At any given time, there have been at least 25 students at Clewiston High School sitting in a room without a teacher. At least one group of students had a full-time sub. This has been true all year. It's still true that if a teacher is highly qualified in English, short of a criminal record or major personality defects, they would be hired.
Salary, benefits, all this and more! Just for walking through the door!
Sadly, we can't find people. And when we find people, they don't always stay. Last year at my high school there was about a 25% turnover rate amongst the teachers. That means that one out of four teachers was a first year teacher, or at least have their first year at our school.
John Williams taught at CHS for three years. He rejuvenated the CROP Program and A-Team. And as a teacher? I didn't see all the percentages, but looking at the overall numbers and from talking with him I would bet $50 that his AP class had the highest average score on campus... I'd again bet that a quarter of the passing tests in our school in all areas came from his one AP class. He was easily worth $100,000 per year... But he's gone now because there's nothing for a young couple from out of town to do. There was no school within a reasonable distance that his wife could go to school. There came a time when he had to move for her as she once did for him. It is easy to say that teaching at Clewiston is a mission, but that mission can put your career on hold for only so long.
There have been 8 different adults working in his room this year. Teachers, full time subs, they've ran them all off. Well, 7 of them. At this point they moved Mrs. White over so they can have some stability for the remainder of the year. I suppose if we didn't let the inmates run the prison we would get better results.
My two new "favoriate" words are Professional Development. Any educator who is worth the salt between their toes will tell you that colleges of education are a waste of time. Maybe one or two classes on planning and issues in education would be somewhat helpful, but the heavy load of education courses are simply a barrier of entry. Now, just in case we didn't learn the 6 credits of material within 36+ education credits we had to earn, we have to keep doing "professional development" at the school level. When we are told we are going to do professional development, most of us are just going to let our eyes glaze over whilst we watch a powerpoint for 90 minutes... Even if there was something I could learn during that time it's impossible to take anything into the classroom as the material is simply overwhelming. I've also spent at least three hours sitting through sales pitches. Sales pitches... Hmm...
And I'm overwhelmed as well. Yeah, I could work 12 hours a day and get everything done and just be the keenest teacher ever. I could dot all of my i's and cross my t's to perfection. Or, I could put together a decent lesson plan... But, for now, 8-9 hours a day is sufficient to make me feel like I'm an OK person.
I am the Teacher of the Year, after all. What now, yo?
Sankey
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