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Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

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Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think homeschooling is usually like you're describing. Most of the people I have met who were homeschooled were not social adjusted or developed and didn't seem 'normal' by most standards. Most of them had parents who were either extremely religious or some other ideological tendency (survivalist, etc).

> Most of the people I have met who were homeschooled The people you have met are probably not a representative sample of the population you would like to generalize to from your experience.

The same can be said of those on the other side too.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#282
post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ditto, except I’m dubious about the prospect of having a child in America.

You’re fulfilling the Idiocracy prophecy. Those who think about their life choices are less likely to breed than those who are more reckless and have children with less hesitation. The similar survival rate of children of the two groups means the more-reckless genes & culture will out-propagate the less-reckless genes & culture. I’m pretty sure less-reckless is what we need more of, but without some extreme and quest…

Oh cool, eugenics on HN.

People are obviously free to downvote this but Idiocracy's entire premise, and the parent comment, are about eugenics.

Additionally, Idiocracy was not very funny aside from Picnicface's Powerthirst jokes recycled into Brawndo.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#283

I 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…

Economist Bryan Caplan (who wrote the book The Case Against Education) has been homeschooling his kids for 5 years and shares his thoughts on the topic:

https://www.econlib.org/emergency-homeschooling-a-how-to-gui...

There's a video interview where he talks about social aspects as well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hN_qg27UubM

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#284

I 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…

Not sure where you're from, but in many places, "society and government" has not failed people the same way it has in the US. Even within the US there are some places where local and state government have performed much better than places like Florida or NYC. That is to say, the problem is not, conceptually, "society and government", but instead, the American society and American government we have today. Don't give…

How did nyc mess up? I can just think of the nursing homes, but that was due to cdc guidelines, which coumo had to implement additional guidelines.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don't appreciate how money is diverted from already underfunded public schools to charter schools.

Isn't it the same funding per student? The money is diverted from the public schools to the charter schools... because the student has moved from a public school to a charter school. Or is that wrong?

Irrelevant. Plan a building for 2000 students. Figure out the best location, heating/cooling, building maintenance schedules, etc. Merge districts so that you can offer niche courses for advanced students. Then have the funding cut by 50%, because 1000 of the students go to charter schools. The fixed costs were planned out for the next 20 years, until the rug was pulled out from under schools. Instead, you get fewer teachers, larger class sizes, lower supply budgets, since those are the costs that can be reduced over a short time scale.

I'm fine with properly managed charter schools. However, opting out of public education does not entitle you to defund public education.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#286
post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure where you're from, but in many places, "society and government" has not failed people the same way it has in the US. Even within the US there are some places where local and state government have performed much better than places like Florida or NYC. That is to say, the problem is not, conceptually, "society and government", but instead, the American society and American government we have today. Don't give…

> has not failed people the same way it has in the US Not yet. It ain't over yet though, even though it might seem like it elsewhere. Basic facts are: herd immunity is prohibitively expensive from the fatalities perspective (although it may be our only long term option), a vaccine is not guaranteed to ever exist, and C19 is now endemic, so it will come back. Oh and also, for the society to function people must be abl…

If a vaccine cannot happen, neither can herd immunity.

I read it has been eliminated in New Zealand, so elimination is possible with good government: https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/new-zealand-coronavir...

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#287
post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anti-charter sentiment is a union (teacher union) protecting itself. The left is along for the ride, because it's the same "tribe", but this is 100% driven by an organization protecting itself against competition.

Even if that is a cause, so? But the real issues revolve around a lack of oversight, small budgets, corruption, and exclusionary practices that hurt already marginalized groups. Edit: "your mask is slipping" isn't a productive characterization. What I meant was, your statement comes off as bias - "tribes", "the left", "protecting itself against competition" all scream pro-capitalist propaganda on a topic that, frankl…

There's fundamentally no connection between the health of a union and the quality of the product. That's not the point of the union -- the point is protecting workers! Nobody argued that meatpackers should unionize so they could pack more meat!

So it's entirely reasonable to separate the reasons for the NEA to (1) exist, and (2) dislike charter schools -- that is, because their job is to protect teachers -- from the educational merits of charter schools. We shouldn't expect a teacher union to balance the merits of charter schools, because it's _not their job_.

We can talk about those points separately, but we need to expect that those talking points are completely independent of whether a teacher protection union (and I don't mean that negatively) objects to the schools which cut them out of the picture.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#288

My wife is a teacher and starting school (in person) in a week and a half. There’s no answers to questions like: - Do they have the budget for counseling when students and teachers pass away? - When a teacher gets sick, what substitute teacher is going to want to teach an exposed class (also, they’ll be making sub plans with covid?)? - When they’re sick are will they be getting additional sick leave? - Do they get wo…

All good questions. If it were me I would join forces with other teachers and parents to bring the questions to the principal and school board (or district). I suspect that in many cases, teachers and parents will need to put significant pressure on the PTB to force them to confront these important questions.

edit - If your wife belongs to a teachers union, this would be a great thing for the teachers union to push for.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#289

My wife is a teacher and starting school (in person) in a week and a half. There’s no answers to questions like: - Do they have the budget for counseling when students and teachers pass away? - When a teacher gets sick, what substitute teacher is going to want to teach an exposed class (also, they’ll be making sub plans with covid?)? - When they’re sick are will they be getting additional sick leave? - Do they get wo…

Even on the outside, it seems like pushing kids back into the classroom is poorly thought out. I can't imagine the shitshow it must seem like on the inside.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Medical staff get to wear PPE. As for grocery workers: My wife's a teacher. She was back in school for a day last week, with a much smaller class of children. The first thing one of her children tried to do on seeing her was give her a hug. I doubt this happens to many grocery workers. In September she'll spend about six hours a day in a poorly ventilated and inadequately sized classroom with 30 children. Neither she…

Having three young kids myself and a parent who is a teacher, I know how "gross" kids are first hand. >Neither she nor the children are allowed to wear masks or gloves. I understand why the children won't be wearing any PPE - my 3yo would never keep a mask on for more than 15 minutes. Why is your Wife not allowed to at minimum wear a mask?

because masks are now a political statement and some administrators are republicans
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