Here's a Shock

Isn't this what conservatives have been telling you all along?

At a time when schools and teachers' unions insist that hiring good new teachers is critical to education, schools must instead choose between the connection young teachers often have with students or the skills and experience of older teachers. Because state law requires districts to cut newer teachers first, there is really no choice. Young teachers lose.

The article continues:

"The strange thing about it is that the people at the top are just waiting for that two extra years so they can get their [full] retirement," Maxwell said. "The teachers who have been there for 30 years have got their foot, their arm, everything but their butt -- which is still in the chair -- out the door. They want to leave, we want to come. And nobody wins."
...and even with fewer students, payroll goes up

Schools lose, too, said Charlie Kyte, executive director of the Minnesota Association of School Administrators.

"The best of teaching staffs have a nice combination of mature, older teachers toward the end of their careers, a nice group of midcareer teachers who are skilled, and a group of young teachers, who are less skilled but are more connected to the kids," Kyte said. "Having younger teachers to mentor is also important for older teachers. It helps them be renewed by the freshness of youth. They get a chance to pass on their expertise."
Even as teaching jobs fold, payroll goes up...

And it always will. The teachers union has spent the last 30 years turning teaching into a blue-collar job; it's succeeding.

The inability to keep younger teachers not only hurts schools now, but it also will hurt later when the loss of new teachers turns into a shortage of experienced teachers, Kyte said.

Posted by Mitch at June 3, 2004 04:24 AM