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COVID-19 2nd wave - Texas only - Stats and such


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31 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

KXAN had a story two weeks ago about the Circle C Childcare Center in Austin, which had 10 cases, 9 of them teachers.

https://www.kxan.com/investigations/child-care-center-in-southwest-austin-reports-10-covid-19-cases-including-1-child/

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2 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

doubt it.  what kind of seal is your double bandana providing?

I have a small nose for one thing.  For another, it's necessary to tie it pretty tight behind my head.  So, while there's kind of a gap on either side of my nose, it's also tighter against my mouth and upper lip and cheeks than the surgical type mask.  I tend to tuck the bottom into my shirt and it's fairly tight across my lower face.  And the bandana is tight/flat across my cheeks and jaws.

 Whereas, with the exception of the nosepiece, the surgical mask seems kind of gappy and loose.  The elastic over the ears does not create a tight fit at all for me.

If the point is to prevent or divert egress, as opposed to ingress, the bandana seems to be more effective.  It's not real comfortable and require re-tying, but I don't spend enough time in mask environments for that to be an issue much.  I should say that these bandanas are newish and thicker, denser weave than some I have had in the past that were more like madras cloth.

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6 minutes ago, mdmost said:

The exact same thing will occur when school returns in the fall. Teachers and staff will get sick. Kids will be carriers and bring it home with them just like they do with norovirus, the Flu, and stomach bugs. It will come down to people being okay with doing that and realizing you cannot send your kids to school if you have people at home who are in the danger categories if they get Covid. Teachers who might be in the same zone will not be teaching kids. Or we're all having in-home learning again this fall. 

Buzz all over HISD mom internet (and take it for what it’s worth) is that teachers just won’t report en masse if they’re told to be at school on Opening Day.  They are currently playing wait-and-see expecting that plans will change and morph and maybe it won’t matter.  But a huge group is planning that if it comes to it, they just won’t show up. I don’t know if that means their first day or the kids’. 

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2 hours ago, mdmost said:

The exact same thing will occur when school returns in the fall. Teachers and staff will get sick. Kids will be carriers and bring it home with them just like they do with norovirus, the Flu, and stomach bugs. It will come down to people being okay with doing that and realizing you cannot send your kids to school if you have people at home who are in the danger categories if they get Covid. Teachers who might be in the same zone will not be teaching kids. Or we're all having in-home learning again this fall. 

and this is what pisses me off the most.

As a parent I have 2 choices:

1) Send my kids to school, where they will essentially be guinea pigs to see how this virus affects school age kids and likely bring it home to me, or

2) Keep my kids at home, do the distance learning thing, and it'll be another year of wasted education.

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3 minutes ago, Message Board User said:

and this is what pisses me off the most.

As a parent I have 2 choices:

1) Send my kids to school, where they will essentially be guinea pigs to see how this virus affects school age kids and likely bring it home to me, or

2) Keep my kids at home, do the distance learning thing, and it'll be another year of wasted education.

I feel you. We’re sending them if school is open and just hoping for the best. They need face to face instruction and human interaction. The spring started out well but then tailed off.

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Just now, mdmost said:

I feel you. We’re sending them if school is open and just hoping for the best. They need face to face instruction and human interaction. The spring started out well but then tailed off.

As the Wall Street Journal reported last month, the results from Spring Break through Memorial Day are in and the verdict is that distance learning is an abject failure.

Kids didn't learn and parents & teachers were super frustrated.

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22 minutes ago, Message Board User said:

As the Wall Street Journal reported last month, the results from Spring Break through Memorial Day are in and the verdict is that distance learning is an abject failure.

Kids didn't learn and parents & teachers were super frustrated.

If you read that WSJ article, despite the alarmist headline and tone, it really didn’t get me there. It felt like a premise supported by anecdotes and special cases.  Even with that, it really just came down to ideas like some districts and schools did better than others,  it was worse for special-needs kids, some parents and teachers didn’t like it, and there is a need for improvement.  Not that the whole concept of remote learning is unworkable. 

Judge for yourself, though: 


https://www.wsj.com/articles/schools-coronavirus-remote-learning-lockdown-tech-11591375078

text of article below  - some important graphs in the link that won’t copy on the phone:

 

This spring, America took an involuntary crash course in remote learning. With the school year now winding down, the grade from students, teachers, parents and administrators is already in: It was a failure. 

School districts closed campuses in Marchin response to the coronavirus pandemic and, with practically no time at all for planning or training, launched a grand experiment to educate more than 50 million students from kindergarten through 12th grade using technology.

The problems began piling up almost immediately. There were students with no computers or internet access. Teachers had no experience with remote learning. And many parents weren’t available to help.

In many places, lots of students simply didn’t show up online, and administrators had no good way to find out why not. Soon many districts weren’t requiring students to do any work at all, increasing the risk that millions of students would have big gaps in their learning.

 

“We all know there’s no substitute for learning in a school setting, and many students are struggling and falling far behind where they should be,” said Austin Beutner, superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District, in a video briefing to the community on Wednesday.

Already, school administrators are looking ahead to an uncertain fall, when many will be trying to apply lessons gleaned from the rocky spring to try to reopen classrooms, possibly using a mix of in-person and remote learning. To prevent a repeat of the spring disaster, some of them say, more students will need suitable electronic devices and internet access, and teachers will need much better training about how best to instruct from afar.

Preliminary research suggests students nationwide will return to school in the fall with roughly 70% of learning gains in reading relative to a typical school year, and less than 50% in math, according to projections by NWEA, an Oregon-based nonprofit that provides research to help educators tailor instruction. It expects a greater learning loss for minority and low-income children who have less access to technology, and for families more affected by the economic downturn.

Even though many students these days are tech savvy, that doesn’t ensure they will do well with remote learning. Some education experts say there is a huge gap between what students can do for fun on their cellphones and gaming systems and how good they are at using a device for educational tasks such as reading a document, answering a question or figuring out a problem.

 

 

“I think we have this assumption that since they spend all their time on their devices, it’s no big deal for them to learn remotely,” said Janella Hinds, a social-studies teacher at the 500-student High School for Public Service in Brooklyn’s Flatbush neighborhood. “But being a digital consumer and a digital learner are two different things.”

Parents, for their part, are frustrated after more than two months of trying to supervise their children’s at-home learning while juggling jobs and other responsibilities.

“It’s been very challenging,” said Mara LaViola, who has a 17-year-old son with autism and other disabilities in the Eanes Independent School District in Austin, Texas. Initially, she figured she would be more tolerant of teaching shortcomings during such an unprecedented time. But she was dismayed that her son’s interaction with teachers didn’t extend much beyond a morning greeting.

“The vast majority of it failed because of a lack of imagination, and a lack of effort,” she said.

Molly May, the district’s executive director of special education, said she felt “all of our students got a high-level of services given the platform and their ability to access remote learning. Teachers were innovative and creative and tried to meet the needs of each child.”

School districts and teachers that had previously used forms of online learning made the transition more easily. But many educators, even those comfortable with the method, say remote learning isn’t comparable to in-person teaching.

“I find it hectic and stressful,” said Dallas middle-school teacher Delna Bryan, whose advanced Spanish classes include both fluent and nonfluent youngsters. “In the classroom, I can look around and see body language and know when some of my students not fluent in Spanish need me to switch to English. I can’t do that online. We need the interaction with the kids, face-to-face.”

Districts are now debating what they should do when schools reopen for the next academic year—whether to rewind back to where students left off in March, or to plow ahead with the regular curriculum and let teachers fill in missing skills. Some plan to administer exams at the start of the school year to gauge learning shortfalls.

School districts didn’t realize the number of students without access to devices and the internet until they surveyed parents. Districts that could afford to do so hurried to buy the technology needed to get students online. Some, such as those in Austin and Belleville, Ill., put Wi-Fi wired buses in parking lots for students to connect from their parents’ cars. Many districts prepared printed packets of work for students without online access, which were handed out in food drive-through lines at schools.

One major issue has been how to assess students fairly when learning is done remotely. Many school districts aren’t comfortable issuing grades for remote work. Some have told teachers not to give failing grades because of equity issues. Many are using a “hold harmless” approach, where grades that negatively affect students can’t be used, but ones that help them or are neutral are permitted. Some teachers believe the rule has simply resulted in students not doing work.

Others worry that remote learning facilitates cheating. “Whatever work we’re receiving online may not always necessarily be the work completed by the child,” said Alexa Sorden, founding principal of Concourse Village Elementary School in the Bronx.
 

Some of the nation’s largest school districts, including Los Angeles and Chicago, concerned about inequities in internet access and parental involvement, have told teachers not to give students failing final grades or anything lower than what they had before the shutdown. Washington state banned “F” grades in all of its districts.

“We can’t use the shutdown to fail them,” said Michael Hinojosa, superintendent of the Dallas Independent School District in Texas. “And some teachers are really good with this and some of them are not. We didn’t want to penalize people until we can make it better.”

Dr. Hinojosa said students won’t be failed for not completing remote work assignments, but those already failing before the pandemic who didn’t do any work will still fail. He said teachers can give an “incomplete” to students who fell short of passing but are willing to complete the work over the summer.

Many teachers unions have been supportive of not grading students because of inequities, although some of their members feel like it allows students to slack off. 

Remote learning has turned the simple task of taking attendance into a challenge. Many count students as present if they log in to do work in programs like Google Classroom, an online classroom manager. Some give attendance credit for weekly progress on completed work, while others allow parents to call in to vouch for their children. Some districts aren’t bothering with attendance at all. Those that have been able to track attendance say it has been below regular levels.

Some students have simply gone missing. Early into the shutdown, the Los Angeles Unified School District estimated that on any given day in a week span, 32% of high-school students didn’t log in to learn.

Mr. Beutner, the Los Angeles superintendent, said at the time that some of those missing are among the most vulnerable—those in the foster-care system or living in deep poverty, students with disabilities and those who regularly missed school in ordinary times.

“It’s simply not acceptable that we lose touch,” he said, while noting that the number of students logging in has grown as the district worked to provide students with laptops and internet access.

Some districts have opted to end the academic year early. The Bibb County School District in Georgia wrapped up on May 1, three weeks ahead of time. Officials cited stress on the community and said they planned to use the time to get ready for next school year.
 

The Quitman Independent School District in Texas stopped giving new assignments two weeks before the school year ended to focus on teaching life skills. Based on their age, students were asked to complete tasks ranging from making a bed to changing a tire to reading a bill. 

“Parents are overwhelmed,” said Rhonda Turner, superintendent of the 1,200-student Quitman district. “It seemed like a perfect time to implement this. We’ve had a phenomenal response” from students and parents.

Lucia Curatolo-Boylan, a mother of four children, ages 4 to 10, in New York City public schools, found supervising the schooling a challenge. “It was definitely more difficult than I probably could have ever expected,” she said. “There was a lot that my oldest son was able to do on his own, which was wonderful. But the other two children really required my constant supervision and presence, which made it also harder to be there for my baby. Her nursery school education of her letters and numbers is quickly disappearing and not a priority because I had to sit with my kindergartner from 9 to 2 every day.”

Her son, 10-year-old Miles, has found remote learning exhausting and unpredictable. “Sometimes you have a lot of work and sometimes you don’t,” he said, recalling a time when he worked “almost an entire school day on three things.”

Some schools, particularly those with ample resources and some experience with remote learning, had a far easier time of it than most.
 

In Broward County Public Schools in Florida, the district had been building its technology program for several years and many teachers were already managing classwork online, so things have gone more smoothly. Nevertheless, a survey of Broward students in grades 6 through 12 found that 52% don’t feel motivated to complete distance-learning assignments. About 45% said they almost never receive adult help at home to complete assignments.
 

Administrators at Riverdale Country School, a private school in New York City, said their foray into online learning was successful, thanks to careful preparation and execution and having the resources to pull it off. The transition involved a month of infrastructure design and collaboration between administrators, teachers, the school’s technology team, students and parents.

Faculty and students participated in one-hour training sessions during the school day, and the school closed for two days before its spring break for a remote learning trial run. 

As the school year comes to a close, districts are focused on making improvements. Some will use summer break to retool remote learning, provide teachers with professional training to use it, and work to outfit students with needed technology, with hopes of using federal stimulus money to do so.

About 9.7 million students aren’t connected to the internet, according to an estimate by the EducationSuperHighway, a nonprofit focused on connectivity in public schools. “As a nation, we were not prepared to take learning online,” said founder and CEO Evan Marwell.

Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, West Virginia and Washington, D.C., have the largest percentage of unconnected students, ranging from 26% to 28%, more than the national average of about 20%. New Hampshire, North Dakota and Utah have the lowest percentage, ranging from 10% to 12%.

Many districts plan to offer summer school, likely remotely, to get students caught up and help combat “Covid slide.” But some educators worry that the same remote learning that wasn’t effective in the spring won’t have changed much for summer.

New York City Department of Education will provide remedial instruction over the summer and possibly in the fall to thousands of students who have fallen behind during remote classes this spring. Officials expect about 177,000 of the city’s 1.1 million public-school students to enroll in remote summer learning, with about 102,000 of them required to take part.
 

School superintendents differ on how to reopen schools in the fall using social-distancing practices. Many are contemplating a hybrid system of splitting up classes and rotating students in and out of classrooms, with some reporting to the school on some days while the others work remotely. Another strategy being explored is to have younger students who can’t be home alone in classrooms every day, while older students learn at home.

To keep everyone safe, districts are considering new rules such as requiring students and teachers to wear masks, having students eat lunch in classrooms and requiring them to attend school in person only two days a week. Other possibilities include prohibiting the sharing of school supplies and the spacing of desks closer than 6 feet apart, and limiting parents and other visitors on campuses.

Educators hope that the rockiest days of remote learning are behind them.

“We’ve been building this plane and flying it at the same time,” said Danielle Buttacavoli, a school counselor at IS 61, the William A. Morris Intermediate School, in Staten Island. “We’ve been getting stronger at using these platforms, and I think the same goes for the students.”


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

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Teachers are being little bitches.
Doctors, nurses, police, fire, and many others are having to step up.
Im working full time. Wife is working.
What makes them special?
I mean I feel their fear but what do they expect to happen?
No work till the disease is eradicated (if that even ever happens)? Just continue to get paid while other teachers step up? Hows thst fair.
They can quit if they dont like it.
My kindergartener last year lost out on lots of needed learning. If this year continues with distance learning may as well not do any school work.
It was a waste of time.
My 11 year old handled it just fine and learned.

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I suppose the dif is teachers don’t go into that profession assuming they will have to put their health/life on the line while those other professions know that risk potential going into it.

 

And it’s literally impossible for them to social distance.

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Guest Lobo
1 hour ago, MirrOlure said:

Just pulled this quarter out of my pocket:
6fdc64bba9520bddc0cbf3596f9b69cd.jpg

And that's how everyone in our tribe got their names. 

Why do you ask, Two Bats Fucking?  

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I feel you. We’re sending them if school is open and just hoping for the best. They need face to face instruction and human interaction. The spring started out well but then tailed off.


That’s what I’m prepared to do as well.
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I suppose the dif is teachers don’t go into that profession assuming they will have to put their health/life on the line while those other professions know that risk potential going into it.

And they get paid shit wages to boot.
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I suppose the dif is teachers don’t go into that profession assuming they will have to put their health/life on the line while those other professions know that risk potential going into it.
 
And it’s literally impossible for them to social distance.

Waiters, Grocery clerks, food delivery folks. There are plenty of people who are at risk whose job would not have been considered “putting their life on the line”


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23 minutes ago, williemackgarza said:

Teachers are being little bitches.
Doctors, nurses, police, fire, and many others are having to step up.
Im working full time. Wife is working.
What makes them special?
I mean I feel their fear but what do they expect to happen?
No work till the disease is eradicated (if that even ever happens)? Just continue to get paid while other teachers step up? Hows thst fair.
They can quit if they dont like it.
My kindergartener last year lost out on lots of needed learning. If this year continues with distance learning may as well not do any school work.
It was a waste of time.
My 11 year old handled it just fine and learned.

You’re literally fucking retarded

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And they get paid shit wages to boot.

I looked it up. It’s better than I thought. $56k avg in Texas. Is that a 9 month contract? As in, can they make more during summer doing summer school or curriculum committees? Or work part time doing something else?
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I looked it up. It’s better than I thought. $56k avg in Texas. Is that a 9 month contract? As in, can they make more during summer doing summer school or curriculum committees? Or work part time doing something else?

It’s really good for an entry level salary but unlike many other professions salaries don’t go up very much thereafter.
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3 minutes ago, DDD Dad said:


It’s really good for an entry level salary but unlike many other professions salaries don’t go up very much thereafter.

Not many that give you summer off, week for  spring break, week for thanksgiving, 3 weeks for Christmas, either. At least not your 60k/yr type jobs.  

34 minutes ago, williemackgarza said:

Just continue to get paid while other teachers step up? Hows thst fair.

This is a valid concern. I would assume they’d be in the school making videos and planning curriculum for 8 hours a day?  Or wine.  We are getting prepared to take it on ourselves again, after the disaster (chronicled unthread) that was our spring. 

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17 minutes ago, DDD Dad said:

It’s really good for an entry level salary but unlike many other professions salaries don’t go up very much thereafter.

And the hours are absolute shit during the school year (50 hours a week would be a dream for them).  And you get shit upon by lots of Karens, whom you deal with almost daily.

But yeah, her in Austin, with a Masters and 15 years in, you are making less than $50,000.

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Fuck dealing with kids all day during this shit. The karens bitching at stores are one thing but kids that don't listen anyway hell no. How much "needed" learning are they gonna get when shitass kids are are touching everything and putting boogers on shit and the teachers are going to have to spend most of their time watching for that crap?

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56 minutes ago, williemackgarza said:

Teachers are being little bitches.
Doctors, nurses, police, fire, and many others are having to step up.
Im working full time. Wife is working.
What makes them special?
I mean I feel their fear but what do they expect to happen?
No work till the disease is eradicated (if that even ever happens)? Just continue to get paid while other teachers step up? Hows thst fair.
They can quit if they dont like it.
My kindergartener last year lost out on lots of needed learning. If this year continues with distance learning may as well not do any school work.
It was a waste of time.
My 11 year old handled it just fine and learned.

The world needs ditch diggers too, Willie.

chevy chase 80s GIF

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39 minutes ago, Liquor and Poker said:

If you read that WSJ article, despite the alarmist headline and tone, it really didn’t get me there. It felt like a premise supported by anecdotes and special cases.  Even with that, it really just came down to ideas like some districts and schools did better than others,  it was worse for special-needs kids, some parents and teachers didn’t like it, and there is a need for improvement.  Not that the whole concept of remote learning is unworkable. 

If we can get the right platform, we can make it work for a lot of kids.  Well, assuming the parents put the time in as well to make sure the kid is doing stuff - kids can't be on Zoom for 8 hours a day.  It's going to be hell on the special-needs kids, and the younger grades (particularly when it comes to socialization skills they are forming right now).

But damn are there a shitload of kids who don't have parents who can help (or parents who won't), or don't have easy access to technology and the internet.

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On 7/2/2020 at 11:34 AM, pearlandhorn said:

Ended up getting tested in Lake Jackson this morning at a private clinic because the state websites for the brazoria county testing is just fucked.  Called all the clinics they put out as testing facilities and none of them have or had tests within the last week.

Will hear this weekend if I'm positive or not.

Just heard from the clinic at 6 tonight that my test was negative.  Starting to feel better but still have drainage and congestion.  Ready to be back to 100% so I can start running again.

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3 hours ago, Message Board User said:

and this is what pisses me off the most.

As a parent I have 2 choices:

1) Send my kids to school, where they will essentially be guinea pigs to see how this virus affects school age kids and likely bring it home to me, or

2) Keep my kids at home, do the distance learning thing, and it'll be another year of wasted education.

Yeah, it really sucks. Both wife and I are considered essential so our choice has essentially been removed. Guess we could get a nanny, but if wife and I are out there among high risk populations, then the kid's getting exposed anyway. 

 

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https://www.statesman.com/news/20200706/health-district-williamson-county-known-coronavirus-cases-increase-by-682-since-friday

Quote

The Williamson County and Cities Health District reported 682 new confirmed cases of coronavirus since Friday, bringing the total number of known cases to 3,151.

The county has had 45 people die from the coronavirus and 972 recoveries, according to a county officials.

The district did not report coronavirus case numbers on Saturday and Sunday because it was switching to a new software system that does not include the number of recoveries.

Quote

The district reported a total of 20,127 tests performed as of Monday; 28.04% of those have come back positive for the virus.

There were 108 people in the hospital as of Monday. The county had 22% of its intensive care beds available and 38% of all its hospital beds available on Monday.

 

 

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And the hours are absolute shit during the school year (50 hours a week would be a dream for them).  And you get shit upon by lots of Karens, whom you deal with almost daily.
But yeah, her in Austin, with a Masters and 15 years in, you are making less than $50,000.

Oh for fucks sake, what k-6 teacher works 50+ hrs a week?
I know teachers or friends married to teachers. Most say its a pretty fuckin easy gig.
All holidays, thanksgiving, xmas/new years, spring break and summers off.
Ive seen facebook pics of lits of em out partying vacationing and not social distancing, but then say its too dangerous to go back to the classroom.
I know theyre not getting paid a ton but no one ever said teaching would make em millionaires. They get paid a decent wage with great benefits.
Everyone is stepping up. Lots of folks got let go with no income. Teachers got to stay home and teach for 1/4 of the year last year. Now its time to go back. I completely understand if they feel their safety is compromised, but like me and the wife, if we dont want to go back to the office we could always quit and find other employment.
Lots of folks would love to have any job to go in to.
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2 hours ago, StruggleBus said:

You’re literally fucking retarded

I don't know what the answer is, but Willie Mack's take isn't unreasonable.  

This virus is a mother fucker, and it may be doing the same damage as it is today for years.  Life has to continue on, in some form or fashion.  My kids are "fine" learning from home, but about 25% of my kids' classmates never showed up for online learning, and another 10% of their classes stopped participating with 4 weeks left.  What are we supposed to do about these kids?  FYI, I live in San Antonio, same as you.  Surely you've seen the same with respect to your kids' classmates participation in online learning? 

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Not unreasonable to let the country's education system collapse with raging virus, teachers not showing up en masse and parents having to abruptly stop working (again). Maybe the teachers can just go take the parents' jobs, problem solved!

If only we were governed by Wilie Mack's Facebook

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5 hours ago, williemackgarza said:


Oh for fucks sake, what k-6 teacher works 50+ hrs a week?
I know teachers or friends married to teachers. Most say its a pretty fuckin easy gig.
All holidays, thanksgiving, xmas/new years, spring break and summers off.
Ive seen facebook pics of lits of em out partying vacationing and not social distancing, but then say its too dangerous to go back to the classroom.
I know theyre not getting paid a ton but no one ever said teaching would make em millionaires. They get paid a decent wage with great benefits.
Everyone is stepping up. Lots of folks got let go with no income. Teachers got to stay home and teach for 1/4 of the year last year. Now its time to go back. I completely understand if they feel their safety is compromised, but like me and the wife, if we dont want to go back to the office we could always quit and find other employment.
Lots of folks would love to have any job to go in to.

Every single k-6 teacher works 50 hours/wk, if not 60+ Unless they’re an absolute fucking slug that doesn’t get shit done.   I don’t know what fucking planet your on 

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8 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

Every single k-6 teacher works 50 hours/wk, if not 60+ Unless they’re an absolute fucking slug that doesn’t get shit done.   I don’t know what fucking planet your on 

Amen. My wife teaches elementary. Her usual day is 7:30 to 4:30 (20 minute lunch), with another 2-3 hours of work each night and on the weekend. Easily 60 hours per week. She does get the summer & winter break mostly off, which is nice for the kids. No crazy camp scramble. And to tie it back to covid, she teaches Rundberg area, which is one of the Austin-ara epicenters: https://www.kvue.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/austin-public-health-new-testing-sites-black-latino-communities/269-e78e6788-6c24-4069-ae6a-d9d71e134067

 

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5 minutes ago, CleverNickname said:

Amen. My wife teaches elementary. Her usual day is 7:30 to 4:30 (20 minute lunch), with another 2-3 hours of work each night and on the weekend. Easily 60 hours per week. She does get the summer & winter break mostly off, which is nice for the kids. No crazy camp scramble. And to tie it back to covid, she teaches Rundberg area, which is one of the Austin-ara epicenters: https://www.kvue.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/austin-public-health-new-testing-sites-black-latino-communities/269-e78e6788-6c24-4069-ae6a-d9d71e134067

 

That’s pretty much the same as my wife.  She’s about 6:45-4, then works about 2-3 hours at home grading/creating assignments/answering phone calls/emails from parents, then goes up on Sundays to print lesson plans and make copies for all the next week.  
 

people that think they work 40hrs/wk for 8.5 months/year are fucking retarded 

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7 hours ago, Foosters said:

Yeah, it really sucks. Both wife and I are considered essential so our choice has essentially been removed. Guess we could get a nanny, but if wife and I are out there among high risk populations, then the kid's getting exposed anyway. 

 

And your kid is going to expose all of his classmates. And they are going home to expose their parents. I'm not calling you out, just pointing out the reality of what this fall is going to be like. 

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6 hours ago, williemackgarza said:


Oh for fucks sake, what k-6 teacher works 50+ hrs a week?
I know teachers or friends married to teachers. Most say its a pretty fuckin easy gig.
All holidays, thanksgiving, xmas/new years, spring break and summers off.
Ive seen facebook pics of lits of em out partying vacationing and not social distancing, but then say its too dangerous to go back to the classroom.
I know theyre not getting paid a ton but no one ever said teaching would make em millionaires. They get paid a decent wage with great benefits.
Everyone is stepping up. Lots of folks got let go with no income. Teachers got to stay home and teach for 1/4 of the year last year. Now its time to go back. I completely understand if they feel their safety is compromised, but like me and the wife, if we dont want to go back to the office we could always quit and find other employment.
Lots of folks would love to have any job to go in to.

Sounds like your friends are shitty teachers. 

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Oh for fucks sake, what k-6 teacher works 50+ hrs a week?
I know teachers or friends married to teachers. Most say its a pretty fuckin easy gig.
All holidays, thanksgiving, xmas/new years, spring break and summers off.
Ive seen facebook pics of lits of em out partying vacationing and not social distancing, but then say its too dangerous to go back to the classroom.
I know theyre not getting paid a ton but no one ever said teaching would make em millionaires. They get paid a decent wage with great benefits.
Everyone is stepping up. Lots of folks got let go with no income. Teachers got to stay home and teach for 1/4 of the year last year. Now its time to go back. I completely understand if they feel their safety is compromised, but like me and the wife, if we dont want to go back to the office we could always quit and find other employment.
Lots of folks would love to have any job to go in to.
Even hypothetocally putting in the absolute minimum, just showing up, doing nothing; just watching kids fuck around in a classroom all day, arriving as late as possible (usually 7:30 or so) and leaving as early as possible (4:30 or so), straight up stealing money... is 45 hours a week. That's with absolutely zero, I mean literally zero, grading, lesson planning, tutoring, extracirriculars, parent meetings, team meetings, etc.
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17 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

Man I taught school for 2 years and coached, so I can actually you know, speak to this from first hand experience unlike most of you. 
Teachers have a job that is fair To generous in what they are paid compared to whats expected of them. 
I worked 40 hours, on the dot, as a history teacher.  Never brought a thing home with me. I worked 50 hours as an English teacher- had typically 10 hours of grading a week to do over the weekend. It was shit I did while watching college hoops or baseball. 
Once the taks test or whatever the fuck it’s called for English ended that went down to less writing assignments to the workload went down. 
I only worked 187 days. I only needed a bullshit 4 year degree (let’s not pretend education is a hard degree plan). I had no measurables I was held to for production. In had little day to say oversight over me. It was by far the least stressful or pressure packed job I ever had, nothing set high stakes or hard. 
I was an above average teacher compared to my peers. My admin loved me because I followed the simple shit that they asked for and parents didn’t call up and complain. My kids liked me ok bc I had a sense of humor and brought passion and excitement to what I was teaching (Love history and literature) and I tried to think out stuff to say, do it what have you for lessons. That said, many times I also phoned it in and that was ok too, which is what I was saying about the job not being hard. 
 

Now, if you could adequately measure somehow the job a great teacher (and I mean top 2-7 or 8 percent) that really gets hard to reach kids to learn does and want

to comp them at 100k or 150k a year or

something like that I’d be fine with it, but I can’t imagine a scenario where the appropriate people get paid for outstanding work in education so I’m just

going to pass on that. 
Note- this is a high school setting with measurable work product expected of students. If you are bringing work home I’m elementary Ed you are definitely doing it wrong. 
I’m sure the teachers in here will bitch at this and say I’m undervaluing them and what they do. All I can say is I love teachers, my mom was a teacher, my brother taught and coached for 10 years, when I wanted a break mid career and decided I was in a spot where I could do anything I decided to teach because of my respect for the position. And I loved it. But damn, the entitled notching done by those that don’t know how the real world works was just a real beat down. The fact that they’ve convinced so many people in their communities that it’s a tough and thankless job that’s criminally underpaid is a shame, because none of that was true at all in my experience from actually doing it, and comparing it to private sector work. 

You forgot the part that you are essentially babysitting 20-25 kids, 80% of whom have parents that don’t do shit for them in the home as far as learning/interacting, especially at the elementary level.  

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7 hours ago, 3shot said:

I don't know what the answer is, but Willie Mack's take isn't unreasonable.  

This virus is a mother fucker, and it may be doing the same damage as it is today for years.  Life has to continue on, in some form or fashion.  My kids are "fine" learning from home, but about 25% of my kids' classmates never showed up for online learning, and another 10% of their classes stopped participating with 4 weeks left.  What are we supposed to do about these kids?  FYI, I live in San Antonio, same as you.  Surely you've seen the same with respect to your kids' classmates participation in online learning? 

My sister is a 6th grade teacher in Kansas.  The school provided tablets to all students when school shutdown.  She noticed several kids weren't participating during the online class time.  She reached out to them they said they that their parents were using them and wouldn't let them get online.

Our kids, OUR FUTURE, need to be in a structured learning environment.  Not for the ones who have parents that care, but for those that don't.

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My kids are high achievers and go to a really excellent school. I had the benefit of an in law retired teacher Helping them with their online assignments everyday. Even still, they learned less. It’s just not the same. On top of that, they’re mental development suffers from not socializing with other children.

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34 minutes ago, gmr548 said:
7 hours ago, williemackgarza said:

Oh for fucks sake, what k-6 teacher works 50+ hrs a week?
I know teachers or friends married to teachers. Most say its a pretty fuckin easy gig.
All holidays, thanksgiving, xmas/new years, spring break and summers off.
Ive seen facebook pics of lits of em out partying vacationing and not social distancing, but then say its too dangerous to go back to the classroom.
I know theyre not getting paid a ton but no one ever said teaching would make em millionaires. They get paid a decent wage with great benefits.
Everyone is stepping up. Lots of folks got let go with no income. Teachers got to stay home and teach for 1/4 of the year last year. Now its time to go back. I completely understand if they feel their safety is compromised, but like me and the wife, if we dont want to go back to the office we could always quit and find other employment.
Lots of folks would love to have any job to go in to.

Read more  

Even hypothetocally putting in the absolute minimum, just showing up, doing nothing; just watching kids fuck around in a classroom all day, arriving as late as possible (usually 7:30 or so) and leaving as early as possible (4:30 or so), straight up stealing money... is 45 hours a week. That's with absolutely zero, I mean literally zero, grading, lesson planning, tutoring, extracirriculars, parent meetings, team meetings, etc.

You have at least an hour and a half a day without kids. In my district they also have a morning off every other week for lesson planning and conferencing. 
So, is  the job so easy a moron could do it?  Probably not. But that’s not really our standard is it?  Compared to something like law or sales where you have to prove demonstrably your value in the marketplace and that’s how you are compensated?  Yeah, it’s really fucking easy. 

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25 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

You forgot the part that you are essentially babysitting 20-25 kids, 80% of whom have parents that don’t do shit for them in the home as far as learning/interacting, especially at the elementary level.  

I didn’t forget that man, that’s basically the job description. But you start out at $55k with 3 months off every year after getting an Ed degree at Sam Houston, and then you have no real deliverables or metrics that your job depends on in real life and yeah, it’s not set up to pay like a doctor, lawyer or accountant or engineer or other professionals. 
I’d love to pay the special teachers more. Tell me how to determine who’s special and whose worth it and I will fight to make that happen. 

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You have at least an hour and a half a day without kids. In my district they also have a morning off every other week for lesson planning and conferencing. 
So, is  the job so easy a moron could do it?  Probably not. But that’s not really our standard is it?  Compared to something like law or sales where you have to prove demonstrably your value in the marketplace and that’s how you are compensated?  Yeah, it’s really fucking easy. 


I used to be a teacher, in Texas at that, so I'm aware of what the job looks like. The compensation issue is a seperate topic from what I was responding to.
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  • immamac changed the title to COVID-19 2nd wave - Texas only - Stats and such

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