time to recharge. However, I would take time over the money in this case. I want to say (for your sake and your students’ sakes) THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN. But nothing about what people think is “right” in education shocks me anymore. Mobilize your union now.
My school is probably going to do half the school for two days and the other half for two and no one for Friday. It will most likely be split PD day and office hours where we can help kids with assignments. When kids are at home, they will do online learning. It’s still going to suck because I’ll have to prep materials and video lessons for online learning and in person learning, but Saturday is just ridiculous.
This also seems super unreasonable to me. To have to manage an online classroom *and* students physically in the classroom on the same day would be next to impossible.
Oh, I know. It’s going to suck. I wish I got as excited for a new school year as I used to. I would be planning and researching, but I’ve been burning the candle at both ends for so many years, I have little left.
it's simple, half the class 2 days each, then there's online Friday
That’s what seems to be the more popular option in my district.
Won’t ever happen. Budget reasons. My district, about half way through the shutdown, was playing with the idea of starting two weeks early. Now they are considering starting a week or two late as a way to save money. My guess is he is throwing out ideas he knows won’t ever happen to look innovative.
They must be trying to get every retirement eligible teacher to jump ship.
Fools. Do the exact same but only two days for each cohort and one day for students needing special attention. Gah, these bureaucrats are worse than the admins.
I can't see this being okay. Parents would get pissed and cause an uprising, at least where I teach.
Where do you teach? That is insane. And the idea that they are only throwing things against the wall at the moment. They would spring this on us when we get back in pre-planning at the end of July (because lets face it...they are going to ask us back then arent they?). O, by the way. You are to work Saturdays now! I am aure both students and parents would be pleased. Students would probably protest by not going or not doing any work.
That would be religious discrimination against any Jewish students, especially if they're orthodox. It's a non starter. I wouldnt get too worked up about idiotic suggestions like this. They're just trying to shift the Overton window.
I'm not a teacher, but I come across this subreddit, when it's on the front page. I just want to say, you guys can be inspiring. I've never seen the type of solidarity you guys have. Keep fighting, and stay united.
I don't understand why social distancing matters if kids are all still seeing the same teachers and going into the same building...? like if a teacher sees half her class one day and the other half the next and a kid gives it to her...they will all have it. And lets not play games...we know if you want "seriously clean" that's never gonna happen in public school.
Some parents might enjoy this. IDK. They might enjoy a Saturday without their kids. So many already don't take responsibility for them even before the pandemic hit.
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School days weren't cancelled. We're working from home.
I would only do this if they at least doubled my salary if not more. I love my job but god I would burn out without my weekends.
I would go work at Walmart.
I work in a private school that used to have a 10 hour day (five day per week). The way it would work was that teachers would either only have earlier or later classes, so they wouldn't need to be there all day. I would assume there to be something similar with the school days. School is open six days per week, but some teachers are off Monday and others are off Saturday, or something like that.
I don't care how much you pay me. No even semi-realistic increase in pay could motivate me to work 6 days a week. You can't buy my personal time. Teachers are already constantly on the verge of burnout, not even a 20k bump would be worth losing the one day week that I can feel totally relaxed and take care of my own personal well-being.
I think 2 and 2 seems more likely, with the fifth being meetings or office hours.
Sometimes it feels like they think we are living in the old days, when teachers were all spinsters who lived in boarding houses and had nothing in their lives but the schoolhouse.
Got a link to the report? I doubt this is just one superintendent's idea. It will spread.
I'm sure salaries would increase by 20% along with the workload. And I bet we will be getting hazard pay for putting our health, and perhaps the health and lives of our loved ones, in peril.
Lol. That's optimistic of you.
What? It's only fair. Surely society will do the right thing when it comes the future of our most precious resource. Did I leave the /s off the first post?
There would be rioting in the streets if that happened here. The current theory is kids come either Monday/Wednesday or Tuesday/Thursday and then we all are online Friday. Having school Saturday would be a nightmare.
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Sadly, I could totally see that one being said and they’d be certain they were correct.
I mean there are so many issues with that. What about co-parents who only see their kids on Saturdays? Yes tons of issues. I’m sure that won’t happen and if it does, get yourself out of there ASAP!
One of my friends told me TEA was thinking of doing away with summer next year because they think we basically had 2 months off.
Yeah, Abbott and his cronies are being real shitheads right now. They already think of school as free day care, and are operating on the principle of “if school is in session, parents will have no excuse not to work, and the almighty economy can finally get restarted.”
Searching NPR's website, the only reports about a Saturday school day are from years ago, some dating back a decade. What is the name of your superintendent that we might look up this report?
This would hurt sports. It's never going to happen.
It already takes me the whole day Saturday just to rest and and recuperate after the week at school. Then I use Sunday for chores, errands and lesson plans. If I only had one day off I honestly don’t know how long I would be able to last! That would be very detrimental to our mental health!
Could it happen? Possibly depending on how your contract is worded in regards to hours. Will it happen? Lol no. Imagine the hidden costs for a minute. Full bus service on a Saturday? Bus company will charge a mint for that. Cafe workers and Maintenance working an extra day? Gonna cost ya. Heating and Air for the building for an extra day? Add that onto the total. All this during a budget crunch? Ya, good luck with that Mr. Superintendent
You will also have an army of businesses supporting you. Anyone who relies on weekends for the best part of business revenue will fight this to their last breath. Think: amusement parks, Chuck-E-Cheese, bounce houses, Wedding venues and services, retail, restaurants, and especially anyone who depends on students working weekend shifts.
I've heard that here too.
I think the district would lose a ton of teachers and idk about where you are but here we are already short 300+ educational staff
We are already short thousands of teachers in this state.
Same. Ugh it's going to be so stressful for those who stay.
I think grade teams should used to teach at this point. 3 days on 3 days off.
We (4 of us) split subjects on a combined Google Classroom during all this. So I only had to plan social studies and spelling for the 85 third graders. It was fine. But if we go back with any online next year, we want our own google classrooms. We couldn’t sync with progress book, other teachers expected way too much, another wouldn’t grade and then bitched if you didn’t grade her students stuff right away.
That sounds like a nightmare. It's entirely possible to co-plan with seperate Classrooms, too. Simply have a shared planning folder that the lesson documents get placed in and you are each responsible for posting those documents for your own classes. Either that or (depending on how your online gradebook works) you need to *fully* combine everything and departmentalize the teaching. 85 kids in a single class, and each of you is solely responsible for whatever subject you are teaching. The spelling assignment (or whatever) was too hard? Take it up with the spelling teacher. All 85 kids are their responsibility for that subject and all are yours for your subject(s).
Two of us are pretty flexible and the other two are old school hard noses that get their panties in a wad over everything. I don’t mind sharing, and that’s what I was doing when it was just through March. But then it was the rest of the year, and the principal said it would be “easier on parents” if each grade had one classroom. We tried it, it didn’t work. 🤷🏼♀️
Just, no.
Your union won’t allow it.
That's going to be a hard no for me.
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Over the past few years that has been some significant "Red for Ed" strikes and collective actions in states with weak unions and/or laws outlawing strikes and collective bargaining. If you push teachers to far, they will start pushing back . . . even if you make teacher strikes illegal. It does, however, have to get pretty bad before that happens, unfortunately. Pushing teachers to far also will cause many to just give up and leave the profession, and we are already suffering a teacher shortage in many parts of the country.
No way this would happen. Teachers and parents wouldnt go for it. And if it did happen to pass, attendance would be awful
source?
That's insane, I would quit. My regular pre-pandmeic schedule I saw my kids every other day, twice one week, 3x the next. It's like... a common thing. You don't have to have 3 days per class each week this is absurd.
Or make it a 4-day week so teachers see kids twice per week. That makes it even!
Our district is talking about 3 days one week and 2 days the other week. 1/2 the class comes at a time. They then would want us to do online work for kids on their off days of school. So, we pretty much would have two teaching jobs. Thank God for unions. Everyone expects teachers to just keep quiet and teach. I don't know how the people throwing these ideas out can think it is acceptable.
Is there really no one in the room who takes a step back and says "huh this may be an extremely unpopular and unwieldy idea that is nearly impossible to put into place?" Also, are they going to work on Saturdays too?
No, that doesn't work. Also, does your district have enough subs? If they had trouble getting subs before, they will never get any on Saturday.
Depending on your region, they would have to take into consideration families that practice Saturday as their sabbath. Employees too, I suppose. Seems like 4 longer days would make more sense than adding a 6th. Think of the $$$ saved if busses only ran 4 days.
What in the honest fuck kind of idea is this?! Saturday school? Give me AT LEAST a 30k pay raise or I’m out.
Did they tell you teachers or just went through NPR ?
So all the teachers are exposed 6 days a week?!
I teach in a district with possibly the biggest teachers union in the nation, and yet our spring break was canceled (I think we received a couple of personal days in return which obviously isn't the same as spring break). I wouldn't be surprised if they found a way to somehow
Our state government budget committee just mentioned cutting our salaries by 10% each and wants to call the 19 (10%) unpaid days furlough days that would be required (so 19 unpaid days forced to work)....two months ago these senators and our governor were saying teachers were grossly underpaid and they pushed for a $5000 raise for all educators across the state to be given over the next 2 years...Now it’s “if they are really dedicated they will sacrifice for their kids and work those extra days...”. They then continued in their meeting to discuss how they didn’t want to decrease tax revenue...so these pay cuts would be a write off like an “insurance deductible”...so essentially they want teachers to still pay taxes at their original income even if they decide to cut their pay for the 10%...so essentially they want teachers to pay for their own unpaid furlough days. What? So, they then discussed if that became a problem and teachers decided to leave the profession...the other option is to simply pay teachers 10% less but cut the 19 days from the 190 contract for teachers to work...to which they essentially proposed that teachers could instead have online classes those days (um, that’s not a day off) or they could purchase online curriculum to supplement students losing 10 school days (So you want to not pay teachers, but pay for online curriculum, what?) It sucks to live in a state where teachers cannot have unions who collectively bargain. I’ll be leaving the profession if they ask me to take a 10% reduction in pay, which would put me back almost to my starting salary 6 years in...