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Hi DI folks, how were the hikes last year??
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Cut bloated administration instead.
Seriously. Why are cuts being made to educational materials OR teacher salaries? Better yet, why not just pour more money into education. We clearly can just come up with money whenever we need to fund a war, but as for funding education? Nope none of our politicians can imagine that. Gosh I'm on one today but this really is infuriating.
There are so many amazing low cost and free resources. I think textbooks are antiquated. I'd love for districts to invest each summer in teacher planning time to write and develop curriculum that would be improved every summer.
Chief
I don't think there's enough in the textbook budget to make a dent in teacher pay. Same with the usual "cut bloated admin" refrain.
There are definitely ways we could make the current system far more efficient. We could cut standardized testing by at least 90% without hurting education quality--things would probably improve with less time spent on test prep. And we could end charter schools, vouchers, and other choice schemes. All they do is duplicate overhead with no benefit to instruction.
But still, the fact is that we don't fully fund education. Cutting tests and waste likely to make a bigger difference than textbooks or admin, but rearranging inadequate funds won't make them adequate.
We don’t use textbooks in ELA at the high school level in our district, but the cost of digital programs like CommonLit and even paperback novels is ridiculous as well. I do know our district admin group is huge…
Textbook lobby and testing lobby are too big to let that happen.
The problem with giving out money for Covid is that just like every other social program, the recipients get used to having that money, and now they rely on it. That money was meant to help kids be in school during an emergency when schools and mainly teachers’ unions said that it was unsafe because of x,y, and z. They said they needed money. They were given money and yet they STILL kept the schools closed siting that it was unsafe. (I also remember the news stories about the teachers saying it was too dangerous to step into the classroom, but they were caught on vacation in Puerto Rico). Now, four years later, schools want the same level of funding?
What for?
Our nation underfunds education, as a whole. More money is needed. Compare funding in USA versus other countries. Also, as a proud union member, I was not willing to risk my life so others working from home could have free babysitting.
https://www.thecollegefix.com/florida-teachers-working-remotely-amid-covid-caught-partying-traveling-and-failing-to-wear-masks/
Our district spent the Covid money on brand new competition only gyms for every high school in the county. The gyms are only used for games. They won’t let the kids use it for PE classes or practice because they don’t want to facility to get messed up, so now every school has a practice gym and a beautiful pristine competition gym. While increasing class sizes due to lack of ability to attract and retain teachers.
At this point in the game, I could function just fine without paper textbooks.