Is that too manipulative?
September 10, 2012
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189 comments:
No, it is "illustrative" of the fundamental issue, that the teachers' union is a political patronage racket.
No, it is "illustrative" of the fundamental issue, that the teachers' union is a political patronage racket.
Oh god MY EYES!!!!!
I'M BLIND PEG!!!!
They're only asking for a 30% raise from a bankrupt state that just nearly doubled its income tax rate. How could anyone see this as unreasonable?
Reminds me of a Code Pink demonstration...
Albino Water Buffalo.
One might think they're from Wisconsin.
I see they put the union enforcers in the front rows.
Will be interesting to watch conservatives jump into bed with Rahm Emmanuel. Were never far apart ideologically anyway.
Absolutely not; this is representative of the spoiled lazy fat-assed commies that litter the teachers unions around the nation. Chicago has the highest wages of any district in the country.
...if it wasn't for the t-shirts.
Comment from a down-state Illinois suburban teachers' union local President: "I can see the city doesn't have the money to give us what we demand. So they should just raise the taxes."
I hope she doesn't teach Civics.
"One might think they're from Wisconsin."
That's why all those union folk from Chicago were able to infiltrate the Wisconsin protests last year.
Seen what Karen Lewis, head of the Chicago teachers' union looks like?
She looks just like her membership.
That's a lot of white people. Are the public schools majority white?
Safe to say that these "ladies" have not exactly been on starvation wages.
Fire.
Them.
All.
There are a lot of smart, talented recent graduates with a bachelor degree and a hunger to work.
What isn't seen is the big screen TV showing a Chicago Bears touchdown.
Ahhh hahahaha! Is it the teacher's union or the baker's guild?! Hahaha! Holy shit. What happened here? Did Obama get Chicago the Westminster Dog Show as a consolation prize for losing their bid for the Olympics? What a pack of savage beasts! Too fun. They're, like, vectoring the shit out of Chicago today.
What they need is to join the Weight Watchers Union.
The same picture is used on the Atlantic Wire version of the story.
It's a Reuters photo.
What a pack of savage beasts!
How dare you dehumanize these womyn!
Actually, it would be interesting to correlate obesity and government union membership.
A few years ago, the Oregon SEIU put out a staged photograph at a rally, which didn't quite generate the reaction that they expected:
http://blog.oregonlive.com/politics_impact/2009/05/large_seiu.JPG
But I think it's the laundry list of facts about Chicago teachers at the top-left of the page that shows he's being manipulative. The photo is just Drudge's answer to the funnies page.
No, this is what union teachers are.
Just remember the immortal words of Albert Shanker, "When schoolchildren start paying union dues, that’s when I’ll start representing the interests of school children."
Let's just say I wouldn't want to meet those 'ladies" in a dark alley.
One remarkable thing about teachers (my sister had a long career as a teacher in the San Francisco bay area) is their remarkable sense of "victimhood".
They feel underpaid and unappreciated. If you look at the objective facts about their compensation (a) in most districts their current compensation levels are not out of line with similarly skilled folk in the private sector; (b) their pension benefits are outlandlishly high--compared to similar folk in the private sector; and(c) objective reality about compensation never penetrates their thinking.
On a lifetime basis, they are very much overcompensated--relative to the private sector. But they don't "get that".
Why would you think the photo is "too manipulative"?
They're comparing themselves to NYC & LA? Both of those cities have a higher cost-of-living.
Hmmmm, maybe CPS should offer the Walker option? Who does the union get its healthcare insurance from again?
Comment from a down-state Illinois suburban teachers' union local President: "I can see the city doesn't have the money to give us what we demand. So they should just raise the taxes."
Well why not? Obviously the Federal, state and local governments don't have sufficient funds to provide the necessary and vital services the people need so taxes should be raised appropriately.
"They feel underpaid and unappreciated. If you look at the objective facts about their compensation (a) in most districts their current compensation levels are not out of line with similarly skilled folk in the private sector; (b) their pension benefits are outlandlishly high--compared to similar folk in the private sector; and(c) objective reality about compensation never penetrates their thinking."
...and don't forget summers and other frequent days off. Off course, if you listen to the teachers unions, teachers spend every second of the summer getting master's degrees and updating their lesson plans.
We are the union
The mighty mighty union
OK...this chant is supposed to win them public support from people who are unemployed or not compensated as richly?
Boggles the mind.
This is gonna be fun for LA & NYC the next negotiation, we're not making as much as Chicago & our COL is higher.
At least the teachers in the pic probably aren't having sex w/their students. Those tend to be much MILFier.
It's weird. Throughout most of history, being a victim was an undesirable position to be in. But in our culture victims hold a position of moral superiority. If you can convince someone that they're a victim, you've put them in a position of psychological power.
ChipS, LOL. They're not even having sex w/ the janitors.
Now those ladies can use some fat shaming.
The spokeswoman I saw last night is the equivalent of two teachers. I wonder if she gets two salaries, or at least two food allowances. The last patient that size I saw couldn't get out of bed and was afraid of starving.
garage, I suspect Rahm is thinking of adopting some GOP policy.
I am surprised it has been 25 years since they had a strike. I lived in the South Western suburbs of Cook County from 81-86 and Chicago schools started the school year with a strike every year (as I remember it). Our district went on strike when I was in the 7th grade and we were out of school for 4 days. I prayed for a strike like kids pray for a snow storm.
The teachers strike. A photo is shown from the picket lines of the strike.
I don't see any issue with the use of this photo.
It is also really rich of Ann to make fun of other people being fat given that she is a pretty hefty butterball herself!
Yes, Retread, what CPS teachers do is exactly the same as what law profs do.
How about comparing the ratios of their students lifetime earnings to the teachers' salaries in each case?
Jay Retread said...
Well this is rich.
Ann Althouse makes over $160,000.00 a year and barely works. That is three times what a senior public school teacher makes.
Ann never blogs about how she is gaming the taxpayers of Wisconsin through her tenure abuse.
This is funny. On her own, AA could probably negotiate a better deal for herself.
You picked the wrong example.
Fat fair fortyish flatulent females are at high risk for developing gall bladder disease. Of course we can't verify the flatulence (thank God).
Hmmmm... Maybe that's why the fat female teachers are so dour. They're afraid of laughing and letting one rip.
If I were the Mayor I would announce that I'm going to try and fire them all, and any hard working Chicago resident who wants to be a CPS instructor should come to City Hall with a fresh resume for review.
That fat, english as a 2nd language, union oaf would have a stroke at her next press conference.
Too manipulative?
When is the truth too manipulative?
Pigs wanna be fed.
More.
"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
CPS teachers work a lot harder by a factor of forty compared to Ann. They also have the weight of trying to mold their students into becoming good citizens.
Garage: "Will be interesting to watch conservatives jump into bed with Rahm Emmanuel. Were never far apart ideologically anyway."
If you are standing on Mars, San Francisco and Tokyo look like they are a stone's throw away.
The sad thing is that when the City gives in to their demands, well before the election and with Obama's help, the rest of us out here in non-Chicago IL will have to pay for it.
Did anyone read the article linked to the Drudge page (from the Chicago Trib)? The teachers are upset because they must be (gasp!) evaluated on their work. The parents are upset, not because their kids' educations are impacted, but because they don't have a place to drop off their kid. The only people cited as having any concerns whatsoever about education were 16 and 17 year old students.
It is also really rich of Ann to make fun of other people being fat ...
There are several ways to interpret what she meant by "manipulative." The particular dog whistle you hear tells us about you, not Althouse.
Manipulative? How so?
They also have the weight of trying to mold their students into becoming good citizens.
Still obsessed w/their weight, I see.
$76k is pretty good money for a part time job.
There was a time teaching was a calling, like medicine or the law. My Aunt Claribel was graduated from Geneseo Normal School in 1909, taught 2nd grade at Tuxedo Park Union School for the princely sum of $550/yr and never once said anything bad about it.
Jay Retread said...
It is also really rich of Ann to make fun of other people being fat given that she is a pretty hefty butterball herself!
Ann is a trim, good-looking woman.
Retread's idea of pinups must be inmate photos at Auschwitz.
Jay Retard said...
Ann never blogs about how she is gaming the taxpayers of Wisconsin through her tenure abuse.
Can you point us to some data showing the 'taxpayers of Wisconsin' fund the law school Ann teaches at and at what amounts?
Thanks in advance
Chip S.
Bullshit. Ann is priming her hillbillies to start in on the "they are all big fat slobs" routine and you know it.
Also, Chicago's suburbs are not "down-state". Take a look at a map, for Christ's sake.
They make on average 75,000 a year. Fire them all if they aren't happy with that.
CPS will spend nearly 50% of its state education funding on retirement costs by 2014.
That's a great business model!
Chicago teachers have the highest average salary of any city at $76,000 a year before benefits. The average family in the city only earns $47,000 a year.
--The sad thing is that when the City gives in to their demands, well before the election and with Obama's help, the rest of us out here in non-Chicago IL will have to pay for it.--
That's why I explain while I love IL, I need to leave and stick everyone else with the bill.
Jay Retard said...
Bullshit. Ann is priming her hillbillies to start in on the "they are all big fat slobs" routine and you know it.
Why do you care, are you a teacher on strike?
How about you go get a clue and come back later this afternoon?
Retread, I actually think the potentially "manipulative" part of the pic is be the way it captures a moment of cheering some unseen speaker in a way that makes the teachers look like a crazed mob.
Standard newspic stuff, except that it's usually Repubs who are made to look silly.
--Chip S.
Bullshit. Ann is priming her hillbillies to start in on the "they are all big fat slobs" routine and you know it.--
That picture is going nationwide, I don't think this blog will make a dent.
In the past 5 years $0.71 from every new $1 set aside by Illinois for PK-12 education went to teacher retirement costs.
Give them a raise!!!
That's quite a flap.
Alex: How dare you dehumanize these womyn!
Good one. Dehu-MAN-ize wo-MAN, you get woMYN.
My state income tax goes from $5000 last year to $8500 this year on the same income which has stayed exactly the same for five years. Meaning I have taken a cut in take home pay so governor Quinn could give big donors, big businesses, such as Sears a tax-relief, tax-credits. Now they are to cut my pay further to pay the teachers to turn out illiterate gang bangers, to ruin more young lives who grow up to be hopelessly unprepared uneducated welfare receiving disabled Democrats.
It looks like the genetics lab at the University of Chicago was trying to clone hometown hero Chris Farley and something went terribly wrong.
Seriously, on those supposedly starvation CPS-wages these ladies don't appear to be missing many meals.
Maybe it's the cafeteria food.
Mom's friend lives near 2 newly-retired teachers - married teachers -
$75K/yr each pension.
All bleeding stops.
Illinois is bleeding: businesses, population, and, therefore, tax dollars.
Chicago's population fell by 200,000 during the decade that ended in 2010, a 6.9% decline, leaving it with fewer people than lived there in 1920.
Illinois is one of the slowest growing states in the US. From 200 to 2010, the population of Illinois grew by a 3.3%, compared to the national average of 9.7%.
Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services lowered Illinois’ rating from A+ to A, making Illinois the nation’s second-lowest rating from S&P. California is rated A-. This was blamed on “weak pension funding levels and lack of action on reform measures.” That is, idiocy like the teacher's strike.
Democrat State Sen. Mike Frerichs is running for reelection in the 52nd District, yet "his own family is moving their business out of Illinois and into Indiana.
Gayle Frerichs, who lives in Tuscola but drives 60 miles one-way to his company headquarters in Covington, said he didn’t like to get thrown into the middle of a political campaign. But he confirmed many of Bambenek’s points about Illinois and its business climate.
He said he saved between $90,000 and $100,000 a year by moving his business to Indiana. Much of the saving was in reduced workers compensation costs, but he also has lower costs in taxes, license plates and health care for his 20 or so employees."
I hope Rahm doesn't give in and sticks to his Republican principals.
Form follows function.
The glasses gal front-and-center is going to get a concussion from the diabetes-arms to her left (our right) if she isn't careful.
Bullshit. Ann is priming her hillbillies to start in on the "they are all big fat slobs" routine and you know it.--
As opposed to the selfless, caring, hardworking, altruistic educators you consider them to be, Jay?
It is also really rich of Ann to make fun of other people being fat given that she is a pretty hefty butterball herself!
So you're blind as well as stupid. Explains much.
"Three proud words! We didn't teach that!"
THE MEME!
That's right I'm confligrating stories!
Somebody needs to Christie the S**t out of their Monday.
Iowahawk: "CTU doesn't want teacher evaluations because their students come from poor dysfunctional parents, i.e., their previous students."
Oh, just ignore Jay. He's comparing an apple to a jumbo-sized bag of Cheetos.
Rahm is being niggardly with the education budget!
My niece is a teacher here. The school had some extra money to blow(shocker), but instead of spending it on the kids they had to go to a resort for a "conference". My niece bitched that they should have gotten each schoolroom an Ipad or something along those lines. Any decorating done to the classrooms is done at the teachers personal expense, and time. My parents volunteer to help my niece with the costs and the decorating.
get rid of public sector unions. All it is , is taxpayer theft.
My aunt is a teacher of the year recipient in Memphis, and the system just broke her. She retired because the unions and the school boards sucked the imagination and joy from her.
get rid of public sector unions. All it is , is taxpayer theft.
Re: Pogo's post,
I always wondered why there was a Gary, IN.
I feel sorry for teachers. They have bad unions just as we in medicine have bad lobbyists. They've been saddled with terrible mandates that prevent them from doing what they do best - teach. Instead they have to focus on documenting what they do for the state. Whenever I try to explain why I am not participating in Medicare any longer, it is only the teachers who seem to understand.
(I honestly think most of them would give up some of their benefits if they could just be left alone to do their job.)
I don't think teachers are any fatter than the general population so in that sense the picture is manipulative. On the other hand, if you go to a tea party rally and wish to be interviewed by the major media, it pays to be morbidly obese. If you have a Confederate flag or, even better, a Nazi armband, CNN is sure to seek you out and give you some air time.
...and don't forget summers and other frequent days off. Off course, if you listen to the teachers unions, teachers spend every second of the summer getting master's degrees and updating their lesson plans.
Well, they likely do go for masters --- in education. To hold up the district for more money for no improvement in capabilities.
Ann Althouse makes over $160,000.00 a year and barely works. That is three times what a senior public school teacher makes.
The professor is also competence. Given their disdain for any evaluation of their work, they clearly are not competent.
Does anybody LEARN in Chicago public schools anyway?
CPS teachers work a lot harder by a factor of forty compared to Ann.
...yet they churn out barely literate kids. Perhaps they should replace "effort" with "competence" and hire teachers who aren't, you know, low-level functional retards.
Good thing Chicago doesnt pay their teachers by the pound. Those are some hefty babes there.
All those hands in the air BEG for a caption this...
"Here he is, direct from Canada...Justin...Bieeeeebeeeeerrrrr!"
"Here he is, direct from the DNCC...Barak...eh?...oh! Barack...OBAAAAAMMAAAAAA!"
"We're from the government, and we're here to help you."
"Now when you see any of your students while on strike, this is the traditional form of greeting."
"Show of hands...who thinks Joe Biden's hawt?"
Where the hell did he take that, at Curves on Division St.?
Looking at CPS demographics here, the teachers are 50% white and the student body is 9% white.
There must be a tremendous amount of racial tension in such an unbalanced population. How do they get away with the obvious racial discrimination?
roll models
Jay Retread,
CPS teachers work a lot harder by a factor of forty compared to Ann.
This is merely an assumption, with no basis in fact. Teachers, by their own admission, work an average of 41 hours/week (study based on teacher self reporting the number of hours worked). This is a full three hours per week less than the average full time worker.
I have some compassion for the teachers' demand. Apparently, they have to live within the Chicago city limits, and their taxes are going up too. They claim to just want to cover their cost of living increases, or something like that.
I think that the easiest and cheapest thing to do would be to allow city employees to live outside the city. Then, no argument about being crushed by the tax burden, necessitated by, of course, their own wage increases.
Also, depending on how you calculate salaries, the Chicago teachers are either the highest paid, or second only to LA teachers.
I think the photo is appropriate.
Unless you believe that unionized teachers really don't make demands.
Maybe the photo was taken after they were offered the 16% raise anyone else would be happy to have.
Maybe the photo really doesn't capture the derangement many of us believe exists in the minds of the entitled class.
Fire the god-damn lot of them, and ban public-employee unions ("just like FDR told us to").
Problem solved.
Photo caption:
"If you're angry, live alone and have a cat, raise your hands!"
Jay Retread
Ann is only overpaid if you look at law school faculty jobs as being a competitive market, which it really isn't. There aren't a whole lot of law school professors nation wide, esp. for heterosexual whites, and the competition to get a job these days as such is brutal. A lot of the new hires have double doctorates - e.g. JD and PhD in, say, economics. Ann got in the door reasonably early as a moderately older baby boomer, before the faculty positions got clogged by our cohort.
But, the other thing to keep in mind about law school professors is that they tend to be the top law school grads, from the top law schools, who are coincidentally the same people who get recruited by the big firms with starting pay about $160k or so - much, much, higher than that of most newby attorneys. And, yes, Ann apparently worked for one of those top law firms right out of LS, a white shoed NYC firm, where she would probably be making a million or so if she had stayed and made partner.
The other dynamic is that the salary structure in a lot of law schools have gotten compressed, with the salaries for the new faculty pushing up the salaries for the old, with the differential greatly narrowing over the years. Which means that the salaries of long term experienced faculty, like Ann, being not that significantly higher in many cases than that of some of the newly hired faculty.
As I said above, yes, it looks like a racket, but the white people getting law school faculty jobs now are typically the brightest law school grads (probably in the top 1-2% in IQ), who have deferred gratification and busted their asses through high school up through most of their 20s. How many of those teachers can say the same?
pduggie wrote:
That's a lot of white people. Are the public schools majority white?
I was about to say.... white people as far as the eye can see. That group could use a little bit of diversity.
drunk, fat, and stupid is no way to go through life.
"Will be interesting to watch conservatives jump into bed with Rahm Emmanuel."
The Chicago Teachers Union is going to hand Mayor Emmanuel his head. Da Mayor will keep talking tough, the stike will drag on, and eventually Emmanuel will be forced to give the CTU everything it wants (plus a few extra sweeteners).
What's needed here is bold, innovative leadership- the kind we saw in, umm, Wisconsin. Emmanuel can't deliver that. And that's about to permanently damage his political career.
Marshal wrote:
Chicago teachers have the highest average salary of any city at $76,000 a year before benefits. The average family in the city only earns $47,000 a year.
Dang! I work in IT in NYC and a lot of people make less than that.. and don't get summers off.
It's a vast collection of leftard tools who are gaming the system in the face of economic collapse. They don't care because the union is all. They've wrapped their entire beings around it. Kids? We don't need no stinking kids. How many times do you need to be shown that public teachers unions could give two fucking shits about children? They have already said so. They prove it in their actions and deeds. But hey, if anyone is jaded enough to believe that some miraculous contract negotiation is going to lead to a settlement that they will all vote for and accept, well, then Urkel hasn't shined the light of his ever loving gaze upon them yet.
Fat teachers on fat salaries clamoring for more...
Everybody sees Red.
Red is the color of blood and strawberries. It is next to orange at the end of the visible spectrum of light, and is commonly associated with danger, sacrifice, passion, love, anger, socialism and communism, and in China and many other cultures, with happiness.
What, no hammers OR sickles?
Seems Drudge is getting soft in his dotage.
Comment from a down-state Illinois suburban teachers' union local President: "I can see the city doesn't have the money to give us what we demand. So they should just raise the taxes."
I guess that teacher never played Sim City- where raising taxes invariably prompts an exodus of taxpayers. Leaving you with a smaller tax base and a high tax rate.
Marshal wrote:
Chicago teachers have the highest average salary of any city at $76,000 a year before benefits
And yet leftist morons have been posting all day on Twitter that these teachers have "low salaries" and it is time to 'catch up'
Isn't that nice?
X said...
roll models
We have here a winner!
Cindy Martin said...
get rid of public sector unions. All it is , is taxpayer theft.
Of course it is and you know what's worse. It's a government sanction distribution machine that has been going on for decades. Where your representation is completely nonexistent. So you basically you have collusion between public sector unions, government bureaucrats, and state/local democrat representatives all sitting at the table without a representative for the tax payer in any form of negotiations whatsoever. It isn't just theft, it's outright usurpation.
They went to the school of Haagen Da'az.
This will not go well for Obama, the Chicago Democrat Machine - or the government employee unions that are critical to keeping Chicago Dems and Obama in office.
Too greedy teachers unions. Asking for too much.
Add in there will of course be talks of anyone but the noble Democrat citizens of Chicago paying for more government employee moolah.
How can Obama get Fed money from Wisconinites and Pannsylvanians to pay for the demands. Inside Illinois, there will be more talk by redistributionist activists of the necessity of "regional equity" (meaning take money from suburbs and other States to give to support Chicagos spending)
And unfortunately for Obama and the public - there will be plenty of "incidents" where kids that look like Obama's son if he had a son will be out and about doing flash mob looting. Perhaps even spending their idle time not studying - but shooting other kids that look like Obama's son if he had a son - for dissing!
Chicago is Obama's idea of America, and how America needs to work.
The longer it goes on the better Romney will be, and the more George Bush will be blamed.
The strike puts President Obama in a tough spot as a union supporter, a Chicagoan and a friend of Rahm.
Let's see what he has to say:
Leadership
And then we wonder why math scores are so low... compared to the rest of the developed countries.
Although, I suspect there is much fudging with that math.
"objective reality about compensation never penetrates their thinking."
The most common argument I've heard teachers make in support of higher pay is that their jobs are so important that they should be paid more. Why, our children are our future!
But when you point out that potable water is essential to life and gem-quality diamonds are not, they always seem to be stumped when asked why a glass full of gem-quality diamonds is worth far more than a glass full of tap water.
Or, considering that even though clean water and sanitation are far more important to public health than availability of brain surgery,a brain surgeon is paid more than are wirjers at the sewage treatment plant.
The sad truth is, education majors are seldom the brightest bulbs in the box. Determine pay by supply and demand? Why, it's just unfair that a ballplayer can make $millions, when I- who teach our future citizens!- am paid but a small fraction of that ...
I guess that teacher never played Sim City- where raising taxes invariably prompts an exodus of taxpayers. Leaving you with a smaller tax base and a high tax rate.
I wonder how much of role Sim City has played in determining my politics. I was pretty good at the game when controlling for natural disasters. The key was to keep taxes low, trade flowing, and increase education to attract high tech industry. But you never were successful if you just raised taxes on residents, commerce, or industry.
People starting and ending the conversation on teacher salary, at 76,000 a year, highest in the nation are missing the far worse "Bigger Picture".
Meaning the salary is the tip of the iceberg.
Chicago teachers have the highest average salary of any city at $76,000 a year before benefits. The average family in the city only earns $47,000 a year. Yet the teachers rejected a 16 percent salary increase over four years at a time when most families are not getting any raises or are looking for work.
The city is being bled dry by the exorbitant benefits packages negotiated by previous elected officials. Teachers pay only 3 percent of their health-care costs and out of every new dollar set aside for public education in Illinois in the last five years, 71% goes to fund teachers pension packages.
And this far worse than you imagined picture doesn't end with greedy union teachers - because as we all know there are FAR MORE Hero Government Workers serving us, educating us, telling us what to do and heroically keeping us all safe than just the teachers..
If anything, Hero Government cops make more...
And all those degreed and credentialled Chicago municipal employees in professional posts??
"I guess that teacher never played Sim City- where raising taxes invariably prompts an exodus of taxpayers. Leaving you with a smaller tax base and a high tax rate."
I first played SimCity in my "Computers in Education" class in college. We had to then write a paper on how the game could be integrated into your particular field of education.
I learned that if you don't keep increasing the education budget the teachers will go on strike.
Ann, who do you think is doing the manipulation? The women who have massive salaries, or the Drudge, for unveiling their greedy demanding faces?
I adore fairy tales and conspiracy theories.
The latest conspiracy theory is, amazing to me, all too believable. Those say that Axelrod has managed this strike so that Obama can swoop in and save the day looking tough on the unions. A faux Sister Soljah moment. The MSM will eat it up.
Although, I suspect there is much fudging with that math.
CTU Goon: Hey, I LOVE fudge.
The sad truth is, education majors are seldom the brightest bulbs in the box.
Ain't that the truth? I remember in college, the joke was that the athletes would be offended if you asked them if they took education courses since they were so easy.
I have some compassion for the teachers' demand. Apparently, they have to live within the Chicago city limits, and their taxes are going up too. They claim to just want to cover their cost of living increases, or something like that.
The irony is that they don't notice that everybody making identical demands (and Chicagoans being morons who don't check to see what they are paying people) is why Chicago is in the shithole it is in right now.
Nobody can afford public unions. That has been demonstrated nicely.
Wrong! Rahm Emanuel, not Axelrod. Pardon Me!
Couldnt have happened to a better city--enjoy your day Chicago parents, and think about what is happening and do something about it.
The sad truth is, education majors are seldom the brightest bulbs in the box
Truth!!! With very few exceptions the elementary and high school teachers that I have had to deal with in my personal and professional life are undoubtedly the dumbest people I have ever had the misfortune to meet.
Not only are they stupid in the mechanics of life, most of them don't even know the subjects that they are supposed to be teaching.
The children could get a better education by using retired business executives and people who have experience in their various fields.
The teachers are dumber than dirt.
Is it manipulation in a story about a strike to simply show a picture of the strikers striking? I've seen video and pics of them and that photo pretty accurately represents how the strikers look. To manipulate (show something different), you would need to take a lot of photos and crop with extreme prejudice.
Some of those fat women seem like they are demanding to be feed with shovels of spaghetti with marinara sauce.
Who would want their kids to be taught by these teachers?
This topic must not be very important to the Progressive Cause, since it drew Jay Retread as the assigned troll.
Sure, garage stopped by...but since he only put in the effort for a single, drive-by distortion, I figure that was a pro bono effort from him.
Actually, it's probably a part of his "buy 30,000 stupid troll comments, get one free" promotion he offers to the DNC/George Soros.
Re teachers and educational achievement: simply correlate SAT scores by educational choice. Yeah--teachers are the lowest of the low.
When it comes to the children, no tax rate can be high enough.
Those say that Axelrod has managed this strike so that Obama can swoop in and save the day looking tough on the unions. A faux Sister Soljah moment. The MSM will eat it up.
Its right of a bad reality show... but, as we have seen over and over... thats how Obama operates.
Hope & Change was all for show.
Some of those fat women seem like they are demanding to be feed with shovels of spaghetti with marinara sauce.
Hey I love spaghetti with marinara and meatballs! Don't let these disgusting hog beasts ruin a good meal!
The children could get a better education by using retired business executives and people who have experience in their various fields.
I'm sure a retired exec would just love to teach at CPS.
Look at the demographic. Fat loudmouthed woment teachers are the only ones who can deal with it.
Those say that Axelrod has managed this strike so that Obama can swoop in and save the day looking tough on the unions. A faux Sister Soljah moment. The MSM will eat it up.
Which would be a ridiculous thing for Obama to do. He's the President of the United States and has no business inserting him in a purely local affair.
If that's how he operates then just eliminate mayors and governors and govern by Executive proclomation.
That would be a great Romney campaign ad though. While Obama is doing Rahm's job in Chicago, I'm working to get Americans back to work. The ones who aren't on strike anyway.
Which would be a ridiculous thing for Obama to do. He's the President of the United States and has no business inserting him in a purely local affair.
"The administrators acted stupidly. "
Althouse is doing her level best to keep Titus at bay.
leeches, state-unionized teachers boated ticks, et cetera:
http://www.cracked.com/article_17199_the-7-most-horrifying-parasites-planet.html
I disagree with the characterization of teachers as being of relatively low intelligence.
The main problems with the public schools are
1) lack of involvement from a significant percentage of the parents,
2) the unwillingness of the schools to appropriately discipline the students that cause the problems,
3) the public school bureaucracy,
4) the poor teachers have an impact that is disproportionate to their numbers. (i.e. each teacher teaches 15-30% of the students that go through their school)
All four of those areas need to be addressed to get the schools to where they should be. Teachers unions have a strong input on 3 and 4, parents/society on 1 and 2, the government on 2, 3, and 4.
Remember that regardless of increases in the salary that occur as result of this, an individual teacher will still receive more money every year due to time-in-grade.
Obama's people have to be absolutely freaking out over this. A long-term strike has the potential to be utterly disastrous for him.
wef - cracked.com is my online crack.
"When a city has grown so overlarge and crowded that it is in immediate danger of collapse ... when food and clean water flow into the city at a rate just sufficient to feed every mouth, and every hand must work constantly to keep it that way ... when all transportation is involved in moving vital supplies, and none is left over to move people out of the city should the need arise ... then it is that Crazy Eddie leads the movers of garbage out on strike for better working conditions."
--- The Mote in God's Eye
(Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle)
Just offscreen, there's someone loading a cupcake gun.
exhelodrvr1 said...
All four of those areas need to be addressed to get the schools to where they should be. Teachers unions have a strong input on 3 and 4, parents/society on 1 and 2, the government on 2, 3, and 4.
Here's school evolution over the last 30 years in schools with too high a percentage of lousy parents:
School administrators don't support teachers when dealing with students and lousy parents because of the possible legal and employment repercussions. Teachers therefore refuse to be held accountable when they aren't allowed to perform their jobs. This infuriates the better parents, but Democrats cannot slight their core special interest.
So the grand bargain to the minority parents is: we can't educate your children, but we'll pass laws to ensure they can get into college anyway. And if they graduate we'll ensure there's a safe government job available. So our inability to educate won't hurt them as long as they can demonstrate a decent committment. And non-minority students? As Jake Diamond says, we have enough rich whites and asians already, so who cares about the poor ones?
Kevin,
...and don't forget summers and other frequent days off. Off course, if you listen to the teachers unions, teachers spend every second of the summer getting master's degrees and updating their lesson plans.
The bloody never-ending credentializing process at least I can attest to.
Jay Retread,
It is also really rich of Ann to make fun of other people being fat given that she is a pretty hefty butterball herself!
Where does Ann make fun of anybody for being fat?
As James Taranto said a week or so back, if you can hear a dog whistle, definitionally, you are the dog.
Hog wild.
When the change was made uptown
And the big man joined the band
From the coastline to the city
All the little pretties raise their hands...
If you're thinking Drudge selected a particular photo because it showed a lot of overweight teachers, fear not. I just walked past the protest here in downtown Chicago, and that's about what it looked like. As I commented to my friends: I'm pretty sure they're not underpaid, but they damn sure aren't underfed!
They look like a bunch of Vatican II nuns who took a vow of profligacy.
Chicago teachers have the highest average salary of any city at $76,000 a year before benefits.
And here is the comparison that should be made , but isn't.
Chicago school children perform near the bottom on standardized tests. beating out school districts in rural Alabama and Mississippi.
CPS isn't in the education business, it's in the public school teacher employment business.
Step back a bit. Look at the School Board. Who is on it? Teachers from other districts, retired teachers, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, and parents of teachers?
So who is representing the tax payers?
Next time there is a school board election, trouble yourself to vote in it. When one of the candidates campaigns on "As a retired teacher and the parent of two teachers, I understand the problems of public education", ask yourself if that candidate is really going to represent your views as a taxpayer.
I blame the voters.
No ... the picture doesn't bother me.
The local news is reporting that the evening Chicago commute is a "mess," and that 8 bus routes have been shifted as a result of the protest.
I say "protest" and not "demonstration," because I believe the CTU achieved the desired effect: intimidation. My suspicion and fear is that much of Chicago politics has become "mitigation of threats" made or implied by the City's variously "disenfranchised" groups. The real power in the Cook County is out of the voters and perhaps the politicians hands as well. It belongs to those who can turn out a public and vocal presence.
Chicago could slip into some very bad times in the months ahead. The level of violence is already an embarrassment, with mobs regularly threatening tourists on Michigan avenue weekend evenings, and a murder rate that continues to climb. Expect to see hard and financially risky moves by the City to keep things from getting worse.
Question: Is the City attempting to "buy" behavior it can no longer assume in a civilized city?
The Belmont Club has a post about Chicago and the "Cease Fire" program.
Big-time payoff.
I taught in a non-union school system. I did not feel under paid, but I did feel screwed over by asshole administrators. It takes 8 to 20 hours of preparation to create one hour of interesting effective instruction—this comes from industrial training studies. If you teach the same subject every period and every year, you've got it made after the first year. However, if an asshole administrator moves you from grade to grade and subject to subject, a teacher is screwed. Every year is the first year. That's why teachers join unions in my opinion.
Also, whenever I sent anyone to the office, the first thing that happened was an investigation of me. The perp's buddies were called up to the office on the loud speaker to back up his story.
Ken,
So a new elementary school teacher, who is teaching approx 4 classroom hours/day, has to spend (at the low end) 160 hours/week on preparation? Sounds like an exaggeration - which is part of the problem.
I'm sorry, but I'm irresistibly reminded of something I saw maybe twenty years ago in downtown Berkeley. Someone had put a sticker on one of the lampposts, depicting a number of large, militant women shaking their fists. The caption was "We Still Ain't Satisfied!" Beneath it, someone had written "Eat more ice cream!"
exhelodrvr1,
So a new elementary school teacher, who is teaching approx 4 classroom hours/day, has to spend (at the low end) 160 hours/week on preparation? Sounds like an exaggeration - which is part of the problem.
It certainly doesn't sound like the work week of any elementary school teacher I've ever seen. When you throw in the 20 hours of actual classroom time, you're talking 200 hours a week.
There are, for the record, 168 hours in a week. I mean, jokes about lawyers' billable hours aside, we don't ordinarily get into territory where a job positively demands more time than actually exists. Especially when it's teaching second graders.
The preparation is a "prepare once" thing.
You prepare once. You review/learn the material and plan activities. And then you do the same lessons over and over.
Unless you get moved around.
Synova,
Granted, for purposes of argument. Though it really isn't "do it once, and then it's done."
But still, 8 hours of prep for one hour of class time? 30 weeks of class time at 20 hours a week is 600 hours. 600 hours times 8 is 4800 hours. That's about 28-and-a-half solid weeks of prep, assuming zero sleeping or eating or anything else. So you take your thirteen weeks off in the summer, work straight through them without any sleep at all, doing the same over Thanksgiving and Christmas and spring breaks, and then for your thirty working weeks you merely spend twelve hours a day doing prep. On top of the four you spend teaching M-F.
And that's the low end. Assume ken in sc's upper range of 20 hours of prep per hour of effective teaching and you are up to 71 weeks (remember, this is 24/7 -- no sleeping allowed) of prep time for a year's worth of teaching.
Forgive me if I doubt that there's a teacher on the planet actually doing this.
Believe me, I know what public school prep time is. My husband is relatively new to public school teaching, though he taught at a private school for about a decade. He's in his second year at his school, coping with four levels of orchestra and a music theory course that he's designing from the ground up. (There has not been such a course in the district before.) He's assembling all his course materials himself, typesetting a lot of them himself, answering all parent emails himself, putting all materials up on his website at the district himself, getting school instruments repaired and bows rehaired on his own time. And so forth.
Does this entail a lot of time and labor and travail? Damn straight it does. Does it take eight hours per hour of class time? It does not. Does it take twenty? Physically, it could not.
Synova,
I can't resist adding this.
There is no winning when teachers strike. Teachers lose, schools lose, students lose,....OH! Wait........Unions win.
holdfast wrote:
Safe to say that these "ladies" have not exactly been on starvation wages.
Oink.
A wee bit o' privation would prove beneficial, methinks.
wyo sis,
There is no winning when teachers strike. Teachers lose, schools lose, students lose,....OH! Wait........Unions win.
Well, in the ordinary way of things, they don't, because while strikers against private companies ordinarily get some sympathy, strikers against the government have a bit of a PR problem, especially if their job is teaching your kids. And, at a minimum, at least keeping an eye on your kids. Leaving every parent in Chicago (well, every parent in Chicago nuts enough to entrust a kid to the CPS) with the choice of skipping work, hiring a babysitter, or availing herself of one of the hastily-cobbled-together school alternatives is not something likely to endear Chicago parents to the strikers.
I am almost tempted to believe the conspiracy theory floated by one of Glenn Reynolds' correspondents: that the whole thing is designed so that Obama can step in, get everyone past the impasse, and even look a bit tough on unions. But, no, it'd have to be later than this for electoral purposes, which means some other sort of work. Reynolds' correspondent was a longshoreman, and that's much more the ticket: You could stage a work stoppage there any time you liked.
Looks about right to me. That is what they look like. Perhaps they do need more money to buy wholesome food. They look like they've been eating lard sandwiches.
I truly feel sorry for the parents who have to put their children in the care of this bunch.
damikesc,
[quoted]...and don't forget summers and other frequent days off. Off course, if you listen to the teachers unions, teachers spend every second of the summer getting master's degrees and updating their lesson plans.[/quote]
Well, they likely do go for masters --- in education. To hold up the district for more money for no improvement in capabilities.
It would be nice were these things optional, but they aren't. It is generally the district that is demanding the Ed. Masters, and the teacher who has gotten wearily used to the mandatory hoop-jumping.
There are only a few people really keen on education credentials. They are, unsurprisingly, people whose livelihood consists in supplying education credentials.
I saw that pic on Drudge this morning and sent it to a friend, with the comment "if any of them were caught having sex with a male student, they'd get life in prison, if not the chair!"
Emmanuel will be forced to give the CTU everything it wants (plus a few extra sweeteners).
For those picket-ladies' sakes, I hope they're artificial sweeteners.
No. I think asking the question might be, though.
for years now, i've been about ready to bust an artery here in victimization central (san fran bay area) over this 'poor unappreciated teacher' thing. they pull in 80k, get a three-month vacation, have benefits up the ying-yang, and get a LIFETIME PENSION fer chrissake!! nonetheless, every time we turn around we're told how they suffer for the sake of the children. they tell sad stories of how they buy their own chalk despite that fact that OVER 50 PERCENT OF THE ENTIRE STATE BUDGET (not to mention property taxes, lottery funds, and on and on) goes to 'education' ...and yet the sheep are guilted into passing more and more tax increases every year to 'save the schools' from their imminent collapse (currently, governor brown wants to 'temporarily' increase the already exorbitant sales tax)...and then the teacher's unions give the money back to the democrats. auuuggghhh!!! what a racket!
oh...and is our kids learnin'?? well..they get to know plenty about ditching school for political protests and how dems are wonderful but republicans are evil. then they drop out and becoming the newest crop of victims. a bargain at twice the price!
All in all, just another brick in the wall...
It would be nice were these things optional, but they aren't. It is generally the district that is demanding the Ed. Masters, and the teacher who has gotten wearily used to the mandatory hoop-jumping.
How effective are you at spotting bubbles?
The union controls the school board. The school board endorses continuing education standards where teachers are rewarded with pay increases if they pursue a masters in their field. The taxpayers pay for this through increased levies on their homes. Higher education loves it because it's a down period for them(Summer) where they can fill some classrooms with their allies. The entire risk/reward mechanism isn't based on merit, productivity, or overall performance. It's premised on just wanting the masters degree.
Like all bubbles, this one will burst too either by choice or by force.
"The key was to keep taxes low, trade flowing, and increase education to attract high tech industry. But you never were successful if you just raised taxes on residents, commerce, or industry."
-- What? The key was to jack up the tax rates right before you collected, then slash them again because people are stupid.
This morning the Washington Post had an editorial that pointed out that Chicago is the home town for both Obama and his Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, implying that the administration needs to get involved in settling the strike.
This strike is Kabuki theater and the fix is in. Obama will have a "Sister Souljah" moment with the teachers unions and look "presidential" as they meekly accept their 16% raises and go back to work.
Wish I could get a 16% raise for doing the same work as I'm doing now.
Oh, and where does the "8 hours of prep for 1 hour of classroom instruction" metric come from. It was more like 1 1/2 to 3 hours for a 50 minute lecture when I was a college instructor.
Of course, I knew my material. Fourth grade math and second grade spelling, now that may take some time for a El-Ed graduate.
All I know about El-Ed as a discipline is that back when I was studying ordinary and partial differential equations my younger sister was taking Fairy Tales I and Fairy Tales II.
Think about that 16% they turned down. On an average of $75k, that would mean at least a $12,000 (!) raise after 4 years. That's $1,000 a month!
Of course, if the 4% is compounded each year, it's even more: $87,740 after 4 years. As if that weren't bad enough, think what that would do to pension calculations!
But it wasn't good enough for them. Pigs.
Can Emanuel fire them en masse, like air traffic controllers?
Damn! talk about beef on the hoof. These women mostly look like someone set their faces on fire then put it out with a shovel.
"Well-fed angry white entitlement," eh? Well, I'm also a teacher, and I'm well-fed, white, and angry, so does that mean I'm entitled, too?
Although I'm happy to say I'm not as fat as the average in that photo.
Well, it's sure not the Hunger Games.
Brennan,
The union controls the school board. The school board endorses continuing education standards where teachers are rewarded with pay increases if they pursue a masters in their field. The taxpayers pay for this through increased levies on their homes. Higher education loves it because it's a down period for them(Summer) where they can fill some classrooms with their allies. The entire risk/reward mechanism isn't based on merit, productivity, or overall performance. It's premised on just wanting the masters degree.
So far as our own experience goes, it's not quite like that here. My husband was hired under a program whereby he could teach without a state teaching credential (which does mean a Masters in education) if he obtained said credential within three years. Accordingly, he's been taking a mostly-online course at a local university while also doing his job. It's not just in the summer; it's year-round, six quarters' worth, a couple classes a quarter.
At least he doesn't have to go through the arrangements his fellow students need to make in order to have their teaching observed and evaluated, because he already has existing classes. Five of them, all at different levels (two middle school, three high school).
Brennan,
I should've added that the credentializing by no means stops with the Masters degree; "continuing learning" is built into the system. And as I understand it, it's not an optional "take a course and get a pay raise" deal; it's a mandatory "take a course or lose your job" deal.
The racket here really hasn't much to do with the teachers' unions as such. It's more about the folks who went into K-12 teaching and then quickly wangled their way out of it into Ed. school teaching positions, where they conduct studies and write books. Well, how do you create a market for your books? You persuade the public that teachers ought to know all about the latest educational research, and they vote in "continuing learning" requirements for the teachers.
I have seen some of these textbooks. They range from actually very good to "does this publisher have a copy editor?" The worst of them footnote someone else's study or Ed. school diss. for the blandest of platitudes.
I've met a lot of my husband's teaching colleagues, and, believe me, no one thinks of this "continuing learning" BS as anything but a chore.
Dah Bores! (said in the same accent as "Dah Bears!")
I'm with Rush. This is setup for Obama to ride to the rescue of the poor downtrodden people of Chicago by twisting the arms of the teachers union to take a 15% raise. The One will save us.
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