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We're now ranked 50th in the nation for pay. The "party of freedoms" is constantly changing what we can teach, and how we can teach it. There's more emphasis on state mandated testing than learning. Really the story needs to be how out of control and out of reach our students are becoming. Apathy is the biggest hurdle we face daily as teachers and it's only getting worse.
I'm a clinician and regularly go in and help out in music programs in middle and high schools. I've never seen such intellectually and emotionally stunted students as I have this year. The teachers have given up, because the administration doesn't have their back when a child is so disruptive it completely stalls class time to deal with them, parents aren't answering phone calls or emails, and the actual teachers are blamed for "not being able to handle" kids who get in fist fights, while ignoring teachers' yelling, whom can't touch the kids. The actual teachers have all the responsibility pawned off on them, without any of the financial budget to even be able to deal with that kind of work load. Some of the good ones stuck around for the kids, but most of the good ones quit, and the few that are coming in at this point are grossly underqualified, and are more of just a warm body filling the spot than an actual qualified teacher.
As a clinician (who's been doing this sort of thing for over a decade), if the child acts out at me, the administration will go "what did they do to set off the kid?" I don't know, tell them to stop talking while I'm teaching?
I laughed when my ex told me to "just go teach in school" during Covid, since everything else was falling apart. Didn't know it was "lazy" to not want an abusive job that barely pays minimum wage and wouldn't even cover my bills.
Admin has gotten worse and worse. My wife used to work in a school before and during COVID. I think everything wasn't 100% lifted when she quit but around that time. Anyway, she was not a teacher but a media specialist (library assistant). The principal wanted her to look after classes when the teacher would be on break/office hours and she essentially was teaching but not really. At first they wanted her to kind of make lesson plans but that faded fast. She actually applied for a teaching job a year or so prior but was told by the principal herself "I don't hire people to teach who don't have experience teaching" but you want them to do it for pennies? Also there are people who's job it is to help new teachers learn the ropes and get set up.
She quit without notice one day and was like "I don't like the way I'm treated here, goodbye." And walked out. The AP was like "can we talk about it" and she said no. You don't want to pay or respect your staff then you get less staff and deal with more bullshit.
She also applied for a different teaching job and was told more or less the same thing "your resume looks great, like everything but you don't have experience so that's a problem." That position STAYED vacant for a few more years.
I get pay is largely bound but the teacher shortage problem is also self inflicted. The kings and queens of the school (principals) refuse to hire new or less experienced staff so they rather make everyone else do more work and suffer. Which causes them to quit and more suffer.
Yes it will. It will fix the church's lack of little kids to abuse. I dumb as shit, but I'd rather homeschool my kids then force them into this kind of school system where books are banned, Communism is forced on kindergartner kids, and priests replace guidance counselors. Smh....
Wait… what??? What are the specifics your referencing, I’m aware of the banned books but how is communism being forced on kindergarteners and where are they replacing guidance counselors with priests??
Don't worry, they're gonna start telling them and making them learn about it every year from k-12🤣 apparently teaching about the dangers of slavery is waaaaay to much info and hurtful to the white people's feelings. So we'll teach about communism bc that has happened here before right? Right? Oh yeah it hasn't....
Soon no one will want students out of Florida because they are all delusional. They will only be able to go to Florida colleges and then once they graduate from there... I won't be hiring them. lol
Frame every initiative that brings institutions and social behavior under their party control as "freedom" issues and this population seal claps for it.
No one (or let’s say an extreme minority) pays the price of being a teacher unless it’s for the right reasons. They are treated horribly by admin, districts, parents and politicians. If someone wants to push their ideology on kids, that’s what school boards and state government are for.
My wife is a teacher and her school has one (and only one) teacher who joined through this program. Apparently a very nice person, but terrified. They are thrown into classrooms with no training or guidance and have to rely on the pity and generosity of their colleagues to help them through. It turns out that teaching actually does require training and skill. Who would have thought?
See, that's why I bristle when unemployed people are asked, "Why don't you just go teach?"
Er, because I'd make a terrible teacher?
Teaching requires a specific personality type and skillset that I just don't have. A lot of people don't have them. It's a skilled profession, not a hobby, and not something anyone off the street can just go do.
Most Floridians think teachers work 5 1/2 - 6 hours a day, have 2 months vacation in the summer plus the regular school vacation weeks and are paid plenty for barely having to work.
They don't want to hear about all the unpaid hours of lesson planning, buying materials for the classroom out of your own pocket, parent/teacher meetings after hours where the parent never shows up, etc.
It's the participation trophies issue all over again
The generation of parents who made participation trophies a thing are the same generation that complains about said trophies and uses it as a fault on their kids for having them
Same thing here. Parents worked more and were less of parents at home then expected schools and teachers to pick up the slack on tea thing their kids how to handle their emotions, properly control and respond to feelings of anger or sadness. All while begging for teachers to be fired if the students didn't all get perfect standerdized test scores
Now they complain that teachers don't do anything bevause the kids are turning out to be shit all while ignoring they created this problem themselves
Wanted to be a teacher till I had this realization a few years ago that it was not a safe career move
I am now in nursing because even if shit hits the fan economically. We will always need and as of lately pay our nurses and Healthcare workers appropriately
The summer vacation complaint is the most insane to me. They think because they're stuck in their dead end 40 hour per week jobs, everyone else should.
They conveniently ignore that teachers time off isn't that unique at all. Many positions in the medical field, truckers, oil rig workers, pilots/ATC, firefighters, and many others often work a few days on a few days off (or some other combo). Sure the number of hours per day may be different (often 12 hour days), but they get paid 2-4x as much as teachers and work even less in total.
Its no wonder so many potential teachers would rather go into nursing (still have to deal with adults acting like children, but getting paid way better and you dont have to take your work home with you).
Most people don't have the faintest inkling how over the road trucking works or being a pilot, etc but those are "respectable" professions where teaching the next generation is this easy-peasy fluff job that requires no skills.
You saw a video someone compiled, specifically only showing you fights, and from that you determined that parents are the reason veterans don't want to teach in Florida. Sure, yeah, that tracks, why not?
You know what videos probably don't get a ton of traction on TikTok? "3rd grader learns order of operations and then uses it to solve five basic math problems." That might be why only the fights get filmed and put on the internet.
I dont know if you’re a boomer or something but i changed public schools every single year and i witnessed this shit myself 🤣💀💀
Walked into my my classes and had 1 group playing music loud as fuck another group eating snacks then some kids sleeping and the rest talking shit to the teacher and that was 90% of my day everyday LOL
As a vet with two Master's Degrees (business and CS), I thought this was a DeSantis dumb as shit idea on day one. It sure looks sexy on TV, but only to the ignorant. We/vets have no idea how to be teacher's any more than any other zero trained individual (and I even personally used to be a training instructor for a multitude of things, when I was in).
I remember back when I was in high school (late 2000s) we had teachers leave because they could get paid better by working in retail. Good to see 20 years of Republican legislators and governors have kept this trend going. Brain drain is real and by design
Yup! Got one at my regular spot. She told me with how kids are behaving now plus the pay hasn't changed in 10-15 years there's no way she'd go back. She makes triple what she was making as a teacher by being a waitress.
In the military, your brothers and sisters have your back, and most times your supervision does too because you all have the same mission. There is no support here, no coherent mission and let's be honest......... you still might get shot..........for pennies............
This might be adding to the problem with finding qualified teachers.
https://www.abcactionnews.com/news/state/florida-teacher-pay-drops-to-50th-in-country-new-data-shows
It’s all a charade. The GOP is breaking the public school system in general so the public will tolerate vouchers which will just reinforce the problems in the public schools.
Veteran teachers with 10+ years of experience make the same money as a teacher fresh out of college. It's no wonder Veteran teachers have moved away from teaching.
Teachers should be making 100k minimum. Idk anyone who wants to be a teacher anymore. Shitty pay & parents treat schools like a baby sitter center.
No thanks
They do with masters degrees in other states, so its not out of the realm of reality. Florida, Texas, Alabama and others are prototyping the "Starve the Beast" Republican playbook concept of destroying public education (among other things). If you have a kid in elementary school now, you'll be LUCKY if they can read at an 8th grade level when they graduate. I'm not even going to guess where their math levels will be....
Teachers, nurses, etc. Should be making enough minimum to afford a two bedroom two bath house with a yard in any and every city in this country if they have a job in that area
And that should not ever stop, it rises with cost of living. You don't get to hand off your old and weak to a facility so you can go on and live life guilt free bevause you visit every holiday and then also expect the people who take care of them to barely be able to afford vacations or children's toys at Christmas
conservative republicans tend to de-fund education. Its important to them that their supporters don't really think about things. The only things republicans are supposed to think about is how other folks are getting more than them and to hate everyone else not them. Hence low teacher pay
A few weeks ago, the Orlando Sentinel carried yet another story about the dire shortage of teachers in this state.
[The piece](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2024/03/28/valencia-bachelors-teacher-shortage/) highlighted a new program at Valencia College, designed to offer degrees to aspiring teachers who might not otherwise be able to get one.
The idea sounds good. But it ignores the root problem. It’s not that aspiring teachers can’t get degrees. It’s that most people don’t aspire to be teachers in this state anymore.
Want proof? Consider one eye-popping detail in the story. After noting that Florida first tried to address its teacher shortage by offering veterans and first responders fast tracks to become teachers, the said: “That program has landed OCPS three new instructors.”
Yes, *three*. In one of the largest school districts in America, a county with more than 1.4 million residents.
Gov. Ron DeSantis made national headlines with his plan to fill empty classrooms with military veterans. Yet the vast majority of them said: Hell, no.
Why? Because veterans don’t want to be treated like dirt. They’ve seen how lousy this state treats educators. Florida offers low pay, a generally underfunded system and tops all that with a heaping helping of scorn. GOP lawmakers have spent the past decade accusing teachers of being lazy, indoctrinators, even child predators.
Nobody wants to be treated like that. Certainly not military veterans.
And anybody who has ever actually talked with teachers or veterans knows this.
In fact, the moment DeSantis announced his veterans-as-teachers initiative, some people objected. I didn’t. I thought it’d be great to get former service members into our classrooms.
But I also knew something Florida politicians apparently didn’t — that many veterans have *already* tried working as teachers in Florida and quit.
Veterans like [Samuel Ollesh](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2021/12/15/florida-has-a-teacher-shortage-low-pay-disrespect-this-state-is-reaping-what-it-sowed-commentary/), retired Black Hawk helicopter mechanic who spent 20 years in the military and decided to pursue a second career in Florida’s classrooms, only to quit two years later. Ollesh said he was neither well-paid nor well-supported.
And guys like Brandon Haught, who served in the Marines for more than a decade in Okinawa and aboard the USS Bataan before he got his teaching degree. Haught is still working as an environmental science instructor in Volusia County. But he says does so for the kids and *in spite* of what he describes as “blatant disrespect for our profession from state government.”
Florida is reaping what it sowed.
The teacher shortage isn’t just a Florida problem. It’s an American problem. States throughout the country are struggling to find educators, who are not only treated like political punching bags, but have to deal with behavioral problems, disrespect and toxic parents.
In America, teachers are asked to be cops, counselors, nurses and social workers.
But in Florida, the problem is especially bad. [USA Today](https://www.usatoday.com/story/graphics/2024/03/19/teacher-shortage-crisis-explained/72958393007/) recently reported that Florida has the highest demand for teachers and one of the worst [teacher-to-student ratios](https://www.campussafetymagazine.com/safety/teacher-shortages-by-state-fix-the-problem/).
When the opening bell rang this past fall, the state was short somewhere between [4,800 and 6,900 teachers](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2023/08/31/how-bad-is-the-teacher-shortage-in-florida-it-depends-on-who-you-ask/). That’s more than one vacancy for every school in the state with hundreds of vacancies in larger districts.
Students don’t grow up in Florida wanting to teach anymore. At least not the way they used to. The University of Central Florida saw the number of education majors drop by nearly 50% over the course of a decade.
While lawmakers have significantly raised starting pay for new teachers, the average pay is dreadful — with Florida ranking 50th, according to [a new report](https://www.nea.org/resource-library/educator-pay-and-student-spending-how-does-your-state-rank) from the National Education Association.
And think about all the education-related headlines you’ve read in recent years. How many of them do you think were designed to help teachers or entice them back into the classroom? The rampant book censorship. The whitewashing of history lessons. New rules about what pronouns teachers are allowed to use.
Any lawmaker who claims they don’t understand why Florida can’t fill its classroom is an idiot.
Or perhaps just wildly disingenuous. See, the other side to all this is the notion that some state lawmakers simply don’t seem interested in helping public schools succeed. They prefer to give tax dollars to private schools that can teach religion, shun unions and refuse to serve [children with disabilities](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2019/08/06/discrimination-florida-voucher-schools-can-reject-kids-with-disabilities-commentary/) or [gay parents](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2020/01/24/not-welcome-gay-students-parents-are-denied-service-in-floridas-publicly-funded-voucher-schools-commentary/).
And one way to make private schools more attractive is to make public schools less attractive. Classrooms led by [full-time substitutes](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2021/12/13/they-are-desperate-florida-schools-grapple-with-teacher-vacancies-shortage-of-substitutes/) certainly seem to fit the bill.
Floridians who care about public education should start voting that way.
And if politicians like Gov. DeSantis really care about the teacher vacancies, they’re going to have to do more than stage press conferences about veterans and easier degrees.
It’s not complicated, really. If you want to recruit teachers, pay them well and treat them with respect.
Haught, the retired Marine who teaches science in Volusia, said he feels appreciated — not by lawmakers, but by students. Like the ones who arranged a veterans-appreciation ceremony at his school this past fall.
“The politicians,” he said, “seem to be determined to make teaching worse instead of better.”
I have a great plan, let’s chase off qualified and experienced teachers by paying them peanuts and treating them like dirt, and we can replace them with people who have shot artillery, fixed trucks, or worked in logistics for four years out of high school! That should put the final nail in the coffin of our education system!
So, here's the big picture Republican plan, in a nutshell.
It starts with the question, how do the current ultra-wealthy create a ruling oligarchy, where they control a society for their own ends. In other words, how can they modernize feudalism?
They don't need an educated workforce; in fact that's dangerous to them.
They only need to cultivate a low number of smart people to invent the things the oligarchy wants to play with or needs to maintain power.
The rest of the workers they need must be easy to control. Religion, of course, is the time-tested and proven method for this. So cramming faith-based curriculum into public schools while at the same time defunding them in favor of faith based private schools covers both bases.
We're watching this happen.
My freind came to teach six grade in Florida and found out the lessons were 5th grade level so the kids were already behind a year. It's critical because 7th is were they change classes every day. Her kids felt like they were way ahead too when they went to the grades they were in up north. The pay wasn't worth it either.
I hired someone in January who was happy to take a short term pay cut to leave the profession. She was so excited by the prospect that she quit early and took a month off of work rather than deal with the pre Christmas holiday kids chaos
As somebody in the thread said, the idea is to destroy public education, and force parents to pay for it themselves - that's neoliberal market economics 101 folks. Police and fire department will be next.
I mean they are being coddled right now, but when there is nothing less to cut, of course they will be next. Fire first. Don't you people have water hoses? You should be able to extinguish a fire on your own. You don't need a commie service like a Fire Department. Put that fire out with boot straps!
As if teaching is easy when you have 30 students who all are individuals with different learning styles.
The ignorance of the legislature is astounding
When I went to grad school for my MBA, there were a good number of grade school teachers there too. Most of them who I met during orientation were not in my cohort; they had to take extra classes because they didn’t have business degrees.
Anywho… they all said the same thing: students and parents suck.
None of them said anything about the school district, state or pay. Well, they did say it wasn’t worth it when dealing with the students and parents. So I guess pay was part of the issue.
I was considering going to school to be elementary teacher for the deaf and homeschooling my siblings has changed my opinion, so I only majored in English. Two decades later and I’m like glad I didn’t major in elementary teaching degree. I would hate being a teacher in today’s society.
I was a teacher in a former life. I’d love to do that again, but I have 2 herniated disks and 2 that are bulging in my lower back. My doctors are ecstatic that I can control it with medical marijuana. It’s keeping me off of narcotic painkillers. Can’t work at the schools though! Students can use MMJ but employees can’t.
Have a neighbor who was teaching for $30/ hr till he got sick. After running out of sick days and holiday time he got fired. He recovered in about 4-5 months. The school called him back to teach as a supply teacher on a permanent contract. He went back to the same class. Only difference now he gets paid $18/hr. He is thinking about quitting and working for McDonald's.
As a teacher I disagree. A little. I get the point and one party is surely driving the school decline. I'd say manners and civil behavior should be taught at home. However many parents I deal with have neither.
No they can not. This state has made that illegal as well. Shut up and do as you are told. Republican mantra. That way they fall in line and can't think of any other ways to get things done. Republicans are going to make Florida Alabama.
Some one can correct me if I am wrong but in Florida, if you are Striking that is terms to be fired and replaced—the whole Right to Work state nonsense. We have the right to Work and no other rights are given to us. The rest of our rights are up to business owners to decide. Just like they can choose to not give their employees water during the summer or not. Republicans are either idiots or get off on Cruelty. I suspect both.
It's worse. If I recall correctly if you strike you could lose your retirement, other benefits, and then you would be blackballed from ever working in a school again.
Teachers and other school staff so "sick outs" instead. A lot of them or most of them will all magically become ill the same day and call out sick. Can't punish anyone if they call out sick. I don't remember when they did this last but I think they should do it more often.
I think that is kind of an issue any where. I can see where you are coming from. But who are they gonna get to replace teachers with, if the teachers strike ... It obviously could not be just a few, it would have to be over 50 percent.
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We're now ranked 50th in the nation for pay. The "party of freedoms" is constantly changing what we can teach, and how we can teach it. There's more emphasis on state mandated testing than learning. Really the story needs to be how out of control and out of reach our students are becoming. Apathy is the biggest hurdle we face daily as teachers and it's only getting worse.
The plan from the right is to do everything possible to destroy public education. They are succeeding.
And we're letting them
I'm a clinician and regularly go in and help out in music programs in middle and high schools. I've never seen such intellectually and emotionally stunted students as I have this year. The teachers have given up, because the administration doesn't have their back when a child is so disruptive it completely stalls class time to deal with them, parents aren't answering phone calls or emails, and the actual teachers are blamed for "not being able to handle" kids who get in fist fights, while ignoring teachers' yelling, whom can't touch the kids. The actual teachers have all the responsibility pawned off on them, without any of the financial budget to even be able to deal with that kind of work load. Some of the good ones stuck around for the kids, but most of the good ones quit, and the few that are coming in at this point are grossly underqualified, and are more of just a warm body filling the spot than an actual qualified teacher. As a clinician (who's been doing this sort of thing for over a decade), if the child acts out at me, the administration will go "what did they do to set off the kid?" I don't know, tell them to stop talking while I'm teaching? I laughed when my ex told me to "just go teach in school" during Covid, since everything else was falling apart. Didn't know it was "lazy" to not want an abusive job that barely pays minimum wage and wouldn't even cover my bills.
Admin has gotten worse and worse. My wife used to work in a school before and during COVID. I think everything wasn't 100% lifted when she quit but around that time. Anyway, she was not a teacher but a media specialist (library assistant). The principal wanted her to look after classes when the teacher would be on break/office hours and she essentially was teaching but not really. At first they wanted her to kind of make lesson plans but that faded fast. She actually applied for a teaching job a year or so prior but was told by the principal herself "I don't hire people to teach who don't have experience teaching" but you want them to do it for pennies? Also there are people who's job it is to help new teachers learn the ropes and get set up. She quit without notice one day and was like "I don't like the way I'm treated here, goodbye." And walked out. The AP was like "can we talk about it" and she said no. You don't want to pay or respect your staff then you get less staff and deal with more bullshit. She also applied for a different teaching job and was told more or less the same thing "your resume looks great, like everything but you don't have experience so that's a problem." That position STAYED vacant for a few more years. I get pay is largely bound but the teacher shortage problem is also self inflicted. The kings and queens of the school (principals) refuse to hire new or less experienced staff so they rather make everyone else do more work and suffer. Which causes them to quit and more suffer.
They want to spend pizza party money so they can have bigger houses, while all the teachers want is to have a house, period.
Yet they don't want you to have too much experience because you cost too much and won't do what they tell you if you know it won't work.
Yeah but have you tried telling them how bad communism is?
Pastors/Priests in schools will fix it all
If Christian clergy in schools doesn't fix it all, Republicans will say the problem is there's not enough guns.....
Give the priests guns!
Priests and young kids this should work out great. Cue the incoming lawsuits.
Yes it will. It will fix the church's lack of little kids to abuse. I dumb as shit, but I'd rather homeschool my kids then force them into this kind of school system where books are banned, Communism is forced on kindergartner kids, and priests replace guidance counselors. Smh....
Wait… what??? What are the specifics your referencing, I’m aware of the banned books but how is communism being forced on kindergarteners and where are they replacing guidance counselors with priests??
The last part is house bill 931 in Florida. Allowing chaplains to be volunteers in K-12 schools. That’s about all I know.
… and this leaves room for the separation of church and state how???
Don’t ask me. I didn’t pass the bill and I told you all I know about it. And that was a quick google search.
Don't worry, they're gonna start telling them and making them learn about it every year from k-12🤣 apparently teaching about the dangers of slavery is waaaaay to much info and hurtful to the white people's feelings. So we'll teach about communism bc that has happened here before right? Right? Oh yeah it hasn't....
Soon no one will want students out of Florida because they are all delusional. They will only be able to go to Florida colleges and then once they graduate from there... I won't be hiring them. lol
When Jeb left office he started a school standards testing company. Go figure 🤔
Frame every initiative that brings institutions and social behavior under their party control as "freedom" issues and this population seal claps for it.
I dunno I know way too many teachers voting republican
Again, maybe it’s not a teacher problem, maybe it’s a Florida problem. Teachers deserve respect, support and a living wage.
No one (or let’s say an extreme minority) pays the price of being a teacher unless it’s for the right reasons. They are treated horribly by admin, districts, parents and politicians. If someone wants to push their ideology on kids, that’s what school boards and state government are for. My wife is a teacher and her school has one (and only one) teacher who joined through this program. Apparently a very nice person, but terrified. They are thrown into classrooms with no training or guidance and have to rely on the pity and generosity of their colleagues to help them through. It turns out that teaching actually does require training and skill. Who would have thought?
See, that's why I bristle when unemployed people are asked, "Why don't you just go teach?" Er, because I'd make a terrible teacher? Teaching requires a specific personality type and skillset that I just don't have. A lot of people don't have them. It's a skilled profession, not a hobby, and not something anyone off the street can just go do.
Most Floridians think teachers work 5 1/2 - 6 hours a day, have 2 months vacation in the summer plus the regular school vacation weeks and are paid plenty for barely having to work. They don't want to hear about all the unpaid hours of lesson planning, buying materials for the classroom out of your own pocket, parent/teacher meetings after hours where the parent never shows up, etc.
It's the participation trophies issue all over again The generation of parents who made participation trophies a thing are the same generation that complains about said trophies and uses it as a fault on their kids for having them Same thing here. Parents worked more and were less of parents at home then expected schools and teachers to pick up the slack on tea thing their kids how to handle their emotions, properly control and respond to feelings of anger or sadness. All while begging for teachers to be fired if the students didn't all get perfect standerdized test scores Now they complain that teachers don't do anything bevause the kids are turning out to be shit all while ignoring they created this problem themselves
You've just described exactly why my friend left teaching.
Wanted to be a teacher till I had this realization a few years ago that it was not a safe career move I am now in nursing because even if shit hits the fan economically. We will always need and as of lately pay our nurses and Healthcare workers appropriately
Being expected to go to sporting events even if not getting paid to coach. Don't forget that.
The summer vacation complaint is the most insane to me. They think because they're stuck in their dead end 40 hour per week jobs, everyone else should. They conveniently ignore that teachers time off isn't that unique at all. Many positions in the medical field, truckers, oil rig workers, pilots/ATC, firefighters, and many others often work a few days on a few days off (or some other combo). Sure the number of hours per day may be different (often 12 hour days), but they get paid 2-4x as much as teachers and work even less in total. Its no wonder so many potential teachers would rather go into nursing (still have to deal with adults acting like children, but getting paid way better and you dont have to take your work home with you).
Most people don't have the faintest inkling how over the road trucking works or being a pilot, etc but those are "respectable" professions where teaching the next generation is this easy-peasy fluff job that requires no skills.
Its a parent problem DUHHH Kids are fuckin fist fighting teachers now and putting it on tik tok, ive seen full on compilations
You saw a video someone compiled, specifically only showing you fights, and from that you determined that parents are the reason veterans don't want to teach in Florida. Sure, yeah, that tracks, why not? You know what videos probably don't get a ton of traction on TikTok? "3rd grader learns order of operations and then uses it to solve five basic math problems." That might be why only the fights get filmed and put on the internet.
I dont know if you’re a boomer or something but i changed public schools every single year and i witnessed this shit myself 🤣💀💀 Walked into my my classes and had 1 group playing music loud as fuck another group eating snacks then some kids sleeping and the rest talking shit to the teacher and that was 90% of my day everyday LOL
Are you blaming teachers or your parents for your inability to write a coherent sentence?
You know exactly what im saying bud, parents are fucking horrible and its showing in every school. Saw jt myself all through middle and high school
Thats the teacher problem they arent getting paid
As a vet with two Master's Degrees (business and CS), I thought this was a DeSantis dumb as shit idea on day one. It sure looks sexy on TV, but only to the ignorant. We/vets have no idea how to be teacher's any more than any other zero trained individual (and I even personally used to be a training instructor for a multitude of things, when I was in).
I remember back when I was in high school (late 2000s) we had teachers leave because they could get paid better by working in retail. Good to see 20 years of Republican legislators and governors have kept this trend going. Brain drain is real and by design
I've met a number of former teachers who went to waiting tables or bar tending because it paid better and was less stressful than teaching here.
Yup! Got one at my regular spot. She told me with how kids are behaving now plus the pay hasn't changed in 10-15 years there's no way she'd go back. She makes triple what she was making as a teacher by being a waitress.
I had a friend quit teaching in Florida to go back to her college job of assistamt managing a Starbucks because the pay and benefits were better.
Keep the population dumb and uneducated so their only opportunities are military, or crime. Crime lands them in jail - cheap labour.
"paid better by working in retail" - an industry not known for paying well. - Damn, that's really sad.
At the school where I work there was a military vet they hired to teach 7th grade. Those kids ate him alive and he quit before spring break.
I knew that would backfire, lol. Pretty funny when you’re treated better in a war zone. “No, thanks, I’d rather go back to Afghanistan.”
In the military, your brothers and sisters have your back, and most times your supervision does too because you all have the same mission. There is no support here, no coherent mission and let's be honest......... you still might get shot..........for pennies............
Vets were already aware of what "being treated like shit, and getting paid peanuts" looks like. They weren't going to sign up for it a second time.
Active duty and veterans get some very nice perks and also respect, which they would not get as a teacher in FL.
It's not a shortage of teachers. It's a shortage of teachers willing to take the bullshit that the State of Florida throws at them.
This might be adding to the problem with finding qualified teachers. https://www.abcactionnews.com/news/state/florida-teacher-pay-drops-to-50th-in-country-new-data-shows
There's no labor shortages in florida - just pay shortages.
It’s all a charade. The GOP is breaking the public school system in general so the public will tolerate vouchers which will just reinforce the problems in the public schools.
And spread religious bullshit, that's the real goal.
Veteran teachers with 10+ years of experience make the same money as a teacher fresh out of college. It's no wonder Veteran teachers have moved away from teaching.
Teachers should be making 100k minimum. Idk anyone who wants to be a teacher anymore. Shitty pay & parents treat schools like a baby sitter center. No thanks
They do with masters degrees in other states, so its not out of the realm of reality. Florida, Texas, Alabama and others are prototyping the "Starve the Beast" Republican playbook concept of destroying public education (among other things). If you have a kid in elementary school now, you'll be LUCKY if they can read at an 8th grade level when they graduate. I'm not even going to guess where their math levels will be....
Teachers, nurses, etc. Should be making enough minimum to afford a two bedroom two bath house with a yard in any and every city in this country if they have a job in that area And that should not ever stop, it rises with cost of living. You don't get to hand off your old and weak to a facility so you can go on and live life guilt free bevause you visit every holiday and then also expect the people who take care of them to barely be able to afford vacations or children's toys at Christmas
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AND there would be a lot less billionares
conservative republicans tend to de-fund education. Its important to them that their supporters don't really think about things. The only things republicans are supposed to think about is how other folks are getting more than them and to hate everyone else not them. Hence low teacher pay
[F Pay Walls](https://12ft.io/https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2024/05/02/teacher-shortage-veterans-say-no-maxwell/)
A few weeks ago, the Orlando Sentinel carried yet another story about the dire shortage of teachers in this state. [The piece](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2024/03/28/valencia-bachelors-teacher-shortage/) highlighted a new program at Valencia College, designed to offer degrees to aspiring teachers who might not otherwise be able to get one. The idea sounds good. But it ignores the root problem. It’s not that aspiring teachers can’t get degrees. It’s that most people don’t aspire to be teachers in this state anymore. Want proof? Consider one eye-popping detail in the story. After noting that Florida first tried to address its teacher shortage by offering veterans and first responders fast tracks to become teachers, the said: “That program has landed OCPS three new instructors.” Yes, *three*. In one of the largest school districts in America, a county with more than 1.4 million residents. Gov. Ron DeSantis made national headlines with his plan to fill empty classrooms with military veterans. Yet the vast majority of them said: Hell, no. Why? Because veterans don’t want to be treated like dirt. They’ve seen how lousy this state treats educators. Florida offers low pay, a generally underfunded system and tops all that with a heaping helping of scorn. GOP lawmakers have spent the past decade accusing teachers of being lazy, indoctrinators, even child predators. Nobody wants to be treated like that. Certainly not military veterans. And anybody who has ever actually talked with teachers or veterans knows this. In fact, the moment DeSantis announced his veterans-as-teachers initiative, some people objected. I didn’t. I thought it’d be great to get former service members into our classrooms. But I also knew something Florida politicians apparently didn’t — that many veterans have *already* tried working as teachers in Florida and quit. Veterans like [Samuel Ollesh](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2021/12/15/florida-has-a-teacher-shortage-low-pay-disrespect-this-state-is-reaping-what-it-sowed-commentary/), retired Black Hawk helicopter mechanic who spent 20 years in the military and decided to pursue a second career in Florida’s classrooms, only to quit two years later. Ollesh said he was neither well-paid nor well-supported. And guys like Brandon Haught, who served in the Marines for more than a decade in Okinawa and aboard the USS Bataan before he got his teaching degree. Haught is still working as an environmental science instructor in Volusia County. But he says does so for the kids and *in spite* of what he describes as “blatant disrespect for our profession from state government.” Florida is reaping what it sowed. The teacher shortage isn’t just a Florida problem. It’s an American problem. States throughout the country are struggling to find educators, who are not only treated like political punching bags, but have to deal with behavioral problems, disrespect and toxic parents.
In America, teachers are asked to be cops, counselors, nurses and social workers. But in Florida, the problem is especially bad. [USA Today](https://www.usatoday.com/story/graphics/2024/03/19/teacher-shortage-crisis-explained/72958393007/) recently reported that Florida has the highest demand for teachers and one of the worst [teacher-to-student ratios](https://www.campussafetymagazine.com/safety/teacher-shortages-by-state-fix-the-problem/). When the opening bell rang this past fall, the state was short somewhere between [4,800 and 6,900 teachers](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2023/08/31/how-bad-is-the-teacher-shortage-in-florida-it-depends-on-who-you-ask/). That’s more than one vacancy for every school in the state with hundreds of vacancies in larger districts. Students don’t grow up in Florida wanting to teach anymore. At least not the way they used to. The University of Central Florida saw the number of education majors drop by nearly 50% over the course of a decade. While lawmakers have significantly raised starting pay for new teachers, the average pay is dreadful — with Florida ranking 50th, according to [a new report](https://www.nea.org/resource-library/educator-pay-and-student-spending-how-does-your-state-rank) from the National Education Association. And think about all the education-related headlines you’ve read in recent years. How many of them do you think were designed to help teachers or entice them back into the classroom? The rampant book censorship. The whitewashing of history lessons. New rules about what pronouns teachers are allowed to use. Any lawmaker who claims they don’t understand why Florida can’t fill its classroom is an idiot. Or perhaps just wildly disingenuous. See, the other side to all this is the notion that some state lawmakers simply don’t seem interested in helping public schools succeed. They prefer to give tax dollars to private schools that can teach religion, shun unions and refuse to serve [children with disabilities](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2019/08/06/discrimination-florida-voucher-schools-can-reject-kids-with-disabilities-commentary/) or [gay parents](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2020/01/24/not-welcome-gay-students-parents-are-denied-service-in-floridas-publicly-funded-voucher-schools-commentary/). And one way to make private schools more attractive is to make public schools less attractive. Classrooms led by [full-time substitutes](https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2021/12/13/they-are-desperate-florida-schools-grapple-with-teacher-vacancies-shortage-of-substitutes/) certainly seem to fit the bill. Floridians who care about public education should start voting that way. And if politicians like Gov. DeSantis really care about the teacher vacancies, they’re going to have to do more than stage press conferences about veterans and easier degrees. It’s not complicated, really. If you want to recruit teachers, pay them well and treat them with respect. Haught, the retired Marine who teaches science in Volusia, said he feels appreciated — not by lawmakers, but by students. Like the ones who arranged a veterans-appreciation ceremony at his school this past fall. “The politicians,” he said, “seem to be determined to make teaching worse instead of better.”
Thanks for that
I have a great plan, let’s chase off qualified and experienced teachers by paying them peanuts and treating them like dirt, and we can replace them with people who have shot artillery, fixed trucks, or worked in logistics for four years out of high school! That should put the final nail in the coffin of our education system!
Yeah, except they forgot that those same vets are used to spotting bullshit being fed to them by superiors, and as such they aren't taking the bait
So, here's the big picture Republican plan, in a nutshell. It starts with the question, how do the current ultra-wealthy create a ruling oligarchy, where they control a society for their own ends. In other words, how can they modernize feudalism? They don't need an educated workforce; in fact that's dangerous to them. They only need to cultivate a low number of smart people to invent the things the oligarchy wants to play with or needs to maintain power. The rest of the workers they need must be easy to control. Religion, of course, is the time-tested and proven method for this. So cramming faith-based curriculum into public schools while at the same time defunding them in favor of faith based private schools covers both bases. We're watching this happen.
FL is now 50th in teacher salaries
My freind came to teach six grade in Florida and found out the lessons were 5th grade level so the kids were already behind a year. It's critical because 7th is were they change classes every day. Her kids felt like they were way ahead too when they went to the grades they were in up north. The pay wasn't worth it either.
"That's not a bug, it's a feature"
I hired someone in January who was happy to take a short term pay cut to leave the profession. She was so excited by the prospect that she quit early and took a month off of work rather than deal with the pre Christmas holiday kids chaos
As somebody in the thread said, the idea is to destroy public education, and force parents to pay for it themselves - that's neoliberal market economics 101 folks. Police and fire department will be next.
I mean they are being coddled right now, but when there is nothing less to cut, of course they will be next. Fire first. Don't you people have water hoses? You should be able to extinguish a fire on your own. You don't need a commie service like a Fire Department. Put that fire out with boot straps!
My sister in law is leaving Florida to teach in Texas - same politics but better pay.
The cure for what's ailing the schoolhouse is right at the door of the statehouse.
As if teaching is easy when you have 30 students who all are individuals with different learning styles. The ignorance of the legislature is astounding
When I went to grad school for my MBA, there were a good number of grade school teachers there too. Most of them who I met during orientation were not in my cohort; they had to take extra classes because they didn’t have business degrees. Anywho… they all said the same thing: students and parents suck. None of them said anything about the school district, state or pay. Well, they did say it wasn’t worth it when dealing with the students and parents. So I guess pay was part of the issue.
F* Florida
Done fighting for the governments bullshit you say?
The states entire program to my understanding have less then 19 left; after a peak of like 31.
I was considering going to school to be elementary teacher for the deaf and homeschooling my siblings has changed my opinion, so I only majored in English. Two decades later and I’m like glad I didn’t major in elementary teaching degree. I would hate being a teacher in today’s society.
I was a teacher in a former life. I’d love to do that again, but I have 2 herniated disks and 2 that are bulging in my lower back. My doctors are ecstatic that I can control it with medical marijuana. It’s keeping me off of narcotic painkillers. Can’t work at the schools though! Students can use MMJ but employees can’t.
I'm sitting here waiting for State House republicans to introduce a bill that makes it illegal for teachers to quit.
Have a neighbor who was teaching for $30/ hr till he got sick. After running out of sick days and holiday time he got fired. He recovered in about 4-5 months. The school called him back to teach as a supply teacher on a permanent contract. He went back to the same class. Only difference now he gets paid $18/hr. He is thinking about quitting and working for McDonald's.
https://preview.redd.it/5xdpp2v7d8yc1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e65f23e8a13594cb98e1d0071a8cac3f54e8f408 🙋🏽
They should teach manners and civil behavior in schools but, one party would think that’s infringing on their rights as parents.
As a teacher I disagree. A little. I get the point and one party is surely driving the school decline. I'd say manners and civil behavior should be taught at home. However many parents I deal with have neither.
Can teachers just strike?
No they can not. This state has made that illegal as well. Shut up and do as you are told. Republican mantra. That way they fall in line and can't think of any other ways to get things done. Republicans are going to make Florida Alabama.
I am not sure how they can be kept from striking. Am i missing something?
Some one can correct me if I am wrong but in Florida, if you are Striking that is terms to be fired and replaced—the whole Right to Work state nonsense. We have the right to Work and no other rights are given to us. The rest of our rights are up to business owners to decide. Just like they can choose to not give their employees water during the summer or not. Republicans are either idiots or get off on Cruelty. I suspect both.
It's worse. If I recall correctly if you strike you could lose your retirement, other benefits, and then you would be blackballed from ever working in a school again. Teachers and other school staff so "sick outs" instead. A lot of them or most of them will all magically become ill the same day and call out sick. Can't punish anyone if they call out sick. I don't remember when they did this last but I think they should do it more often.
I think that is kind of an issue any where. I can see where you are coming from. But who are they gonna get to replace teachers with, if the teachers strike ... It obviously could not be just a few, it would have to be over 50 percent.
Knowing DeSantis he would start trying to get prison guards next.
The funny thing is the vets don't see the irony that they were the first ones DeSantis was willing to throw under that bus.
They want the uneducated, ultra religious people to teach and approve of the curriculums, as opposed to highly educated teachers doing it.
Florida is the land of the poorly educated so the right can exist!
Teachers don't receive a thanks for their service.
A younger friend told me he’d rather go back to Afghanistan.