News-Record.com

Not surprising!

Does some of the dissatisfaction of our teachers stem from young and relatively inexperienced principals?

Joe,
The teachers I talk to are unhappy with central staff/Grier/more paper work/new programs/untried new programs/large class size/cuts in money yearly/too much teacher training(or not the right type)- usually they like their principals, but complain that the admins are not in the school enough due to meetings....

I have always thought that the training is not on message. So much of it has little to do with what improving instructional skills of the teacher in her area of expertise. Instruction, to be any good, has to be given by someone who is smarter and more accomplished than the people he/she is trying to train. Guilford County does training on the cheap.

I'm a teacher in GCS and particpated in the survey. The results are accurate and the public should take note since unhappy teachers affect the education of our kids.

The biggest problem that I have and that was mentioned in the survey is lack of time. It's difficult to do tutoring, to contact parents, and do all that needs to be done with all of the meetings and paper work that we have now. On average, I work 55 hours a week (including nights and weekends), but I'm an experienced teacher and I don't coach a sport. New teachers must work even harder because they are putting together lesson plans for the first time and are trying to manage all of the duties of an experienced teacher. Keep in mind that new teachers have the same duties and expectations as someone who has taught 10 years or more.

Another issue is lack of discipline in the schools. Teachers often see this as lack of support from their school administration, but administrators are under a lot of pressure to follow the rules and procedures from central office. Stricter rules and consistent enforcement would prevent many major problems and would teachers to do what we were originally hired to do--teach.

Andi,

Pls give us your ideas on how Dr. Grier and central staff can help the teachers on discipline problems. Do you want more students removed from the classroom?

Can you give us any examples where the current administration is more lenient that past administrations.

I hear you and I want to help and support you.

Joe:

I know your question was directed to Andi, but I hope you'll allow me to put in my two cents. Here's my idea: Yes, students who continually disrupt the classroom absolutely should be removed from the classroom. If they want to come back, on their first day back, the student's parent or guardian must accompany them and spend the day with them in the classroom. Once the parent is inconvenienced, you'll see how quickly those dispuptive kids will shape upand teachers will finally be able to do what they're supposed to do--teach. If Grier is such an "innovator" he'll see this as a bold plan to address discipline on the schools.

Guilford County has a lot of schools. I see no reason why we cannot experiment with various rules on discipline problems. What is best should be duplicated throughout the county. I agree, we must have order in the classroom.

What is truly astonishing is study the Guilford County School handbooks from three years ago compared to now. Note the "discipline" for infractions such as cheating. It used to be suspension. Now it is zero on a test and a call to the parents for 1st offense, 2nd offense, 3rd offense. If these are the changes for cheating, imagine how lenient the other rules are.

We need to pull out the three year old manuals and start from there. I agree that the parents should have to come back to school with the student. In fact, let him follow the student around for a few days.

There are many examples of administrators being more lenient. Also many of these administrators are liked and respected for other reasons. Many of us have heard that they have been "steered" to look the other way.

Rules need to be strict. They need to be enforced. And, above all, it needs to come from the VERY TOP loud and clear. If Terry Grier were to do this, he would find many parents behind him.

Good question about what teachers need from our administration. Many students (but not all) that have behavior problems also have academic problems and are below grade level in math and/or reading. Students need the extra tutoring we push at the high school level when they are in elementary school. I should never have high school students that can not read above an elementary level, but it happens all of the time. Students that are struggling with school at the elementary level should be given extra tutoring. This would have to occur as a pull-out program during the regular school day or as an after school program. Regular classroom teachers rarely have the time to work one on one with a struggling student and it is not fair to these kids to push them on to the next grade level when their academic skills are lacking. They are being set up to fail and fall further behind.

Also, something must be done about students that continue to disrupt the classroom. I am a major proponent of preventing problems before they happen. I talk to my students privately and have given students after school detention with me instead of writing them up along with talking to their parents. If I have spoken with the student and parent, offered my own detention, and the child continues to misbehave, I do not have any other options than to let a principal deal with that student. More often though, you have students that are disrupting the class to the point where you can't teach and other students can't learn. You can send the student out only to have them sent back to you. Principals also look down on teachers who send students out because it's looked at as the teacher not being able to control their class when it could be just one or two students causing the problems. In fact, I have sent a student to the office only twice this whole semester (same student) because I did not want to send students out only to have them come back to the classroom doing the same disruptive things all over again. It ends up making the situation worse because students see that nothing is going to happen them(and we certainly don't want to make our suspension rates go up). Teachers need to feel supported and to be able to teach and not have to deal with constant disruptions from unruly students that simply don't care. I'm not sure what the solution is, but I want ALL students to be able to get the best education possible and many talented, bright students would rather goof off, run their mouths, and get in trouble than participate in class and do well in school.

Reading that just make me want to goof up.
I am so fed up with this BS of a school system!!!!!!!

Andi,

Instead of students being sent back, there should be a holding room for them. They could sit and do school work or do alone what they do in a classroom, goof off. At least they would not be disturbing other students. They aren't in class learning anyway if they are just seeking the attention by disrupting.

Their parents should be called to come and sit with them. Perhaps there should be fines for parents who do not show up to take care of their own children.

TERRINA

In reference to Andi's story (the same story of most of our teachers), what do you propose doing with these students who are cheating the majority of the students out of THEIR education?

It is pretty bad when a student can assault a teacher, laugh in their face daily and a teacher has to put up with this humiliation because they cannot afford to quit their job.

Whatever happened to the Breakfast Club mode of punishment for bzad behavior where students had to come to school on Saturday. Maybe if some of these students had to be at school in detention while their friends are off having fun on the weekend, it would get their attention.

southwest's graduation was a wonderful event as we were all proud of our kids. one thing that ruined part of it for me was that dot kearns showed up for OUR ceremony. she has done NOTHING but attempt to divide us as a community in an effort to make her alma mater (central) stronger. she made me want to puke. at least my daughter's name was such that she got shake nancy routh's hand. what was dot thinking? was she trying to rub our noses in it?

at least susan and grier were smart enough to NOT show. if either did, they'd look as hypocritical as dot!

i only have to put up with this nonsense for two more tears. i look forward to seeing garth up there with our kids.

do us all a favor dot .... stay away. you've messed up our kid's lives enough. NO ONE wants to see you around OUR SCHOOL!

The U.S. Supreme Court has decided to take up the fight of student assignment based upon race.

See it here.

Supreme Court to hear schools race case
By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press

The Supreme Court said Monday it will decide the extent to which public schools can use race in deciding school assignments, setting the stage for a landmark affirmative action ruling.
Justices will hear appeals from a Seattle parents group and a Kentucky parent, ruling for the first time on diversity plans used by a host of school districts around the country.

Race cases have been difficult for the justices. The court's announcement that it will take up the cases this fall provides the first sign of an aggressiveness by the court under new Chief Justice John Roberts.

The court rejected a similar case in December when moderate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was still on the bench. The outcome of this case will turn on her successor, Samuel Alito.
"Looming in the background of this is the constitutionality of affirmative action," said Davison Douglas, a law professor at William and Mary. "This is huge."

Arguments will likely take place in November. The court's announcement followed six weeks of internal deliberations over whether to hear the appeals, an unusually long time.

In one of the cases, an appeals court had upheld Seattle's system, which lets students pick among high schools and then relies on tiebreakers, including race, to decide who gets into schools that have more applicants than openings.
The lower court decision was based in part on a Supreme Court ruling three years ago, written by O'Connor, which said that colleges and universities could select students based at least in part on race.

The court also will also consider a school desegregation policy in Kentucky. That case is somewhat different, because the school district had long been under a federal court decree to end segregation in its schools. After the decree ended, the district in 2001 began using a plan that includes race guidelines.

A federal judge had said system did not require quotas, and that other factors were considered including geographic boundaries and special programs.

A mother, Crystal Meredith, claimed her son was denied entrance into the neighborhood school because he is white. The Jefferson County school district, which covers metropolitan Louisville, Ky., and has nearly 100,000 students, was ordered to desegregate its schools in 1974.

The court will also consider whether Seattle's so-called integration tiebreaker system, which has been discontinued, is tailored to meet a "compelling interest" by the school.

A group called Parents Involved in Community Schools sued in July 2000, arguing that it was unfair for the school district to consider race, and Seattle halted the system.

Numbers,

I edited your comment to create a link to the article. The address was running off the page for some reason.

Hope you don't mind.

Terrina Here.

I believe we have not created the climate and culture that fosters a successful school environment.

We have unruly, oppressive, and disrespectful environments at many of the schools I visited this Spring.

The environment I saw is destructive and unfair to teachers and students.

It is disrespectful to teachers to put them in a no win situation with classroom behavior. If they send a student to the office, they are judged as insufficient in classroom management, and if they do send a child, nothing happens (this is what Andi shared and what I see and hear constantly) and it is the model of disrepect all around. It disrespects the teacher, the students that are behaving, and the student that is mis-behaving.

It is a maladaptive cycle, and we have to stop that one. I would like to see the Administrators at the schools having accountability for changing this cycle and supporting the teachers and students.

The student should not return for that class period. And they need intervention. They need to go straight to the counselor or social worker so we can find out WHY that student is acting out. Human beings never do things without a reason. We always have a reason for our behavior. So wouldn't it be more efficient for us to find out WHY THE STUDENT IS ACTING OUT?

Like Andi said, most of the students that disrupt class are behind at least one grade level. So of course, it is easier to get kicked out, than to sit there feeling stupid because you cannot follow what is going on in the class.
I see this as a great way to identify students who need intensive tutoring.

GCS just added a reading resource teacher position to the middle and high schools to address 6th and 9th grade students who are 2 or more grade levels behind in reading.

Why we haven't done that all along is a great question.

I attended a Community Service Forum this past Friday "Building an Action Plan for Success to Reduce the Rate of Suspensions, Expulsions, and Drop-Outs." It was presented by the School of Education at A&T Univ. and the NC State Dept. Of Public Instruction.

There is intelligent, good work being done on this subject, but I believe the time is now for our community to let GCS know that we must put this issue on the FRONT burner until we are doing a better job of creating a stable, nurturing, supportive environment for teachers to teach, and students to learn.

Dr. Elsie Leak, Associate Superintendent for the state of NC, asked that we all consider the following quote so that we might all get on the same page and begin to make a difference.

"We can, whenever and whereever we choose, successfully teach all children whose schooling is of interest to us. We already know more than we need to do that. Whether or not we do it must finally depend on how we feel about the fact that we haven't so far." Ron Edmonds

disgusted,

FYI Susan had a family wedding on Saturday.

She wasn't there in 2004 either.... Must have had a prior engagement ot too hung over from Central's celebration.

Not sure about 2005. I didn't have tickets for that year.

Terrina,
I serve on our middle school's leadership team, and I'd like to make one correction to your post. GCS has not "added a reading resource teacher position to middle schools"--we were told to cut an elective teacher position in order to make a reading teacher position. We agree that it's a nice position to have, but the mandate without the position is, obviously, causing some difficulty for us. For example, a PE teacher might teach 175 students daily, but a reading teacher working with 6th graders who are below grade level may teach 30 students per grade level during elective time. This means our other elective classes will be even larger than they are now.

North311,

I guess what everyone says is true then. She just doesn't like SW.

Only Nancy Routh came to SWH's graduation in 2005.
A county commissioner told me last year there were FIVE school board members at Western in 05. Guess we know how SW rates. At least this year there were 3 board members there.

I heard that Grier was booed at Andrews' graduation - AGAIN!!

Teacher,

I am aware that this is an issue. I serve on the leadership team at Kernodle, and we had the same issue regarding the directive to add this reading teacher.

The information we got from Dr. Grier was that, since the students that are behind will have to replace an elective with the reading class, the number of students in the electives would go down, and somehow he and Peggy Thompson did not feel that would stress out the elective numbers.

Of course Dr. Grier worded it much better than I just did, but that is the idea.

I hope that is how it will work out. We cannot have over packed PE classes, of course, because that becomes a safety issue.

Please let us know how that is working at each of the schools.

Kernoodle,

another school where kids need diversity.

Its on the radar screen!

Bad behavior is an acquired trait. It can be corrected. The first thing a child must learn is how to sit in his seat with the mount shut. Parents can help by making him sit in one place for 20-30 minutes at a time. Sitting and reading at the same time is best but reading may have to come later. Listening skills should be taught by both parents and teachers. Some people think that is impolite to tell a student to shut his mount, but it is often necessary. In the fifth grade, I went an entire year with no speaking except when called on by the teacher. (Except recess, lunch period, etc.) We got used to it and we learned a lot. You have to introduce silence to the students. It is hard a first, but they soon learn to occupy their minds with activities that do not involve talking.

Terrina,

There are many more electives than PE! You just insulted every teacher who teaches an elective. Remember six pages of ART ELECTIVES at SWH last year??

Joe,

Please go volunteer and try to silence a room these days for 20 minutes. Pick any school, any grade. Good luck. The way classrooms function today is not how they functioned years ago.

Diversity Dot,

If Kernodle looks like the Northwest High graduation, both students and audience, you get the big Polka Dot award of the day. Diversity MUST come to these schools. With so many involved parents, I know they will want to take their share of the gangs too to help out.

Have just been to the seventh grade award ceremony at SW middle. The diversity in that school is incredible.
Those that said "those kids need diversity" are just plain nuts!
Not only that the are lazy ass ignorant because if they took the time to go and see it they would be qualified to comment on it.
Meanwhile the real work needs to happen at Kernoodle,Northwest Dudley and Smith!
Diversity Dot is watching you!!!

If you were offended by my post, you misread it. I used PE as an example only becasue the previous post mentioned PE. Of course we honor all our specials teachers. If we did not value what they offer, we would not have them at the schools. If we have them, they must have some reasonable class size comparable to the other subjects or they cannot succeed. So Specials teachers, please speak up if this is not going to work. Are you talking to Mark Jewell about all this?

We do not want specials teachers to be over-burdened because of the addition of the reading teachers at 6th and 9th grades. Please let us know.