Teaching Salaries

     

            Nobody is required to read anything that I write. That's the beauty of freedom.

           I have recently changed districts for my mental health. I overstayed in my previous district due to monetary issues-primarily that I was being paid very well. I know, but for teaching trust me: it was good money. Good money, my bills were paid and I was angry, anxiety ridden, frustrated and moments away from a medical event. 

           Last year I realized I had traded my sense of self, my mental stability and my integrity for the all mighty dollar, and decided to exit. Some how. Some way.  I formulated a plan, but first, a lesson for the non teachers reading this. This is how you start planning to exit teaching.

           Retirement from teaching is not a lesson you are taught when you become a teacher. Both lessons that I am recording here, I wish I had known before I ever embarked on this career.

           Upon retirement after 21 years, you are only eligible for 51% of your salary. At 35 years, you can only receive 87.5% of your salary. You cannot receive 100% of your salary after any number of years.

          Your salary years in PERA are your actual years teaching, but your pay is attached to your district. Now if you spend 35 years in one building, then you will be at far right end of the grid at top salary and you will retire at 87.5% of that salary. But, if you left your district at year 18, you did not receive a salary that is 18 years in your new district. Depending on the new district, you will receive anywhere from eight to eleven of your 18 hard earned years. Are you still with me?  THUS and such, if you spend three years in your new district and decide to  retire at year 21 and 51% of your salary, you are NOT retiring at year 21 on the Pera pay  scale, which does not exist. You are retiring at year 13 on the salary pay scale. 

        If you change districts after year ten of teaching, you will not retire with the benefits owed for your full number of years that you taught. How is this fair? It is not. They are "golden handcuffs", forcing teachers to remain in a district for their entire career. Here is another grievance for another day, but education has changed dramatically, and due to the turnover of principals it is difficult for teachers to remain in one building for 30 years.

        So, the numbers I am using to demonstrate are NOT real numbers, but the gaps are similar. Let's say you switched districts and are in YEAR 21 across two districts according to PERA. But your new district only gave you eight years when you changed over at year 18. So on the district pay scale---which is your salary and what you will retire at 51% of---you make $70,000 a year. For comparison, your salary in this district for your actual years of 21 would be $80,000 a year, which you do not make, because the district ignored the first 16 years of your career. But you make $10k less because Colorado districts do not honor your full 21 years.

        By comparison, if you are in a district that is "higher paid" even with the cut in years and district change, the same thing will happen: they will only give you X number of years. Adding insult to injury, they are a lower paid district. Again, NOT REAL NUMBERS but as example:  you're making $70K at District A where you worked for 18 years. You switch to District J who is notoriously the lowest paid district, and they agree to give you eight (you heard me) of your 18 years. This puts you at year eight and $55K a year on the salary schedule. You have just taken a $15K a year pay cut. As a 21 year public school veteran. Don't you feel respected, valued and empowered?

        The numbers aren't real, but the gaps are my friends. Sometimes worse, depending on the district. 

        Anyone else in a career that deliberately punishes you when you want to change locations? Not even JOBS, just LOCATION. This career also offers double indemnity as you are UNhireable after age 50, AND there is a district here that will non renew teachers after their third year to avoid them receiving teacher status. Which means these people can't get hired again in the same district. This appears to be to avoid paying teachers. If they stay, you have to increase their salaries, but if you keep non renewing them, you'll have a constant staff of people who are making the bare minimum of first year teachers. 

        In my personal experience in three districts, this above strategy also ensures that your teachers are younger than your admin---which has become a frightening trend. Principals are young and threatened by veteran teachers-largely because their "Grand New Plan" was already tried and failed and they don't want to hear about it from someone who is going to A) warn them it will not work and B) sigh heavily when it fails. But that's a different grievance. Today is simply a salary lesson.

        I worked with people who were miserable, but sticking it out so they could get the most money possible in retirement. They'd still have to work somewhere after they retire. We retire from teaching, not from work.

        But again, that's another grievance.

        Thank you for attending today's civics lesson. I appreciate you.

              

Three Buildings in Two Months...

 

        When I was in my 20's I would hop jobs every six months.

       With the exception of B. Dalton Bookseller, but even that was broken up. Southwest Plaza for about two years, then Green Mtn for a year before I moved to Houston. Then Seabrook for a year, quit to go to Hastings Records, then bounced back over...that sort of thing.

        Teaching at Littleton High School for 17 years was my longest stretch at one gig. When that ended and I hopped to Hinkley I figured I'd die there. Double entendre and subtext intended for those who know.

        This summer, after four years (my time at Hink) of talking about leaving education, I finally said "This is gonna be my last year" outloud to Jim. I had been busted down to 1/2 theatre and 1/2 lang arts regardless of the cornucopia of support and blood, sweat and tears I had put in to get the department back up to speed. This was irrelevant to admin, as my classes weren't "big" enough to justify.  Largely because my lists of students requesting my classes were under 20 and mysteriously disappeared, which meant they didn't exist and nobody wanted theatre. Theatre is very specific and when it is used as a dumping ground, problems ensue. Like students dumped in the class are eventually asked to perform, and they bail. I'm not choir,  you can't hide in a section. I'm not band, you cannot hide behind an instrument, or put on headphones to learn piano "alone" but in a class. At some point, in some capacity, you are going to have to participate with other humans in theatre.

        I can't fight any more. So I said "This is it."

        Now, I could have let my co teacher continue to do all the heavy lifting in lang arts, continued to allow nothing but original scenes in Spanish  in intro and pulled APA through more intensive script analysis and schools of thought. But no, I believed a colleague in another building when he reached out and said the middle school wanted theatre.

        OK, full time theatre.

        In a middle school.

        In Aurora.

        So I skipped. 

        To be clear "Full Time Theatre" in the same district meant No Pay Cut. Sounded like a good idea.

         Skipping forward, three weeks later I was sitting in my new theatre at Kennedy High School in DPS.

        New district. Full time theatre. Dark for three years. A rebuild.

        Massive Pay cut.

        23 Minutes from home.

        My first day, some kids snuck into the theatre to ditch. I asked them to leave.

        They left.

        Nobody called me a bitch. Nobody told me to fuck off.

        My first day at Hinkley I was told to fuck off twice in twenty minutes by students who were asked to please sit down.

        At North, I was ignored completely and tables were flipped over.

        I'll keep y'all posted, but so far...

       

from angry to sad

 

Littleton made me angry, gave me anxiety.

Hinkley made me angry, hopeless.

North crushed my heart. Verified No Hope.

I'm done with education. 

This is scary as hell, with only 21 years in I can't afford to retire like my parents. I still have to work, but the only guaranteed job is in education subbing. :)

Because I am old.

Sigh.

I don't want to sell my house, and I don't want to learn a new job.

UGH.

Buh Byee

 

   

    In July I started to write a blog called "My Last Year Teaching".

    I walked in the door of Hinkley this year and said "I'm leaving at the end of the year."

    That was 7 August.

    Today, 2 October 2024, I am 19 days away from leaving this building for good.

    RelatedUnrelated, I walked  out the door of  LHS on 4 October, 2019.

    The original plan was to make it through the year here as half time theatre half time lang arts and then retire at the end of the year and work online from home for Progressive. From Home. The Dream.

     By the second Week it was abundantly clear that I was not going to survive LA 12 with my mental health intact. It's not like LA at Littleton, or an elective.  It's on three platforms, daily assignments and graduation capstone requirements. Half the kids on IEP's  and several not on track to graduate. Thank God for co-teachers. Yet, relying on her to carry the weight for both of us also took a snicker snack to my mental health. I started mumbling, and checked out of the class in the name of working on Steel Magnolias.

    I have a new, kind hearted AP, but his job is to do as he's told, and what he's told makes no sense for performing arts, and takes up two planning periods a week. Another clipper clap to my tottering mind. I began low tirades against using AI in writing. I upped the snack factor for rehearsals. I stared bantering with the AP regarding data collection which is going to tell me what I already know: If you do not rehearse, you do not improve. I dug in harder to  teach Theatre of the Oppressed. I actually taught Oedipus to ten kids who speak only Spanish.

    North Middle School reached out the first week of August. I replied that I would be interested if they could hurry it up before I started rehearsals, thespians, cabaret, collage... Silly Billy Am I. This district moves at the speed of global warming.

    First it was the email  "Are you interested?"  But no job post, just vague "electives opening". Scrolling through turned in assignments in LA 12 - I paused. I answered "Yes".,

     Then it was "It's posted as electives" but was posted in a secret hiding place to which I had to be directed.  Grumble mumble snap pop, I am not digging around on another platform. Thank you. Click.

     Then it was "just email the principal directly" who sent the link. Tap,snap, upload.

    Surfing IC and Naviance and Study Synch to locate turned in LA12 material was making my brain fog worse. But I stopped everything to ferret out the job posting at North. Eyes are bad, need  a new prescription. Just take them off and read naked eyed, running my hand through my gray and green hair, three inches from the screen. 3 September. Old Lady Searching For Her Resume: Black on Silver, 4X8.

    By the time they called to interview on 11 Sept, I wasn't interested but invested in my kids. I blew off the first interview by shutting down entirely on my way out the door. My brain screaming "Nope nope waste of time you're old with all due respect to your experience stop it, kryssi, just stop". And... they rescheduled for the next week. Ugh. So I went. And two days later I was hired.

    So.

   I am transferring  to our middle school who want a theatre program. I've been asked to build it. They've not had one for six years. I'm wanted. I feel valued.

    That can't be right.

    My creed has always been “I don't want to belong to any club that would have me as a member”.  Groucho Marx meant it as funny, self effacement. I took it as a life mantra for my loser mentality.

       Let's take a derailed moment here to appreciate that when I left The Building in May I was scheduled to teach LA 11, which I did not want to do due to SAT prep.  The principal switched it to LA 12 without asking me---the same way she struck my theatre classes. When I asked why she  switched me from LA 11 to LA 12, she said "You said you were worried about SAT prep." So giving me a graduation requirement class is better? My brain feels like it's getting hit by a 2X4 every day.

    Staying here and teaching half and half was not working. Living in a building with no hope sucks. Theatre is dead---you can't teach only freshman and seniors with no middle ground to train people. And you can't recruit for classes that don't exist from a class of seniors trying to graduate. It is a dead end.I live in the center house in the middle of a dead end, one way street. Steven Wright. I don't even write my own material, but at least I site it appropriately. And I'm screaming to empty space in the cul -de -sac like hurricane Harvey sitting on Houston. Nobody's listening, and I'm now irreparably angry and seen as the crazy woman jumping up and down on the stage.

Edward Albee wrote, " It's one of those things a person has to do; sometimes a person has to go a very long distance out of his way to come back a short distance correctly."

    My long distance journey began 4 October 2019.

    I thought it referred to driving to Aurora from Lakewood.

    Then I thought it was teaching theatre online during Covid.

    So I doubled down, focusing on "correctly" and built the theatre program back slowly and respectfully, using a trip to NYC, returning kids to Thescon, The Bobby G's and CHSSA. No drama with parents, personal feelings or ego.

    Collage. A Christmas Carol with band, choir and fourteen small children from the community.

    Uphill. Like Sisyphus.  Against bullying admin, apathy, trauma, loss of hope.

    I don't know what what "coming back a short distance" looks like. I don't even know where "back" is located. But I feel strongly that I prepared for it correctly. And it is not here in this building.

    And to follow up, Mr. Albee's quote is Jerry's from Zoo Story. He's referring to how far he's traveled to reach this spot in Central Park, at this time, so that he can coerce Peter into killing him.

    To be continued...

    

    

My Last Year Teaching

 

    26 July 2024

    I have to return to the building on 31 July for meetings. Students arrive 7 August. This will be year 21.

    There will not be a year 22.

     I have promised myself for my own mental health to set the deadline.

      In the words of Salieri "I'm slowly watching myself become extinct".

      I did everything right. I brought the theatre back: Thescon, Bobby G,  travel to NYC, scholarships, five shows last year---hell, one of my kids won a STATE wide activities award.

       But I can't stop the steady decline in building enrollment.

       I can't stop the revolving door in choir and band.

      I can't stop the change in administration.

       I can't stop the evisceration of performing arts at our only feeder school.

      I can't stop the fact that when you google our building a shooting comes up.

      The principal cut IB theatre.

       Then she cut my mid level classes, leaving me with only beginning and advanced.

       She cut tech theatre.

       And I have to return next week as half time theatre/half time LA12. Leaving me no opportunity to recruit, or bring back IB, or even get a musical mounted.

       So. 

       I am clearly not wanted, so I will go.

       I can't put the energy in if I'm half time, and I will not. There's no point, that building does Not Want Me.

       So I will chronicle the last year of a 21 year teaching "career".

       Assuming I make it to 1 August. It's not looking great.

Theatre is Hard

 

    I'm writing this at 10 am the morning of the closing production. I don't mind naming them, because I have nothing negative to say, and my job is over so they can't fire me. But I am not naming them out of habit or PTSD.

   The last five years have been a very specific kind of hell. I am not alone, and I am not complaining; simply stating. Becuase if you're reading this, you live in the same country that I do and have your own hellscape stories. And while I will give lip service to appreciating the shift in lip service to taking care of one's mental health, the words are as empty as any other spoken to us in recent years. One cannot take care of one's mental health without expensive insurance, or expensive out of pocket appointments and meds. The mere fact that an advertising entity suggests mental health support is available to me, a regular person, when they know it is a lie is causing a mental health issue. I expect insurance companies and the government to lie to me. But now they're using "mental health" to peddle their pharmaceutical fallacies. 

   I do have insurance. I have Kaiser. 'nuff said, eh?

   I have used theatre as therapy my entire life. I tend to rework Tom Hanks' words in A League of Their Own.  "Yes, theatre is hard. It's the hard that makes it great. If it was easy, everyone would do it."  She was always there for me. She got me through high school, college, my twenties, parenting and teaching.

    Well, she was getting me through teaching, but that's another blog.

    After we reopened in 2021, I took every job I could directing and teaching. I stacked them--I would leave rehearsal early at Hinkley to make it to rehearsal at Mines. I worked like that for a solid 13 months.

    And around month four I realized...I didn't feel any better. Worse, my directing was falling away from me, I could feel it running down my arm like shower water, and puddling at my feet where it would evaporate. Gone. Moments, connections, techniques--even  mechanics were leaving me. One college show I actually wrote in my notes "I am sucking at this".

    There is the self preservation part of me that wants to blame a post Covid world. People have foggy brains, mental health struggles and students are afraid to be seen and separated from their phones. Combined, these elements make directing not just "hard" but frequently impossible. I used to drag shows across the finish line on my own; now I draw boundaries. I am no longer the one stitching and building and teaching and designing. It it fails, it's not on me. I hate it, and I hate that kids will allow it to fail. So that's a hit to one's mental health.

   Which is why I took the gig to direct Gilbert and Sullivan with a community theatre this summer. High school theatre has become impossible--there's more to that story but everyone's tired of hearing me bitch about admin--so maybe community theatre  would be better.

    I did not have to stitch or build. I did do a basic design, and had to teach a bit. From that perspective, it was better. The actors were all adults. They all want to be there. On the surface, this experience should have renewed my faith.

   It did not.

   This group of people are all heart, positive and dedicated. Yet I was a grumpy dick. I wanted to work at the level I had been used to ten years ago, only to be faced with the fact that that level doesn't exist in community theatre. Instead of doing what I used to--finding a way around it, making connections and building community--I wielded theatre like a scepter and whacked people with it. I hope you are appalled reading this; I am appalled writing it. This approach made my mental health even worse, and now I have guilt mixed in. I was punishing actors with theatre instead of building them up. And I knew it, and came home angry after each rehearsal. Great. I'm fine, it's fine, stop looking at me I'm fine.

    This is not who I am.

    The mental health hits, three known bouts of Covid and fights with admin have left my brain disconnected as well. I have to take notes and send rehearsal reports via email, I can't give them live, my brain won't form the words. I've tried to return to being the funny/sardonic director in the booth, and the same turrets- esque verbal salad is happening. Maybe it's early onset dementia. Maybe it's stress. Maybe it's Maybelline. Whatever it is, I can't verbally communicate the way I used to, and I'm forgetting what I did or said five days ago. In June I pledged to walk every day, I  missed one day and completely forgot about it. I told this cast I'm glitchy due to the motorcycle accident almost ten years ago---which is somewhat accurate, that's when it started---but I don't believe it. The bike wreck rung my bell and disconnected irreparable synapses, but that is not the only issue. I've been told I suck by administrators for so long now that I not only believe it, but I'm living it. I suck at this.

    And so...in conclusion, all in all, to sum up, I'm done. 

    Theatre is hard.

    Too hard for me.

    Immma buy a llama and live in Delta and talk to no one.

    Scene.

Today's Contemplation-Commutes

 

    17 July 2024

    I had no idea that my commute was contributing to the decline in my mental health until this week. It's not the distance -between 28 or 34 miles depending on which direction you travel via my google map. I originally thought that was part of it, and it likely is. I refuse to drive I70 from Lakewood to Aurora due to the increasing number of commuters driving over 90 miles and hour and the decreasing--arguably absent--presence of police. The anxiety this combination creates has arguably caused a cornucopia of mental health issues.

    This summer, I have been subbing at what I call The Pony Preschool in Arvada. As suggested, the preschool farm houses five ponies, two goats and a pig. The children are treated to daily pony rides. I signed up for this because my mental health has deteriorated at an alarming rate, and the show I picked up to direct and keep me sane this summer is not working as it should. I hoped to cleanse my palate by engaging outside of the public school system, with an independent business owner who had chosen preschool and seemed like a good person.

    The choice was perfect. While the work is exhausting on my 58 year old arthritis ridden frame, my cognitive issues have quieted. I load 18 preschoolers on and off of ponies for thirty minutes of my day and my brain stops screaming. I delight in preschool speak. A very quick sampling:

         Me:  

        Yep, you have to pull your unders all the way up after you go potty, or your shorts get bunched up.

            I'm not the boss of  your water bottle.

            Please stop touching your brother.

            Do I look like a trash can?

            Is one googley eye and one paper eye OK?

        The Kids:

            Water is good, it tastes great and is good for us. Not like spiders.

            That is my oldest parent. (It was his grandpa)

            Which sister are you? ( My sister Karie and I work together, and look way too  much alike).

            Do you like my drawing?

        I have also encountered the true meaning of leadership while at the Pony Preschool. In my building, there is a lot of finger pointing and buck  passing because nobody is leading.  The director of this preschool, who had at least 10 teachers in the building at the time, walked down to the horse trough to retrieve a dead mouse. I can think of many reasons that is not her job,and only one reason that is is: her school, her responsibility. The move impressed me.

    That's all well and good, but it is not the thesis stated in my first paragraph.

    My commute during the school year is Lakewood to Aurora. Whether I choose I 70 or not, I pass a lot of homeless folks. A Lot. There  are encampments, solos, duets, folks by the hospital sleeping in a wheelchair, or under a shopping cart--which was am impressive demonstration of  flexibility as I watched them unfold from under the cart.

    My commute the last few weeks has been from Lakewood-Green Mountain, specifically- to  Arvada. West Arvada, specifically.  Specifically, 74th and Quaker. So the west edge of Arvada. I drive 6th to 93, and turn left on 64th. And I see...trees. Sky. Small businesses. School of Mines. More trees. Quiet neighborhoods. Trees. Tree lined streets. Sunshine. Commuters enjoying their own drive and not exceeding the speed limit.

    Know what I do not see? Homeless folks.

    It wasn't until this commute that I realized part of my commute misery is what I see along the way. I arrive at work during the school year not just physically tired, but psychologically exhausted by what I've witnessed on my drive in. I drive 50 minutes to arrive feeling like I've already worked all day. By exquisite contrast, I arrive at the Pony School feeling uplifted. Positive. Smiling.

    Smiling.

    Knowing I have a lovely return commute home keeps me buoyed as I schlep Biddle Bops on and off of ponies, glue colored cupcake holders to tongue depressors and escort the boy line to and from the potty and handwashing five times in three hours.

    And that's really all I wanted to share today. Your commute is tied to your mental health. Sorry if you already knew that, I'm frequently late to the party.

    Thank you for reading.