Earlier quoted context omitted.
Strong statement: dumb kids are better than dead kids.
Deaths in children are essentially 0
Today I learned that children live on their own and never interact with adults away from school.
Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
151–160 of 954 posts
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#152Sweden's strategy is looking more sensible every day (with the exception of failing to isolate nursing homes, which was a blunder). Their excess mortality rate is back to zero, and they never closed schools for a day.
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
She's in Colorado. The teachers' union agreed to a pay cut & freeze during the Bush financial crisis; pay had had only started to rise again a few years ago. This is somewhat of a digression, but the extremely low rate of teacher pay (for a job that requires a Master's degree) limits the pool of available teachers greatly. The people taking these jobs typically must have some other way of supporting their family; eit…
> There is no good economic argument made to become an elementary school teacher. AMEN. I would NEVER recommend ANYONE become a teacher based on my wife's experiences. You used to be able to write off expenses as "non-reimbursed employee expenses" but they cut that out so teachers get the token $200 writeoff. We spend almost 10x that annually supporting her in the classroom. It really is glorified day care in most pe…
My wife hung up her hat after busting her butt for 5 years. Pay was garbage. Expectations too high — mostly from the students and parents. I often jokingly ask if she’d go back if they offered twice her pay. She doesn’t even hesitate - no.
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or maybe they'll choose not to. It's a market economy. Maybe $30k per year isn't worth risking the life of one's family.
Maybe. I think the major problem is there is not a compelling childcare alternative that's ready to take over if the schools don't open. I also think it's a "tale of two cities". There's a lot of political will to reopen the schools in rural areas that haven't been as deeply impacted by the virus itself. And rightly so - the risk in rural upstate New York is much lower than in Flushing, Queens. It's probably wisest t…
I'm already having friends with kids call to see if we can do co-ops where 3-4 kids go to a single home and do online school. By limiting the families, you limit exposure, and solve the child care and socialization problem at the same time.
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#155[deleted]
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
She's in Colorado. The teachers' union agreed to a pay cut & freeze during the Bush financial crisis; pay had had only started to rise again a few years ago. This is somewhat of a digression, but the extremely low rate of teacher pay (for a job that requires a Master's degree) limits the pool of available teachers greatly. The people taking these jobs typically must have some other way of supporting their family; eit…
> There is no good economic argument made to become an elementary school teacher. AMEN. I would NEVER recommend ANYONE become a teacher based on my wife's experiences. You used to be able to write off expenses as "non-reimbursed employee expenses" but they cut that out so teachers get the token $200 writeoff. We spend almost 10x that annually supporting her in the classroom. It really is glorified day care in most pe…
My mother briefly taught middle schoolers as a side job to her cleaning business she was running. One year in, she decided the money and the admin politics and low-key racism was not worth the stress. She is black and was working in a very rural white area. She made a lot more money pushing a mop than teaching.
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#157Serious question. At this point, why can't teachers wear n95 masks? Data has shown they adequately protect even healthcare workers that are constantly exposed to heavy viral loads.
Healthcare workers are constantly replacing those masks with new masks and have vastly better protection than the average teacher, who usually has to buy their own supplies with their meager salaries.
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or you know, you could deal with the virus like 99% of the other first world countries and be half way through it instead of still not having hit the peak of the epidemic. It's crystal clear that the US is doing something wrong. "it's not that bad", "europe is reopening schools so we should do it too", &c. What kind of mental gymnastic do you have to go through to even write these things... https://i.imgur.com/2Pkl2P…
> It's crystal clear that the US is doing something wrong. And if that's the reality, then we need to figure out how to move forward from there. We can't go back to March and convince everyone to do a better job of shelter in place. We followed all the rules in my family. It was, in my opinion, a waste of time. I'm not going to hide in a hole for fear of the damn boogey man for the next three years.
> We can't go back to March and convince everyone to do a better job of shelter in place.
Apparently it's impossible to convince Americans to do a better job of anything. So "moving forward from here" is going to be just as incompetent and half-assed as shelter in place was. Apparently no one in power has learned a thing, hence this article.
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#159I have pretty much given up on everybody at this point. I have already pulled my kid from school and will not send them back. I am in a single income family and I am now working from home. All actions and purchases at this point are to help us to become more independant from the system. Society and government at large has shown itself to be unreliable and undependable. I am also making longer term plans to move out o…
The real illness is on a different level - it's the way the main culture in the US sees and understands the world. It makes some spectacularly wrong assumptions there. But those assumptions were never seriously challenged (no enemies nearby, dominance after WW2), so then why change, right?
Now those assumptions are being challenged. And of course a lot of people, rather than change and give up their cherished "identity", would plow ahead blindly, consequences be damned. Everyone who is protesting masks, I am looking at you and your beliefs.
This has happened many times in history. Societies get their beliefs challenged by reality. Some adapt, fix their stuff, and go on. Some don't.
There is still time to change. But not much.
Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk
#160The federal government is doing this on purpose to kill public schools.