Arizona Rep on Teachers Forced To Work Multiple Jobs: "That's America!"

[GMDino]

He's right...but for the wrong reason.

Quote:Arizona has a massive teacher shortage. It also has some of the lowest paid teachers in the entire country, many of whom are forced to take on second or even third jobs just so that they can pay their bills.

But according to Rep. John Allen, the House Majority Leader and a Republican from Scottsdale, that's just part of what makes America great.

Here's Allen testifying in a House floor session on Wednesday:

Quote:There’s lots of people out there with second jobs. Most of us in this room have a second job. Good for them! I like seeing people try to get ahead in life, when they take their god-given talents and efforts and make themselves better. That’s America! The idea that we are somehow torturing somebody if they have a second job is just ridiculous. And, they have a long summer! What a great opportunity for people like us and teachers to go and get a second job. Let’s all go out and get a second job this summer. I know my wife would greatly encourage that.

In a stunning display of tone-deafness, Allen later doubled down on his remarks, telling the Arizona Capitol Times that people who take on second jobs aren't necessarily doing it because they're on the brink of poverty.

"They want to improve themselves," he said. "They want to pay for a boat. They want a bigger house. They work hard to provide themselves with a better lifestyle."

Sure, there are plenty of examples of, say, lawyers who dabble in real estate to make extra money on the side. But suggesting that their "side hustle" is equivalent to that of a teacher who bartends at night or drives for Uber on the weekends is ludicrous.

As ProgressNow Arizona's executive director, Josselyn Berry, put it: "Show me a teacher who can afford a boat and I’ll show you a Republican politician who cares about education. Teachers aren’t getting second jobs to buy boats or fancy houses. They’re paying rent and bills. They’re buying groceries."

Phoenix New Times reached out to Allen on Friday to ask if he could, in fact, introduce us to an Arizona public school teacher who owns a boat. He has yet to get back to us.

Here's what actual teachers had to say about the boat comment, by the way:
View image on Twitter

Quote:[/url]Beth Lewis @TheBethLewis
My armada for this summer. Thank gosh I work two jobs so I can afford this life of luxury  #ThisisAllensAmerica@AZHouseDems
2:00 AM - 28 Apr 2017

View image on Twitter

Quote:Miss Maya @MissMaya311
So, since I'm apparently rolling in the dough, I guess I'll buy myself a boat. In reality, this is all I could afford. #BillsnotBoats
2:46 AM - 28 Apr 2017 · Avondale, AZ

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Quote: Follow
Marisol Garcia @marisolgarciaaz
Closest this teacher will come to owning a boat. I have bills to pay to provide for my family. #Commitment #billsnotboats#RiseUp
9:17 PM - 27 Apr 2017 · Phoenix, AZ

Some relevant facts, from a new study by Arizona State University's Morrison Institute: 74 percent of Arizona school administrators say they're experiencing a teacher shortage. Forty-two percent of teachers who were hired in 2013 left the profession within three years.

Meanwhile, Arizona elementary school teachers have the lowest pay in the nation when adjusted for cost of living. High school teachers are doing only marginally better: Their salaries are the 49th lowest in the countr out of all 50 states. And, when adjusted for inflation, Arizona teachers are actually being paid less than they were in 2001.

The average starting salary for new teachers in Arizona is just short of $32,000, and experienced teachers aren't doing much better. A 2014 Center for American Progress study found that mid-career teachers with at least 10 years' experience were making an average of $37,600 a year, allowing many of them to qualify for federally funded benefit programs like free school breakfasts and lunches. Sixteen percent of those teachers also had jobs outside the school system. 

It doesn't seem like too much of a stretch, then, to conclude that Arizona's teacher shortage might just possibly have something to do with the fact that teachers can earn more money working just about anywhere else.

Quote:Sen. Martín Quezada 

@SenQuezada29
This is how out of touch AZ lawmakers are. Rep Allen thinks this is what #PublicSchool teachers do w/ their 2nd jobs. #BillsNotBoats
9:13 PM - 27 Apr 2017 · Phoenix, AZ

The state's Republican leadership, however, seems to think that the solution is to make it easier to become a teacher. SB 1042 — the bill that Rep. John Allen was testifying in support of when he went on his rant about second jobs — lets anyone with "expertise in a content area or subject matter" teach at a public school, without having to take a proficiency test. 

The bill passed and is expected to be signed by Governor Doug Ducey soon. Which would be great news if there was actual evidence suggesting that Arizona was making it too hard to get certified as a teacher.

But, as Democratic Rep. Kelli Butler pointed out during the House floor session, Arizona has literally tens of thousands of certified teachers who aren't currently teaching. Some have retired, but others have simply moved on to other, better-paying jobs.

"We’re experiencing an exodus of teachers in Arizona because we do not value them," House Minority Leader Rebecca Rios testified on Wednesday.
"These are people wanted to go into this profession and lasted two or three years. But now we’re going to bring in a whole group of other folks and expect that they’re going to outlast [them]? I think it’s simplistic and naive on our part."

Quote:[url=https://twitter.com/Jennifer_Pawlik]Jennifer Pawlik @Jennifer_Pawlik
Infuriating. Income from 2nd (& 3rd) jobs weren't for a boat or vacation, but food, clothing, & mortgage. Oh, & supplies for my classroom! https://twitter.com/SenQuezada29/status/857993938170396672 …
1:40 PM - 28 Apr 2017

Many of the Republicans who spoke in support of the bill seemed bothered by the fact that they couldn't just wander into a public school and start teaching.

"I have a master’s degree, a law degree, and yet I could not teach," Rep. Maria Syms said. "I’d have to go through the certification process."
Rep. David Stringer, who earlier this year called teaching an easy job that doesn't require any special skills, argued that there are lots of retired people living in Arizona whose expertise in fields other than education make them perfectly qualified to teach.

His example? Himself. After retiring as an attorney and CPA, he decided he wanted to teach, but couldn't because he didn't have an education degree, he said. He's now enrolled in a graduate program at Arizona State University.

"Although my teachers and the coursework are interesting and stimulating and helpful, it really has not better qualified me, in my judgment, to become a teacher," he said.

(One parent's response: "I DO NOT want him in a classroom with my kids. He creeps me out & I'm a grown up!")

What Stringer and others don't seem to grasp is that people who are very smart and good at their jobs often don't have the slightest clue how to teach.

"You have a kid who gets a bad teacher — who might be a great attorney or engineer or doctor but doesn’t know the first thing about how to handle kids — that’s maybe a semester or a year out of their learning experience that we lose," Democrat Ken Clark pointed out.

Or, as Mesa Public Schools teacher Amethyst Hinton Sainz put it in an essay that's well worth reading in its entirety:

Quote:Imagine a junior high where three or four out of your child’s seven teachers each day have no training in any of these areas, and no experience teaching 12- and 13-year-olds. Imagine that your family just moved here from Syria, Senegal or Chihuahua, and you trust that at school, your child will learn English (and math, and science, and health, and…) Or, imagine that you have lived here your whole life, but your child is a shy, sensitive introvert. Or dyslexic. Or the class clown. Or depressed. Or just impulsive. It’s not hard to imagine how throwing teachers into a classroom unprepared is a bad idea, no matter how much they know about other topics. 

Many of the Democrats who objected to the bill made a similar point — that teaching isn't just about putting together a lesson plan, it's also about recognizing which students need extra support or guidance.

Rep. John Allen had something to say about that too, after he finished talking about how happy his wife would be if he got a second job:

"Let’s stop asking [teachers] to parent. What we’re hearing here that we’re not giving them enough money to parent our children. Well, there isn’t enough money to have them parent our children. We should parent our children. For those who aren’t, we should use social pressure, cultural pressure, to have them improve. If we have declining outcomes, it almost always goes back to declining family atmosphere."

Right. So, in other words, if you don't have a stable living situation at home, you're out of luck. But we will publicly shame your parents. (Allen, by the way, is the same guy who recently called out an atheist lawmaker for giving an invocation that he didn't find to be religious enough.)

Anyway. If any of this makes you feel like screaming, the Arizona Education Association, AZ Schools Now, and ProgressNow Arizona are holding a "Boat Parade 4 Teachers" protest on Tuesday afternoon at the Capitol.  

http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/arizona-republicans-vote-to-drop-teacher-certification-requirements-suggest-teachers-with-second-jobs-are-buying-boats-9286738

[GMDino]

Quote:Rep. David Stringer Strikes Again: Teaching an Easy, Part-Time Job; No Special Skills Required






Representative David Stringer is on a roll this week.

First, the Republican from Prescott made the dubious claim that faculty advisers for high school newspapers were out to "propagandize their own liberal views through what purport to be student publications."

Then, Thursday, at the monthly Arizona Business and Education Coalition luncheon at the Capitol, Stringer took it a step further by insulting all teachers.

According to Representative Jesus Rubalcava, Stringer told the group that teaching doesn't require a specific skill set. He then allegedly went on to say that teachers aren't paid badly considering that they have easy part-time jobs with with two months off in the summer.

A recent survey by Education Week showed that Arizona teachers have the fifth lowest pay in the country, earning an average salary of $43,800 a year.


"People wake up!!" Rubalcava — who works as a special education teacher at Bales Elementary School — wrote on Facebook. "He's an elected official serving on the education committee!"

New Times reached out to Stringer to see if he wanted to clarify his remarks or disagree with Rubalcava's characterization of what he said. (It's worth noting that while the luncheon wasn't taped or recorded, other educators who were present have confirmed Rubalcava's version of events. ) He finally responded.  Update is below.  

It's understandable that it took so long for him to get back to us. It seems safe to say that Stringer was  inundated with angry phone calls. Progress Now Arizona has asked teachers to call his office and "tell him your job isn't easy or part time."

And judging by the look of Stringer's Facebook page, he's been hearing from a lot of people.

Here's a sampling of the response:

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Update: New Times has received an e-mail response from Rep. David Stringer, who writes, “My comment was that education is typically a much less rigorous course of study than engineering and many other disciplines. I don't know of any other profession besides teaching that offers a 180-day work year and so many paid holidays. A lot of people go into teaching for just that reason. But that doesn't mean teachers have an ‘easy job.’  I don't think I put it quite that way. Most teachers are dedicated professionals who work hard for their students.”

Stringer adds that he’s currently working on a graduate degree in education at ASU — a degree which he doesn’t seem to think has a lot of value.

“I did say that half of all Ph. D.'s awarded annually in the US are in education and that they are easier to get,” he writes. “There are a lot of diploma mills out there. My point was that the academic rigor of a Ph. D. in education is not the same as a Ph. D. in physics or biochemistry.  The marketplace values these disciplines differently.”

http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/arizona-rep-david-stringer-teaching-doesnt-require-special-skills-9153451-9153451

I suppose the only easier job with more paid time off would be elected official?

[Yojimbo]

Arizona, what a shit hole.

[GMDino]

(05-04-2017, 11:55 AM)Yojimbo Wrote: Arizona, what a shit hole.

They were quite the read today! 

[oncemoreuntothejimbreech]

I use my boat I bought for self-improvement with the money I earned from my second job to commute between my two jobs because I'm too busy working on the weekends to go boating.

And nothing says "self-improvement" like boat ownership. My boat makes me smarter, wiser, kinder, stronger, more healthy, more handsome, more generous with my time and money to the less fortunate, more informed, and even my jokes are funnier.

Hell, I don't even need to perform daily oral hygiene any more because my boat even makes my smile brighter.