Two Endorsements, No Jobs

 

  Again, or still, I am flummoxed at the lack of job listings

  19 June and there's ONE lang arts opening at Pomona in Jeffco. As someone on the inside of this teacher crisis, I question its authenticity. Based on the jobs that have been posted, there were really no more listings than in past years.

   So. Since I work and worked with people who are actively looking to get out of either the building or of teaching, who quit, I can say that my research suggests there are not any jobs being posted.

   Option 1: The jobs being vacated are not being filled due to the budget cuts. Teachers inside the building are then picking up additional classes to cover the gap.  Or, the position is being cut and those classes are no longer offered .This is going to cause more teachers to leave, as their class sizes will increase, as well as their work load.

   Option 2: The vacated jobs were filled with student teachers who were already in the building.

   Option 3: After realizing that only experienced (AKA "Expensive") teachers were applying to jobs, the decision was made to simply not post the jobs and implement Option 1.

   Option 4: There is no crisis. Nobody quit teaching this year. Nobody retired. Nobody hopped buildings. It was all an elaborate scheme to scare high school graduates into enrolling in a teacher education program in college.

    To be fair, I have noted a cornucopia of elementary ed jobs, special ed jobs and paraprofessionals. Since you can make $20 an hour at McDonalds and only $17 an hour as a paraprofessional, I can see the issue there. You are not at risk of a student biting you, or punching you at McDonalds. Oh, and by the way, PAY THESE PEOPLE MORE THEY ARE DOING GOD'S WORK WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK !

   For those who do not know (which is one person, of my six readers, five are in education) a paraeducator is a special ed teaching assistant. They are not licensed, which is why districts get away with the crappy pay. They are kind, patient humans, who many times are retired educators, or college students, or folks who just want to freaking help. Their job includes changing adult diapers. They have to be certified to lift students out of wheelchairs. They understand how to teach phonics to kids with down syndrome. They ( and the teachers that they support) get punched, their hair pulled, puked on. They change wet pants. They adapt core class lessons to their student's abilities which range from non verbal CP to higher functioning autism and everything in between. They teach the lessons they've distilled. They create differentiated lesson plans for every student's ability. Did I mention the threat to their physical safety? They also get attached to the students and their parents, write IEP's and have  meeting after meeting after meeting after meeting after meeting...

    Sped teachers and their paras must deal with behaviors on all fronts. These are not students who respond to traditional consequences. When these kids are mainstreamed into core classes without their para, they can lash out verbally---some will hurl obscenities, some will slap or punch. Then they are removed from the core class, and everyone with a functioning brain asks why this is being forced on the student, and the answer is "it's the law". So there's that. Inside their own classes it's also a struggle. One sped teacher is permanently in pain because a student attacked her from a raised walkway as she entered the building. He jumped on her back, slamming her to the ground. She now has permanent disc damage that causes daily pain. Yet, she returned to the job every day for her remaining years and retired last year.

   But I digress.

   I actively applied for every, single posted language arts job (and one humanities) in three districts from March to May of this year. All totaled, I'd say 15 jobs. Not any more than any other year, which is why I don't think the crisis is real, even though I personally know people who are quitting. Something doesn't add up. I was offered an interview for ONE lang arts job and then ghosted. I was summarily rejected based on my application, only, from three of the others. One school, to whom I submitted a LANG ARTS application, called me for a THEATRE interview. That was disheartening, as I did not apply for the THEATRE job. They had to dig my application out of the system, call me to take the morning off, make sub plans, to "interview" for a job that wasn't actually available. They knew who they wanted to hire, but policy says they must interview other candidates. Bull Shit Policy. So my time was wasted. Thank you.  I was not even given consideration for a theatre position in the new PA draw building IN MY OWN DISTRICT for reasons the current theatre teacher cannot understand, either.  I was shunned from a humanities opportunity because my second endorsement was held up by bureaucratic bullshit around my fingerprints, which the CDE has had for twenty years, but sure, feel free to jack me out of the the one real opportunity I had. Thanks.

   And I digress again.

  This isn't fully synthesized, it's mostly vomit, but Imma push "publish" anyway. Only six of you read these, anyway, and I needed to vent.