THAT is not universally true at all. In Texas the “teachers union” is a toothless sympathy group.
My wife worked all her career as a public elementary school teacher. The “summer vacations” people think she received were off-set by her low pay. (Ten years at less than $30K for 14-16 hr days. NO actual vacation…. spring breaks, holidays, etc. were taken up preparing for return-to-class lessons… surrounded by 20-28 kids all day without coffee breaks other escape from constant bad behavior that resulted from parents using school as a “baby-sitter” because no discipline taught at home. My wife left the house at 6AM to drive 50 miles to be there at 7AM to meet schoolbuses at 7:30AM and herded kids all day long, then remained until after dark preparing for the next day. She bought school supplies and lesson plan supplies out of her own pocket. Her “lunch” period watched kids to prevent fights on the playground. (When was the last time YOU spent 10 months working 14-16 hrs straight with misbehaving kids and angry parents to boot?)
Her ”summer vacation”. consisted of two weeks in required attendance at a continuing-education-workshop and then she had to go to the school a week in advance to do janitorial work unstacking desks, mopping floors, creating “welcoming environments” out of the walls and setting up furniture, libraries, shelves, and lockers for the kids.
She had to re-use 5 year-old dilapidated textbooks because the athletics program (“coach” was supposedly also a teacher but he was always served with a subsitute or gone away on training programs or to games.)…. she and her kids had dilapidated textbooks because the athletics program spent the money on paving the stadium parking-lot, striping the field, and buying concrete parking-curbs and signs that designated the parking places for “Coach”, Principal, and school-board.
Her retirement consists of $1400/month and her insurance..?? When the governor (Rick Perry…you know the guy… the one who couldn’t remember which agency he would get rid-of when he became president.. the same agency he was appointed to head-up by Trump… the “Energy Department”… then when he became Energy Sec’y he discovered the agency he headed-up and wanted to dismantle was also the agency responsible for all our atomic-energy plants, weapons, stockpiles, and disposals…). …. Yes, Rick Perry ran for governor on the promise that he would increase teacher salaries by $6K…. then later he changed that figure to $4K… but when he took office it actually became $2K salary increase…. BUT…the teachers Health Insurance premiums went UP by ..you guessed it almost exactly TWO THOUSAND DOLLARs.
So the INSURANCE COMPANIES that contributed to Rick Perry’s campaign is who got the $2K raise… the Teachers got a higher TAX BRACKET!
BTW, when she retired…her health insurance premium went to $700+ per month for reduced coverage. (This was for supplemental insurance to medicare and would be taken OUT of her retirement paycheck of $2400 before taxes.). It was far cheaper to carry her on MY insurance than the Teachers Retirement System!
Did I mention that she does not qualify for Social Security? The TRS system did not pay into SS…although my wife paid into it for years as a dental assistant before becoming a teacher. She’ll never get a penny of that back, not even survivor benefits when I die.
Don‘t spread false rumors about teachers getting summers off, overpaid and fantastic benefits. Thems fightin’ words for me.
www.kktv.com
