Boots & Sabers

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Owen

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1430, 08 Dec 21

Government Schools Are Closing More to Appease Lazy Teachers

This happened in West Bend too. They made the Monday after Thanksgiving a day off with less than two weeks notice. This is what happens when organizations are run for the benefit of the people in them instead of for the people they serve.

After a few months of relative calm, some public schools are going remote — or canceling classes entirely — for a day a week, or even for a couple of weeks, because of teacher burnout or staff shortages.

 

At least six other school districts in Michigan extended Thanksgiving break, and three districts in Washington state, including Seattle Public Schools, unexpectedly closed on Nov. 12, the day after Veterans Day. In one instance, Brevard Public Schools in Florida used leftover “hurricane days” to close schools for the entire week of Thanksgiving.

 

In Utah, the Canyons School District announced that all of its schools would go remote one Friday a month from November until March, equivalent to more than week of school.

 

A few of these districts have closed with very little notice, sending parents scrambling to find child care, as well as summon the wherewithal to supervise remote learning. Beyond the logistics, many parents are worried that with additional lost days of in-person school, their children will fall further behind.

 

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1430, 08 December 2021

15 Comments

  1. dad29

    “Teacher Burnout”?

    Is that like revving the engine and letting the clutch fly with the tranny in first?

    Or is that the Delicate Flower Disease?

    Either way, there’s a lot of smoke.

  2. Mar

    Teaching used to be a noble profession run by professionals.
    Now, it is a crime racket with a bunch of lazy ass teachers and administrators.
    I guess weekends and holidays off along with summer vacations, winter and Spring breaks, teacher inservice days is not enough time from the children teachers supposedly care for.

  3. Jason

    >with the tranny in first?

    I think they prefer “Gender Fluid” now-a-days.

  4. Tuerqas

    I fully agree with the Utah initiative. I think the future should be more remote so practicing it once a month will get the teachers and the students more comfortable with it. Once a week would be better.
    And next time the Gov goes for total control that includes education shutdowns, everyone there will be much better prepared to go on teaching. All schools should go to one or two days remote each week.
    And to give teachers a break that they probably don’t deserve, I would get stressed out faster too if I had to count on the responsibility of teenagers for a portion of my health…

  5. Mar

    Are you serious, Tuerqas?
    And what are you teaching the kids?
    They can take a stress day off once a week or month when they go to work? That’s not a very teachable moment on work ethic
    Notice they didn’t take a Wednesday off, so, they just want a longer weekend.
    In our school district, they go to school 4 days a week and have 2 weeks off after each semester. But the have extended the schoolday by an hour or so each day and the school year is from July through May.

  6. dad29

    “Gender Fluid”

    Buick had one of those trannies in the ’50’s; they called it “DynaFlo”. Used adjustable vanes and fluid.

    Nothing new under the sun.

  7. dad29

    It’s not “teaching the kids,” Mar……it’s teaching the parents what bullshit is being forced down the throats of the children so that parents can continue their revolt, choosing home-school or parochial/private schools.

  8. Tuerqas

    No Mar, the Utah initiative is to teach remotely once a month, not to take any days off.

    Which would, incidentally, give parents a chance to see what bullshit is being forced down the throats of their children:).

  9. Tuerqas

    And actually, as long as they teach their 180 days worth of ‘education’, they aren’t even being lazy. Are any of the extra days off nationally shorting that total? I am just asking honestly. I don’t know, but usually extra days off (like a bad snow year) during the year are just added to the end of the year (or maybe they are embracing climate change so hard that they don’t believe they will need as many as contracted for snow days:).

    I don’t agree with just adding a ‘stress day’ off whenever they want, but I don’t ultimately care so long as the kids are taught the number of days/hours that teachers are contracted to teach them.

  10. Mar

    I think last year, some districts shorted their days but were given waivers.
    But, are you satisfied that that as long as the teacher put their time, you don’t mind?
    Last we lost hundreds of thousands of students who dropped or rarely attended class online and the quality of education sucks even more, though , the plus side, parents got to see what the teachers actually taught.

  11. Kevin Scheunemann

    Time to defund and just voucher all kids up.

  12. Tuerqas

    “But, are you satisfied that as long as the teacher put their time, you don’t mind?”

    Not even a small bit, but that was not the topic of conversation. The title was laziness, and in that light the 180 days is relevant. If they teach their contracted 180 days, they are not ‘closing more’.
    I think today’s public teachers have been brainwashed and are teaching by rote that include unhealthy biases every day and it continues to deteriorate every year. And in that light, a once a week or month remote school that parents can see might be an avenue for educational improvement. I don’t see how occasional remote classes would hurt any more than a normal day…

  13. Mar

    “I don’t see how occasional remote classes would hurt any more than a normal day…”
    Sorry Tuerqas, but teaching remote classes vs inaction classes is not even close to effectiveness.
    First, many kids will not attend the virtual classes. Especially, if the kids don’t have internet or a computer to use for the classes.
    Second, many parents work 5 says a week, M-F. So, now parents need to find some kind of babysitting. It’s not that easy, especially with little notice.
    Third, it is laziness on the part of the educators. I’m not sure what line of business you are in, Tuerqas, but would your boss be OK if you worked at home for 1 day a week or month? I know, none of the jobs I have held in my 6 decades of work, not one would let me work from home or do remote work. Of course my first 4 decades of work did not have computers to allow this to happen.

  14. dad29

    I join MAR with skepticism about the efficacy of ‘remote learning.’ All sorts of signals are sent (both ways) in a live environment that simply cannot be replicated over the air. And those signals are important.

    A 1:1 ratio might work well, perhaps up to 4:1 (Student/teacher). After that……..who knows?

  15. Tuerqas

    In order: kids don’t attend classes now, and the ones who would skip virtual, but not physical classes, are the ones not learning from classes. You have a point, but you obviously think more of public education today than I do.

    I would agree that K-6th age school kids should not be included (and Utah stated all schools which is a negative), but odds are good that if a middle or high school kid can’t be trusted at home, they are already failing at school. That said, this is your best point and my worst.

    Since the pandemic I have worked from home. When they called people back in I had to start coming in one day a week and work 3 from home. The pandemic did show that a lot of jobs are as or more effective when worked from a home environment. Yes, there are still a lot of jobs that could not be done from home, but I think the job market on that subject is changing and if public education took the step to have ‘virtual Fridays’ the majority of job places would be able to make it work in a number of different ways. Way before the pandemic, I worked four 10 hour days a week for years in a retail store. There are options, and I think it would be a positive development. It is not lazy for anyone to WANT to work from home even once a month.

    Dad29, I think you also overestimate the value of public education:). I substitute taught for years and the worst part of the day was lunch or off periods where I was with other teachers (except for the few violent incidences with students). Once a month from home would not seriously degrade the schooling currently being put forth, and for the parents who could monitor, it may be a very good thing. And the one best reason for occasional remote learning is getting schools to be prepared for the next reason Guv wants to shut them down or take kids out of schools. Way better than the unpreparedness they showed last year.

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