So... Providence, Rhode Island... fires ALL their teachers...all 1926

Providence faces shortfall, teachers to get dismissal notices

The school district plans to send out dismissal notices to every one of its 1,926 teachers, an unprecedented move that has union leaders up in arms.

In a letter sent out to all teachers Tuesday, Supt. Tom Brady wrote that on Thursday the Providence School Board will vote on a resolution to dismiss every teacher, effective the last day of school.

In an e-mail sent to all teachers and School Department staff, Brady said, "We are forced to take this precautionary action by the March 1 deadline given the dire budget outline for the 2011-2012 school year in which we are projecting a near $40 million deficit for the district," Brady wrote. "Since the full extent of the potential cuts to the school budget have yet to be determined, issuing a dismissal letter to all teachers was necessary to give the mayor, the School Board and the district maximum flexibility to consider every cost savings option, including reductions in staff."

Some of them will probably get their job back... or not... they could fire all of them... and hire new teachers that will do the same job for a smaller salary...

And those teachers have an union... didn't save them.

Sounds like a tactic to stir up a Wisconsin type revolt, this action can only have one purpose behind it. How can they have an entire capital city with no teachers? Like you said, many will get their jobs back, but next year there may be 60+ kids per classroom.

reply to post by Vitchilo


If every teacher was part of the union, then that is why they fired them all. So they could not declare any sort of discrimination. They just used the union laws against them.

Was this not bound to happen eventually? With debt racking up in every state, how long did these government workers think their salaries were going to last? You can't pay someone if you don't have any money...The fed gov was going to have to cut the budget eventually.

...now as to why they would cut school teachers first instead of DMV workers or something less substantial is beyond me...

Originally posted by defcon5
the teachers had to perform to retain their jobs, which increased the students education levels significantly.

What dictates a teachers performance?

Is it the grades of their students?

Sounds like hairs are being split, you can't teach the unteachable. There are so many students in public schools who are downright thrilled with mediocrity--they have no desire to excel in classes. Are these students counted in a teachers 'performance'?

Not saying you are right or wrong, but it takes two to tango. In this case, one to teach and one to learn. I can't imagine the teachers in other countries are really that miraculous.

reply to post by Tharsis


Real teachers will get all kids to learn.

Remember that movie Stand and Deliver?



Students can tell what teachers were teaching and which ones are calling it in.

It would appear that maybe, they may be making a move towards the privatization of schooling???

Could be some BIG money for one of the Gov. political backers??

But, it does bring up another problem..............does Rhode Island have a lottery??? If so, is it legal for them to collect from it if they have fired all the teachers???

Any lawyers around??

This sure makes unions look like a great ponzi scheme, where they keep taking money, but never can deliver the insurance their members are paying for..

reply to post by defcon5


This is EXACTLY the problem. And it's the problem with all Unions----the crazy rigmarole you have to go through to fire a member. I think the original intention of having some sort of review process and offering help for improvement first was a great idea, so that employees couldn't be fired for political reasons. But it has turned into a process where we can't fire anyone until we pay them for sitting around for 3 years while we miss deadlines that draw it all out another year. It has to stop.

And merit-based pay would absolutely help, too. It's insane to have a clause that discourages the very reason why most people continue to go above and beyond for their employer. Yeah, teachers should want to give of themselves to students----but they would be insanely masochistic if they did that for years with no financial recognition for it. Pay the rock stars like rock stars!

But don't outlaw bargaining. Bargaining is what got us where we are, in both the good and the bad ways. Bargaining can be used to get us out of this mess, too. We just need to renegotiate union clauses like the merit pay and firing issues, in a public way where we give everyone the unbiased facts about those issues. Bring the negotiations out of the dark----that's a big step forward. Outlaw back-room bargaining.

Holy Chr1st!
That is hardcore!

Nothing else to say, really.
Wow!

reply to post by defcon5


Wow.

Speechless

I hate to say it, but this is the kind of thing that happens when you refuse to take on difficult issues and instead keep "kicking the can down the road." Eventually, if you don't consciously take control of the decisionmaking process, decisions get made anyway, one way or another, by The Fickle Finger of Fate when the money simply runs out.

States have been putting off tough budget choices for years -- decades, really, in many cases. The demographics were always there in plain view, but everybody chose to ignore them, or to "worry about it later." Dober, thoughtful essays, editorials, and white papers were written as long ago as the 80s. There was much harumphing and polite hand-wringing in conference centers, and tut-tutting over sunday-morning newspaper columns, but at the end of the day, everyone just shrugged and went back to doing what they always do because, after all, after all that stuff was twenty years down the road and "we'll think of something, we always do."

Except now it's no longer 20 years in the future; those 20 years are now in the past. Time flies when you're having fun. The wolf is at the door, scratching and whining and spraying the welcome mat with his pungent animal essence. And you will see more and more cases like this where suddenly stuff drops off a cliff because woops, we never made the tough decisions we should have 5 or 10 or 20 or 40 years ago. All of a sudden, heh-heh, no more teachers or no more pensions or no more garbage collection because there's nothing in the till and everyone will be pointing fingers blaming everyone else for the mess.

reply to post by ParkerCramer


That is one part of the equation that just does not make sense to me. Were in the world is all of that lottery money going? One more time the people have been robbed.

Maybe if all the teachers refuse to go back and parents are forced to deal with the problem of caring for and educating their own children maybe just maybe they will be just a bit more supportive of the teachers and realize the problem is not the teachers but the system.

I don't know where you guys live, but I'd say a regime change is in order for most k-12 teachers. Half of the ones I had in school did nothing but sit behind a desk and shop VW parts all day. They need to get rid of the ineffective teachers, and put in effective ones. Before they are paid more, they need to perform better. Two of my close relatives are teachers, and they'll tell you the same thing; performance is not adequately rewarded and seniority is king-- at least in CA's educational system.

we, the people need to all sit down and look at just what our federal, our state, our county and our city or town ARE spending money on. I'm not gonna debate weather or not our gov'ts both federal, state, and local, are in a financial crisis. (I'd defeat myself in such a debate. But they have been using this tactic for a long, long time...
They go through our money like a child in a massive candy store, spending it on every stupid and dumb thing that they can dream up. Find ways to spend money they don't even have. then. well, they notice the hole they dug themselves in, or maybe it's the people that notice the massive hole they are stuck in, and well, decide they need more....
ummm...how to get it, raise taxes of course!! but, well, the people haven't been taking too kindly to the tax collector taking more and more year by year, so how do we convince the people that they want to be taxed more??
oh ya, we can terrorize them with threats....we can say we are gonna close half the schools, we can say that we are gonna fire all the teachers, we can tell them that we won't be available if their house catches on fire, if we scare the bejeezus would of them, they will come around and beg us to raise their taxes on them!! and we can continue paying for these stupid things for another year!! give our selves raises to boot!


people need to sit down and look at what the money has been going to, and then they need to take what they have found to the council meetings, and challenge them to answer the tough questions!

reply to post by Infrasilent


I agree with both you and Defcon5 in this. I just mentioned it a few minutes ago in a reply that I made in another thread.

I come from a family that has quite a few educators and a common complaint is the lack of ability to test and make sure that teachers are qualified to be teaching. Some of these relatives have mentioned how much extra time they put in to help their students and try to clean up after the messes made and left by previous teachers. Some students have no interest in the help and some are happy to get it. The problem is that this cleaning up shouldn't be an issue. If a teacher is not performing adequately and teaching properly, they need to be removed from the education system, but the unions have made this all but impossible.

Many teachers are adamantly against the idea of testing, too. Suggest it to most teachers and they will howl in outrage that you dared to imagine that they should be subject to tests to be sure they are qualified. Not all of them, some actually agree with the idea, but many really are passionately opposed to it.

I gave some examples in my other reply why this testing should be mandatory for teachers. If you have ever had a teacher call home to complain that your child was making up words only to find out that one of the "made up" words that the teacher was moaning about was "vociferous" and being used correctly in a sentence by a kindergartner (as happened to my sister a number of years ago), you might agree. This happened to my sister almost weekly. Or notes that you would have sworn on your life had been written by a child to see the spelling and grammar, but the note was in the teachers handwriting. Or the teacher last year who was retiring at the end of the year and marking time (her words) who was talking to the class about one of the special needs students, and my daughter's friend, and said that the girl "has a brain disorder and only has the knowledge of a three year old." Sweet creamy Jesus on a ritz! Why would you say that to the class? Talking to some of my daughter's classmates, though, verified that this really did happen. There are countless other examples over the years that my daughter has been in school.

On the other hand, she has had some teachers who were fantastic and made learning fun and effortless and put in the time and effort and who I was sorry to no longer have when she advanced to the next grade. They worked with the parents and made it easy for us to keep track of what was happening in our child's education and help her out when needed. These teachers, and this behavior, is what should be rewarded and commended. We absolutely should not reward failure. Pay and the longevity of a teacher's career should be based on merit and performance and not seniority and union membership alone.

Take care,
Cindi