<p>Oh I see what you mean now, thumper. Sorry!</p>
<p>Cobrat, you have it backward. Charter schools have significantly more required summer hours. Significantly more.</p>
<p>retire or ben terminated so motived emloyees could be hired but NO; union rules preclude this</p>
<p>That statement is not true. Union rules do not preclude someone from being fired. I have mentioned many times I work in a union/government environment and the only thing that stops people from being fired is poor documentation by management. That or just total neglect by the managers. I am a non-union manager managing a significant number of union workers and I accept responsibility for the performance or non-performance of my staff.</p>
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<p>I believe this largely confirms what I kept hearing and noticing of friends who teach public school in NYC and other urban systems.</p>
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<p>True, but my friend’s experience was that teaching in a charter school had less bureaucratic hassles and when she’s took summer vacation, it was genuinely more carefree than her current experience in a NYC public high school.</p>
<p>Granted, she’s getting better pay, benefits, and is closer to doing her part to improve one NYC public high school which was what she had always wanted to do since we were adolescents.</p>
<p>Cobrat, you are smart, insightful and interesting when you are talking about things you really know about. Your historical posts are epic. But I have come to believe that you make up stories just so you will be included in certain conversations.</p>
<p>Sak, you have PAID vacation? Really? In most places, teachers are paid for the number of contracted days and not a penny more. You can SPREAD your pay so that you are paid every 2 weeks all year long, or every 2 weeks for the 42 weeks of the school year…but if your contract is for 185 school days…that is ALL you are getting paid for.</p>
<p>If you take a day off without pay, you are docked 1/185 of your annual salary.</p>
<p>No pay for Christmas, those random Monday holidays, and the summers…or for Christmas and spring vacations days off. You are spreading your pay over the school year…not getting paid time off. I know of NO district that pays for time off, and I was very active in contract issues on the national level.</p>
<p>But even so…if someone really likes teaching, the rewards on a day to day are there. I know…I did it for 38 years!</p>
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<p>Cobrat, you seem to have friends who have the worst luck (you have to stop listening to all of those stories coming from Cliff Clavin and SophIa Petrillo). In all my years working for the DOE (which I currently still do), I have never, ever had a mandatory summer obligation (in fact they are against our contract and cause for grievance). There may be people who have “mandatory summer obligations” like completing their masters in order to keep their jobs because they could not fit their courses in through the school year (especially if they are coming up on their 5th year in the classroom). Perhaps they are looking to work on their 30 credits over their masters or are taking courses/internships to get an administrative license as it may be more advantageous to them to do this work over the summer. Even future administrators that go through LEAP/principals program are paid for their summer work. </p>
<p>The only people who do “mandatory summer work” are principals, who contractually work 12 months, AP who have been hired in the last 8 years are 12 month APs 10 month APs are paid per session for working over the summer (however, both Principals and 12 month AP’s have 3 weeks of vacation over the summer).</p>
<p>But believe me when I tell you there is absolutely nothing that is mandatory that has to be done over the summer. People who do sign up for workshops, summer school, grading regents, programming, setting up the new school year, working on IEP’s etc, are paid for their time and at any time can decline to do any activity without any kind of fear or repercussion!!</p>
<p>Thumper - I guess you’re right 
My husband has it worse, though - no sick or personal
days. He has to pay $250 if he misses a day. Ouch! Luckily, he doesn’t believe in sick days, and he gets paid for every 4 or 5 his AP kids get, which is a lot of money. (100% pass rate for 12 years - he’s awesome!)</p>
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<p>And my impression is that you automatically discount any accounts which don’t accord with your known experiences beyond those you know like your D. </p>
<p>Since NYC is such a large urban school system, there are likely going to be some variations depending on the principal, school(s) concerned, and individual teachers/curricular concerns within each subject/school. </p>
<p>After all, the teaching experiences and demands on teachers at my old neighborhood’s zoned high school are likely to be very different than high schools in neighborhoods like Bayside, Flatbush, or moreso…high schools like Midwood or Bronx Science during the same given period.</p>
<p>I doubt that has changed in the last twenty years due to the wide variation and needs of each school, neighborhood, and local community.</p>
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<p>All this means is that you and cobrat along with his long list of friends and relatives are not even remotely familiar with the workings of the NYC DOE system because he is wrong on so many levels (and yes, cobrat, I have worked at a wide range of schools from phaseouts, to Stuyvesant, screened programs, to ed opt programs to zoned high school-which there are none in manhattan and very few in the outer boroughs).</p>
<p>Cobrat, the entire world of 20 years ago barely exists anymore. Getting old doesn’t have to be so painful. Don’t hold on to the past so tightly. Embrace your greater wisdom and experience!</p>
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PG is suppose to relate to your story because your cousin tutored some sorority sisters. I guess the connecting dot is “sorority.” Of course people outside of Greek life wouldn’t tutor their friends and classmates who had struggled. I also would like to know how many cousins do you have, cobrat?</p>
<p>Sybbie - I don’t know anything about NY schools. I do know many teachers, though. Teachers work hard - that’s all I’m saying. And the teaching doesn’t ever stop. My day was over hours ago, but I’ve called two parents, emailed three students, and started the stack of 76 5-page AP essays while this conversation has gone on, as I’m sitting waiting for my own child to get through with Teen Court. ( They’re the lawyers, not the defendants.) </p>
<p>Kind of beside the point, though. My education is put to use every day. I speak with authority. My students have confidence that I know what I’m talking about, because of my educational pedigree. It matters to them, so I’m glad I have the name. My dh referenced above got his Masters at a state school, though. He is the smartest teacher I know. Undergrad, too. (W&M)</p>
<p>Zoosermom,</p>
<p>My basic point is that the question poses by the OP is a symptom of how teaching as a profession has been stereotyped among the greater public and IME…even among faculty/grad students in other graduate divisions on the same elite university campuses, as a profession for academic mediocrities.</p>
<p>Rightly or wrongly, those stereotypes have been developed over a few decades and as a pernicious chicken or egg problem/effect, a sizable portion of those who enter the education field are popularly perceived as graduates in the lower half of their graduating undergrad classes. A phenomenon referenced by Xiggi and a few other commenters. </p>
<p>While there has been some improvements, these stereotypes will take longer than a decade to eradicate from the greater popular consciousness. Especially considering the very title of the OP post is a symptom of such negative stereotypes.</p>
<p>Cobrat, I don’t necessarily disagree with your post 114. There are a lot of negative perceptions. It is just great to see what you are saying without having to wade through a weird story. You really are interesting.</p>
<p>Agreed…just express YOUR opinion. No need to relay stories about the cousins or friends. Not necessary at all.</p>
<p>Cobrat, do you think it gives you greater authority or gravitas to cite other people’s opinions?</p>
<p>"It’s something I’d think you would have some experience with considering what my older cousins said about her experiences with fellow sorority sisters with strong academic skills in their respective fields tutoring fellow sisters who had struggles in those fields.</p>
<p>PG is suppose to relate to your story because your cousin tutored some sorority sisters. I guess the connecting dot is “sorority.” "</p>
<p>Cobrat, can you back up here? Why would you think that because your cousin tutored some sorority sisters of hers, that tutoring would be “something I had some experience with”? Where does that logic leap come from? And why is everything so third-hand?</p>
<p>I see other benefits teachers get as well. Teachers in our district get three paid sick leave days each month. These accumulate if you don’t use them, and teachers that have worked for a long time can have over a year’s worth of sick days built up. You can take sick days if you, your child, husband, parent, or other family member is sick or has a doctor appointment. A number of us have dealt with cancer and its treatment and taken much time off but gotten paid because of accrued sick days. In some school districts, they even allow teachers to ‘give’ their sick days to another co-worker if they want, say if the co-worker is out due to major illness (not the case in our district). On top of sick days, teachers each get five personal days a year. If they don’t take them, the days revert to accumulated sick days the following year.</p>
<p>As a paraprofessional, we get one and a quarter sick days each month, allowed to accumulate, and three personal days a school year that roll over to sick days if not taken.</p>
<p>To me, the teaching profession is conducive to raising a family because of its work schedule. Once your children are school age, you will pay less child care if your kids attend the school district you work at. You have most of the same schedule, with a week or two off during the Christmas season, you always have New Year’s Eve, New Year’s day and Thanksgiving off, and heck, Black Friday, too. If school is cancelled due to bad weather, you don’t have to scramble to find someone to watch your kids because you don’t have to go to work, either. You get a spring break and are home all summer with your kids and not paying big chunks of money for child care. </p>
<p>All of this seems to me to be added benefits to the teaching profession. I’m not saying teaching is easy but there are perks to the job that you may not get elsewhere.</p>
<p>Miller…I was a 38 year teacher in the public schools. My husband and I raised two great kids. Re: child care. Every center in this area charges by the week, not by the hour. So the cost <em>I</em> paid was the same as for anyone else with a kiddo full time in the day care. Plus, I never got there until the place was closing anyway…between meetings and paperwork, and planning. Plus, our centers ran year round. To keep my kids’ spots in the great day care they went to, I had to pay for full time day care in the summer when I seldom used it. Ditto school vacations. Those daycares are businesses, and I fully understood this.</p>
<p>I worked in a primary school and our school day didn’t end until 3:40…and there were very often meetings for an hour after that (required). I seldom got to see any after school sports events for my kids when they were in high school. Many folks in the community had the misguided notion that I could just walk out and go…not true.</p>
<p>School vacations…you live in the town in which you work. I never did. My kids and I had the Christmas time vacation at the same time, and Thanksgiving. That was it. Every other school vacation did not coincide between the school districts. Even their summer was different. They often got out a week or so prior to me, and started a week or so prior to me.</p>
<p>Re: sick days…I would urge anyone who thinks this is a perk to come and work in a primary school.</p>
<p>What I am saying…what is happening in your town is not necessarily representative of the many thousands of school districts in this country.</p>
<p>Still, teaching can be a rewarding career. It was for me, and many of my colleagues.</p>