DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post - Idaho ends tenure and collective bargaining for union teachers

**Greapyjeory** · 10-03-2011, 09:56 PM

You do raise a fair point - there are some people who are teachers because they've always wanted to be teachers and they teaching and all that. Generally, they're liberal arts majors (English or history or art). The passion is nice, but there's also a glut of lib arts majors who say, "shit, I got this English degree, now what? I guess I'll go into teaching." My SiL had a thought like that with her anthropology degree (thank God I talked her out of it). The school systems do kind of have their pick with that group. But, the problem is attracting the science, math, computer science, and other majors that are competitive in the market. That is where you need some sort of incentive, and they've just removed a big one and replaced it with, well, nothing. A college degree is expensive, and most of us don't get to go through school on our parents' dime. So, when we face our student loan payments, we have to take into account the long-term prospects. Job security is important if you're looking at starting somewhere between 40 and 70% lower in salary than your fellow grads.

In the short run, you're correct that subjects that teach skills or subjects connected to more profitable jobs are harder to attract teachers. Still, I would think Idaho could eventually come up with something specifically aimed at those positions that could make up for this difference.

Applying tenure across the board is a problem though.

10-03-2011, 09:56 PM	#23
Greapyjeory Join Date Nov 2005 Posts 405 Senior Member	You do raise a fair point - there are some people who are teachers because they've always wanted to be teachers and they teaching and all that. Generally, they're liberal arts majors (English or history or art). The passion is nice, but there's also a glut of lib arts majors who say, "shit, I got this English degree, now what? I guess I'll go into teaching." My SiL had a thought like that with her anthropology degree (thank God I talked her out of it). The school systems do kind of have their pick with that group. But, the problem is attracting the science, math, computer science, and other majors that are competitive in the market. That is where you need some sort of incentive, and they've just removed a big one and replaced it with, well, nothing. A college degree is expensive, and most of us don't get to go through school on our parents' dime. So, when we face our student loan payments, we have to take into account the long-term prospects. Job security is important if you're looking at starting somewhere between 40 and 70% lower in salary than your fellow grads. In the short run, you're correct that subjects that teach skills or subjects connected to more profitable jobs are harder to attract teachers. Still, I would think Idaho could eventually come up with something specifically aimed at those positions that could make up for this difference. Applying tenure across the board is a problem though.
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