Peace in education

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Originally Posted by fratri

"working harder and doing more for less" should not be acceptable for anyone in Canada.... Public service workers or not... my comment wasn't to defend teachers but to defend a Canadian way of life....

If we as a society believe/accept "working harder and doing more for less" as the new norm, we are all doomed.... (and I am not just talking about teachers here) The rich will only become richer and the middleclass will fall.... Without the middleclass we do not have an economy.

Now anyone know what they are on strike for? I mean really know, not hearsay.... It would be really nice to have a debate knowing the true facts, not the gossip...

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Not sure what logic you have behind "If we as a society believe/accept "working harder and doing more for less" as the new norm, we are all doomed...." In fact the exact opposite is true. Have a look at Greece. People not working too hard expecting everything paid for.

There is no free lunch. No magical ever growing cash pile that we can all live off. Every product we use, every service we use has to be paid for and we pay for it by working. If you have a hospital stay that costs $10K someone has to work to pay enough taxes to come up with that 10K. If your kid goes to a public school that costs (just guessing) 6K per student/year, someone has to work to pay the taxes that pay for that. And as society moves forward, we expect more so we need more cash to pay for it. That means more work, with more going for taxes leaving less for the working man. That's life in the private sector.

Fatri but that "is" the new reality. We can try to pretend otherwise, or wish it weren't so (as my friend said in different words).

I know teachers ad I find many aspects of this difficult. But realistically speaking they and many other P servants live on different worlds. Really don't seem to know what life is really like.

Is it an important job?
So is an electricians, a bankers, a grocers, a XYZ.

Is it an easy job? Nope, I don't think so. Doubt I could do it.

But
Salaries that are really damned good given time off...hours that for many see them getting home at 3, 4, 5 pm in time to feed their own kids, etc, etc...Pensions that are.....

I empathize on many of the topics but when you look at what the general public is doing, facing, dealing with. When you consider, that teachers and Unions have had a large role in seeing this govt re-elected many times, have benefitted from some of ther largess (prior to 2010)

kicking or screaming, its time for "PS" to face reality and realize that those is private who really drive the economy, etc, etc.

Cant afford it
And currently they are getting hammered with increasing cost, taxes, fees.

Consider poor Johnny Q, who works all year. Earns maybe 60k (still pretty good compared to the mean), but doesn't have a Pension.
Hydro
Land Taxes (your welcome Mr OPP officer who starts at 90k and has a Pension)
Taxes and fees
Orpp alone is going to take 2% or another $1,200 year....Lets not forget the biggest tax grab in history (the Health premium) which has done what?
and on
and on
and on

the writing is on the wall, imo its going to get ugly, and the only people to blame are "themselves", the Liberals and their Unions who as my friend said are eating their own.

My daughter's high school runs on 4 1hr classes per day, plus 1hr lunch plus 1hr msip (study period). Since most teachers have at least one spare (some have two), their work day is 3 hours per day of classroom time, plus one hour where they must be in a classroom of students supervising a study period. And that is for 8 months of the year, with a 2 week Christmas vacation and 1 week March break.

Including the MSIP, that's about 700 hours of work a year as compared to the close to 2000 for the working man.

For most of the school year I arrive at 745 AM and leave between 400 PM and 500 PM. I work through my prep period and almost always work through lunch while grabbing something to eat. In the busier times I will be marking tests and such at home in the evenings pretty frequently.

Not complaining and I am sure most here do the same or more in their jobs - just don't sell the myth I work 4 hours per day.

I'm sure some ( who care) do. It wasn't that long ago i was in school and 50% had a binder of the lessons from previous years, would photocopy before class, hand out, teach for 25 mins. The rest was work time while the teacher did other things. Pass your work back behind you for you classmate to mark while the teacher took it up. Mid terms and finals were the only exception.