news-record.com

OMG......asking some of the most important people to take a pay cut when these people do not get enough money as it is.......the teachers are already purchasing materials for the classroom that they are not provided....and now a pay cut too.....Why on earth do you think these people should not complain when judges who make over $100,000 a year will not take a pay cut.......May GOD bless this country and help those you are trying to lead make the right decisions......did our government people also take a pay cut? I bet not.....
Try living on a teacher's salary for a while....get real.....

It's kind of sad to think this is the product of the fastest sperm Charles Sr. had. Imagine the dearth of intellectual curiousity in the genetic material that didn't make the swim upstream fast enough.
Where to start? Anyone who cites The Hoover Institute is already the intellectual equivalent of the student who needs the short yellow bus to get to school. Just imagine a financial think tank proudly named after the architect of the Great Depression. Might as well attend a lecture at the George W. Bush Institute for Intellectual Curiosity. (They're still trying to get him to finish reading "My Pet Goat.")
I also have to wonder what Chucky Jr. was doing during math class, because he certainly wasn't paying attention. While teachers' salaries have increased 93% since 1988, he leaves out the one fact that would have undermined his one-sided diatribe: teachers' salaries in 1988 were embarrassingly low. (My first teaching job in the area at that time was for $14,500. So a 100% increase 20 years' later would only put me at $29,000. Nice try, Chucky Jr.)
This guy has a sweet gig: He picks up a check every few weeks to spew his ignorance and hatred to the public via the N&R. Maybe just once he could use this gift of space as something other than a regurgitation of right-wing talk radio talking points.
But I doubt it.

Charles Davenport is a blatant liar.

First of all, the John Locke Foundation is an ultra-conservative think tank. They are one of the "special interests" that Davenport despises--one dedicated to ultra conservative Republican positions that got our economy into such a mess.

Secondly, there is NO teacher's union in North Carolina. the North Carolina Association of Educators (NCAE) is a professional organization that does try to present the teacher's point of view. But membership is voluntary (I am not a member, though I am a nurse educator), and the NCAE has NO collective bargaining power. It does not have the voice that teacher's unions actually have.

The numbers Davenport quotes from the John Locke Foundation are a shell game. They've toyed with the numbers to create an illusion of good pay. I can tell you, few public school teachers make $59,000 a year. I've been teaching almost four years in the community college and I don't make that much. I would if I still worked at the bedside. But then, I'd be eligible for overtime too.

Fact is, I took a pay cut to teach. Now the community college has been working hard to raise teacher pay to the national median. But we're not there yet, and probably won't be any time soon due to the economy.

And the truth is, Davenport acts as if once you take a state job, you lose your right to complain when you are mistreated.

He's wrong. Teachers have every right to complain.

The educational system is a royal mess, and the easy villain is teachers (and,where they have them, teacher unions).

Well, you can't blame unions in North Carolina--we don't have one.

Administrators don't support public school teachers. Kids run riot in the classroom. They aren't punished, aren't taken out of the classroom. Public school teachers spend more time trying to restore order than they have to teach. When they DO have time to teach, they're teaching to the EOG tests. Small wonder learning doesn't take place.

We don't value education in this country anymore. Because we don't value it, we won't fund it properly. It's just another pork barrel where the money goes to waste.

Good Afternoon!
I'm lying in the hammock,sipping a cold one on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, and I don't have a care in the world. You see, I'm a teacher, one of those "union" sympathizers in one of those awful "government-run" schools, and I was going to begin working on report cards today, along with planning for the final two weeks of the year, but after reading Charles Davenport's piece of brilliance this morning, I've decided that I've been working too hard these past 35 years and that I can take a shorter path for those report cards manana! I mean, for cryin' out loud, why should I go the extra mile with what little I've learned when just about anyone--according to Charles Davenport--can walk in the door of the classroom and effectively teach?
Look, I'll let others call Davenport the idiot he seems to be in most of his columns. In fact, there's not much need to make anything personal. I've been hearing the same old bleating about public schools for years, the same old song from the right that characterizes us as overpaid, underworking minions of the all-powerful NEA. You've heard the song as well. Part of it goes, "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach." Does the old song end there? Unfortunately, not. There's always the admonition that teaching is not a profession (leaving doctors and lawyers and, I guess, wrestlers and prostitutes alone with the title), along with the promise that you really
don't need much training or expertise to become an effective teacher in the public schools of this great country.
From where does all the hatred and hysteria and fear and arrogance come, especially when it comes to the subject of public education and teachers? I really do not understand it. All I know is that teaching has been my life's work. It has never been boring. It has always been challenging. Like most jobs--including those professional ones--you learn far more as you go along. Have I ever dreamed of getting paid the big bucks for teaching? No, I knew it would take me over thirty years and a masters degree to draw a top salary (for me now, around $64,000). On the other hand, did that mean I would shut up and take whatever the state or county decided to do for--or to--the schools and the teachers? Absolutely not. Does that mean I was against the 0.5% reduction in my pay this month? Actually, not. I'm willing to do my part to help balance the state budget.
Have we reached the end of the argument? Heck, no. I'm afraid some folks won't be satisfied until the last public school in America comes tumbling down. I do wish some of those critics would spend some time with me in the classroom. They would find a different and a better world than they imagine.
You know what? I've changed my mind. Now where are those report cards?

Panacea please explain the difference in a Union and an Association. You can dress a mule in a tux and you still have a mule. Wake up and think a little. Remember the AMA and the BAR Assoc. are the two strongest Unions in the US.

First off—teaching is not a profession? It requires no specialized skill? OK, make a third grader understand why you must use a reciprocal to divide fractions. “Because that’s the rule” is not an acceptable answer. Teach a kindergartner to recognize the letter “b,” tell you the sound it makes, and give an example of a word beginning with it—and not by rote memorization. Be responsible for not only knowing the content of everything fifth graders must learn in science, history, math, and English, but also know how to teach these concepts to students with absolutely no prior knowledge. Explain balancing equations to a sophomore chemistry student; discuss the first declension of Latin; solve an example of a complex calculus equation and give justification for each step. Having trouble with that? Remember, you’ll be doing all of this in front of a classroom of roughly 25 students (or 35 or 40, if proposed budget cuts go through), many of whom have attention problems, behavior problems, or simply don’t “get it.” OK, we’ll take any old nobody from the streets—surely anybody who went to public school can teach public school, right? Wrong. A teaching degree is a 4 year degree, the same as a business degree or journalism degree, and many teachers go on to graduate school. At most colleges and universities, BAs in areas such a elementary education have the most rigorous requirements and require more than twice as many credit hours as most other degrees.
Yes, we teachers love what we do and want to help as many students as we can. But that doesn’t excuse us from the human feeling of wanting to get what we deserve in terms of pay.
And lastly, you must remember, you wouldn’t be writing this article without the aid of lots of teachers...just think, if even one of those teachers had been given a .5% pay cut and had to leave the profession in order to find a higher paying job to support his/her family, your name might not be in the newspaper today. Funny how things could have worked out differently, huh?

Note: I posted some of the comments below over at EdCone.com, so I apologize if you have read it already. Readers here have made some of the same points. (By the way, thank you for your comments.)

Remember that the purpose of my teacher pay study was to compare North Carolina teacher compensation to other states. Adjustments to the nominal salary are necessary because of differences in cost of living, experience, and pension contribution across states. I make it pretty clear in several places in the study that I am talking about adjusted, not nominal, salaries.

I should also add that another purpose of my study is to respond to the oft-quoted National Education Association study that says North Carolina teacher pay ranks X in the nation. The NEA study does not even adjust for cost of living. So, their ranking favors states with high costs of living (New Jersey, California, Connecticut, etc.).

What's cool about my latest teacher pay study is that it uses DPI figures to rank NC school systems according to average pay with all benefits included. At a total compensation package of $53,530 ($40,239 of which is salary), Guilford County is below the state average and state median. Some of this may be a function of a teacher workforce with less experience than the state average teacher, which large and expanding school systems often have. Unfortunately, teacher experience data for NC school systems is not (to my knowledge) available.

Teacher pay is not a question of how much we value (or should value) teachers. It centers on economic factors like supply and demand and taxation, as well as attitudinal factors like our government's priorities and our basic assumptions about education. For example, compared to other nations, we pour quite a bit of money into educational and social programs, student support services, administration, school buildings, school-sponsored athletics, etc.

Last week, a radio talk show host asked me what I thought about the NCAE's mobilization efforts. I told him that the NCAE is fighting a civil war - they supported or endorsed the politicians that they are now "fighting." But to be honest, they are not putting up much of a fight. Wearing red on Wednesdays, as their leaders have asked members to do, isn't going to get the job done.

Unfortunately, teachers are being used as a pawn in a political game. State leaders want to raise taxes and, to draw sympathy to their cause, are threatening to cut teacher positions. (The National Park Service used to threaten Congress with closing the popular Washington Monument if they did not receive a certain level of funding. It worked every time.) Teachers (and the NCAE, if they have the chutzpah to do so) need to call them out on this.

Teachers and the NCAE also need to offer viable cost-saving alternatives. My argument, from the start has been that the state needs to protect the classroom. (See my "No Bureaucrat Left Behind" paper released last week.) Before the first teacher position is eliminated, the state needs to cut the dead weight from DPI and their expansive efforts. School systems need to boot their consultants, coaches, coordinators, and managers. Moreover, let's stop spending money on programs that have not been evaluated or don't work. These cuts will not cover the entire budget deficit, but it is clearly the place to start.

Terry Stoops
John Locke Foundation

"Teaching, on the other hand, requires neither specialized knowledge nor long and intensive academic training."
Luckily for Chucky D. he has just described the qualifications for being an editorial writer for the N&R. He knows not of what he says about the profession of teaching, but he's obviously well-qualified to write for the N&R. :-)

As a graduate of the public school system, I can think of very few teachers who were "professionals". Many were unqualified hacks who were tenured in and therefore virtually guaranteed to remain employed, whether they accomplished anything or not. There were a few exceptional teachers and I fondly remember them even many years later, but most seemed more interested in getting paid than going the extra mile to help their students.

I don't understand why teachers (or judges) think they should be exempt from a 0.5 percent pay cut. Surely such highly educated people understand that their pay and benefits come from taxpayers, and tax collections are way off due to so many people in the private sector (where money is actually generated) being out of work. No magic fairy is going to come along and inject billions into the state coffers. Sacrifices have to be made, especially by those who rely upon the government (whether a salary, a pension, or welfare) for income.

I work in the private sector and I haven't had a raise in over 2 years. The company has also eliminated our bonus program, so in effect I've had a pay cut much greater than 0.5%, yet no one is rallying to support my profession! And what I do is just as important to the economy as a teacher.

I respect what teachers do but I agree that there has been enough whining.