It just gets better and better.

Warning: This Post Rated R for Language. This post in no way reflects the views of Baltimore County teachers, Baltimore City teachers, any teachers I know or may in the future know, the N.E.A., or TABCO. Though it should.

Education Secretary Rod Paige calls national teachers union a ‘terrorist organization.’

Let me lay it out for you, layman’s terms: Bush says [and I confess I’m paraphrasing], “All y’all teachers better make our kids smarter ‘n’ stuff, make ‘em do real good on tests. Here’s a list of [counterintuitive] ways to do it [a.k.a. No Child Left Behind] — and you have to follow it, or no more money for you. Oh, and by the way, I’m not going to help y’all out with any extra funding for all the ridiculous hoops I’m gonna make y’all leap through in order to comply. Just, y’know, make it happen.”

And then his very own Cabinet member says, “Yeah, take that, ya big bunch of terrorists.”

To our schoolteachers.

Do any of you remember your teachers? Harried, overworked, underpaid people you made fun of? Well, life sure as hell hasn’t gotten any easier for them.

And now, to top all of this ignominy off, certain members of the voting public want to point fingers at Baltimore City schoolteachers for the mess that the city schools are in.

Talk about blaming the victim.

And I’m not just spewing out my ass. I was a Baltimore County teacher for a time. It’s fucking hard work. About the same pay as a clerk at Home Depot. Far more likelihood of getting poked, insulted, or beaten [or called “You fucking slut! You fucking ho!” during class].

To have the fucking Education Secretary pile on more bullshit is, I would think, about the last straw for these guys.

I hereby propose that any numbskull motherfucker who thinks they can cut yet more funding for schools, yet more salary for teachers, and pass it off as “cost-cutting measures” be forced to give teaching a try. Just for a day.

‘Cause you know what they do to substitute teachers …

Thanks to Erik Pepple for the link.

February 24, 2004 | Filed Under politics

Comments

7 Responses to “It just gets better and better.”

Dan on February 24th, 2004 2:29 am

I’d love to be able to act surprised by that mentality towards education but my mom’s a teacher. What’s sad is that the lack of logic reaches all the way to the local level. The last levy voted down in Toledo was done so at the urging of a parents group. Yes, they wanted better education for their children so they gave the system less money in which to do it. (The reality of the situation was that they wanted to punish the school board members. Dumb.)
Tran on February 24th, 2004 10:13 am

Wait one second, Bush is giving money ñ just not to public schools. Federal funding usually delegated to public schools are being transformed into “vouchers” and those “vouchers” are only allocated to faith-based schools [Catholic schools who donít even need to hire teachers who have teaching degrees so negating anything union, and did I add ñ are paid, much, much lower than traditional teachers].

The vouchers are about one to two thousand per kid. And these are the institutions that already have huge funding because these schools have tuition that is about ten-thousand per kid, plus whatever the local parish and Archdiocese gives [because faith-based institutions are also in their budget].

I talked to a priest, who also ran a school, when I was in Arizona ñ Padre Joe.

And to top it off ñ some states are now incorporating the education budget [which is supposed to be separate from other city and state budgets, because it is supposed to be spent just on education] into their overall budget. Thus tapping into what little money that public education has, and not allowing the education department itself to allocate their own money, but having it allocated by the mayor or governor as he or she sees fit.

Iím not going to head into the entire “teachers get treated like shit thing.” M. Bee did a good job of that already. But all hear this, “Welcome to the New United States ñ where we were believe that we wonít leave a single child behind, we will just forsake the lot of them. Get you some God, or get you going.”
nougatmachine on February 24th, 2004 12:02 pm

God, this sucks. What I really hate about all this is it’s turning teaching into a job that nobody in their right mind would ever want to do. This means that good teachers just get fed up and do something else, so the kids get screwed over and have to deal with idiots teaching them. I only just graduated from high school two years ago, and I can remember at least two extremely gifted teachers leaving for better pastures. I also remember far too many teachers who obviously had no love of pedagogy and wasted my time come in.

And this was before all of these fun new ideas from Bushie…
-J. on February 24th, 2004 2:12 pm

Actually, this is all a brilliant strategy. First, screw up the economy. Check. Second, make teaching more difficult and demeaning than it already is. Check. Finally, point out that in this economy, the only readily-available jobs outside of health, computers, or customer-service…

…are in teaching.

Mark my words, this won’t be the last time a loaded word (i.e., ‘terrorist’) is used in politics this year. In this country, it’s impossible to be ‘too conservative,’ but the term ‘liberal’ is a smudge. And disagreeing with the president isn’t silly, it’s ‘unpatriotic.’

This is why Dean was so important in the primaries. Despite his poor showing, he showed the Democrats that they have to reclaim the language of the hegemonic conservatism.
mike wolf on February 24th, 2004 3:42 pm

thank you…….

i taught in baltimore city for 2 years, and have to say teaching is one of the hardest jobs in the world, and i have been so pissed off recently at all this bs. Take baltimore city for example, disctrict is broke becuase of mismanagement from the board, but who is expected to get pay cuts, the ones doing the work…..

in about a week ill be having my first child and all i can say is, I really hope this turns around.
Iain on February 24th, 2004 4:52 pm

You strive to be the best terrorist you can be, and for what? Finally, thanks to Rod Paige, all us hardworking terrorists are getting the recognition we deserve. Way to go, Rod! Since I started teaching I have only been able to dream about being compared to suicide bombers and ruthless dictators, but now my dream has become a reality. What other profession has the chance to earn such accolades? This must be what they meant when they talked about “the rewards of a teaching career.”
MB on February 26th, 2004 3:35 pm

Dan: Sounds like the same old story going down in Northwest Ohio .. the school board versus the parents, and everyone being a blockhead. Tran: Right on the money, as always, and you know what I’m talking about. Nougat: Finding good teachers is getting harder and harder, because the people who make good teachers can’t stomach the bullshit they have to put up with. J. - Right there with you on Dean’s value. Hopefully the Democrats are still learning something. Mike - Best, best, best of luck with your soon-to-be-born baby. I hope things with the schools work out in your favor. And Iain - you’re my favorite terrorist.