Why don't you start by showing how a vast majority of teachers put forth the bare minimum effort. How they are using the same lesson plans they did 5 years ago. Look into how schools/program directors will literally waste money other wise they will have that money take from their budget the following year. 

Do a story on how if a kid in the KHSD gets caught selling drugs, they ship him to another high school. Just sweep the problem under the rug, don't solve it is what the brilliant minds that run the KHSD opt for. They say "change of scenery" may help fix the kid. Tell me how that makes sense, we should try that with abusive husbands maybe Fox can do a reality show!

I am sick and tired of hearing teachers say they aren't paid enough, I have no problem with upping their pay. They do a thankless job that is greatly under-appreciated. They should be compensated. But the standards they are held to are too low.  Get rid of tenure.

Anon

Their jobs are hardly underpaid or thankless thanks to a very effective union.   They make more in their 6 hr/day 9 1/2 months jobs than you do in a year.  Add to that a full paid medical and retirement plan to the tune of $20,000 a year.   Doesn't look so bad now, does it?

Teachers have  talked so long and loud about being underpaid and undervalued that the public has bought it without question.    Do you know how much your child's teacher makes a year. 

Are the anonymous posters aware that half of the people entering the teaching field quit within five years?  Read this article:  www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/08/AR2006050801344.html - If it's so great, what's that all about?

Do half of the people entering other fields quit at that same rate, say County workers hired by the Board of Supervisors?  Nurses?  Bus Drivers?  When a person from one of those professions goes home at the end of eight hours, their shift is over.  When a teacher goes home after 7 hours and 15 minutes, he or she might spend another three hours (more or less) making lesson plans (which if checked by the site administrator, can't actually be years old) and/or checking and grading papers.

In 2004, the median income for an elementary school teacher was $41,400.  In the same year, the median income for a flight attendant was $43,440.

In the first two years of teaching a new teacher can be fired for almost anything!  I have personally witnessed a first-year teacher let go by a principal because he "lacked experience!"  

So I'm to understand that tenure is bad because an individual works to get a degree, jumps through myriad education credential hoops, takes, and must pass, competency tests, student teaches for no pay (list another job where an apprentice goes unpaid), finally gets hired, must attend workshops and teacher training sessions, be constantly evaluated (even harassed, perhaps), evaluate students, meet parents, attend meetings, and then, finally at the end of two years with the mantle of tenure placed firmly on his or her shoulders, COMPLETELY discard all desire to teach children, to abandon the caring and nurturing nature inate in an individual who would even initiate the process necessary to become a teacher - dump it all so that the 'tenured' teacher could use the same lesson plans over year after year and just "collect a paycheck?"

There may be "bad apples" in the teacher barrel but teacher pay/competency/tenure is no where as black and white an issue as the anonymous folks make it out to be.

Thank you McDougle..you really nailed that one.  I've seen it first hand.  Long hours at home still working.  I've also seen the scrounging around for household products to use in demonstrations and the out of pocket money spent for extras for the students.  Talk to me about teachers in it for the pay when you've lived in the house with two of them.  Both still attending extra college classes and teaching full time as well as the things mentioned above.  Oh yeah..and that doesn't even include the extra curricular activity time they spend with the students.  For the naysayers...are you on your feet for the entire day?  Skipping lunch to enter grades?

There's an old song..."Walk a mile in my shoes, And before you abuse, criticize and accuse
Walk a mile in my shoes."

Try it for a while.

mcdougle, I can understand teachers quitting and moving to other better paying districts but are they leaving the teaching field altogether.  I worked for the county fire department and in a span of about 5 years I had 6 trainees, probationary firefighters.  5 out of the 6 left as their trainee status was finished and went to other departments.  I hope that doesn't reflect on my being a hard ass but on Kern County not paying comparable wages to neighboring Counties or in your case districts.  I think the tenure in most peoples minds means that even if a teacher is terrible we are stuck with them because the boards do not have the guts to fire them.  I have always thought a good teacher can't be paid enough and you just have to pay the lousy teacher.

Hi Lisa,

I sure wish there was someone, maybe a group I could confer with about the situation I and my 14 year old daughter have found ourselves in. During the past year due to my husbands job transfer my daughter had to attend 3 different schools. While we lived in a rental waiting for our house to sell so we could buy another here it was pretty difficult.

This, our first year here in Bakersfield and her first year of High School we've had the shock of a lifetime. After she became "temporarily suspended while awaiting a hearing to see if she will be allowed back in North High School" we found ourselves riddled with worry and fear and wondering how this situation could have been worked out before it became one where she is literally struggling to remain in the Public School she has come to love.

There were no unexcused absences, no weapons or drugs or even bad grades. She has never been in a fight, stolen anything, done tagging or many of the things I see some students suspended for 3 days and returned to NHS time and time again. Without explaining the exact nature of the notes she and a fellow student were caught writing, disrupting her French class I would like to ask you for help.

I desparately need help and guidance as a parent, a taxpayer a resident of Kern County and Bakersfield in how to prepare for this hearing set for December 20th. If there is support to be found for myself, and for my daughter who struggles daily to get homework from the teachers enough to remain busy with it at home.

We worry about all the absences, class lectures and tests she is missing and what this will do to her grade point average...not to mention possibilities of going on to college and what this is doing to her record. We fear she may be sent to the 'community school' which is reserved for the kids who have previously been in trouble with the courts & juvenile system. We are scared.

Our lives seem to be falling apart at home here and we pray every day for a positive attitude and hope for strength to keep us moving in the right direction. But we feel as if the carpet is being pulled from underneath us and we may find ourselves slowly unravelling along with it.

It is OK to leave your reply/advice/comments/resources/contact suggestions to me on my Blog/Profile here in Bakersfield Californian. Perhaps by posting this I may get other comments, suggestions, stories, help and advice. I am open to any and all suggestions and comments as they may be of help not only to us but others who might find themselves in similar situations.

Thank-You, Sooz58 (Susan Allen)

Our Story on www.Oildale08ers.com  website

McDougle,

Unfortunately, the motivated Teacher, who actually has a calling to the profession, is an exception. There are WAY too many Teachers out there, who got into teaching because you don't sweat and you get Summers off. That's because Teachers Salaries are WAY too low. Anybody worth their salt, goes into Industry. The bottom of the barrel usually go into Teaching. This is a bad deal for those Teachers who are actually called into the profession. The No-Loads make them look bad.

The credentials required to teach in the public education system are a cake walk compared to many credentials required in Industry. Try obtaining a P.E. License or a C.P.A. and then come back and tell us how hard it is to receive a Teaching Credential. The biggest joke within the academic world is the E.D.D. (Doctoral Degree in Education). If you don't believe me, compare the course work requirements with those of a Doctoral Degree in Philosophy or Engineering or Science.

Tenure is nothing more than a scam on the taxpayers. Teachers shouldn't have a free pass to roll over and play dead after a few years (this happens regularly). Say what you want. There is NO ACCOUNTABILITY for a Teacher's output. It's not accurately measured. In Industry, (where output IS measured) if you don't produce, you're fired. That's That. In Teaching, if you don't produce (so long as you have Tenure), you're allowed to sit on your a$$ until you retire. How is this fair and just?

HAHAHAHA...this is in response to anon2, that said teachers are better paid than myself. First, you have no idea what I make a year and it's plenty more than teachers make.  I left the teaching profession to do what I do now, but that's besides the point. 

I don't want to argue with you because I believe we are on the same side of the fence here. I think if you had taken the time to carefully read my post you would have seen that, instead you attacked me personally.  I agree that they have cried for far too long. What I said was if they want more money we need to raise the expectations for our teachers. Teachers are paid on a scale, the more years and post grad units they have the higher and to the right of the scale they move. So, the teachers that have been there the longest make the most money and are them most complacent (for the most part).

I may be mistaken, but I think you are basing your point of view on teachers here in KC where a moderate income such as a teachers will make for a comfortable living. HOWEVER, it's not that case in such places as the SF Bay area, LA or San Diego. I have a friend from college that had to leave teaching because she could not afford to live in SF on what she was paid.