Illinois teacher commits suicide citing working conditions

[tblue37]

37. I am 61 years old. When I was in school, teachers had authority in the classroom.

If a kid acted up or didn’t do his work, the teacher was able to do something about it. Parents backed up teachers’ efforts to teach and, when necessary, to discipline students. These days, if a kid acts up, the teacher can’t do much to get him back under control, because the administrators are too afraid that the parents will sue if anyone says anything negative to their precious darling or, heaven forbid, give him a grade he doesn’t like.

Unfortunately, back then some teachers did abuse their power in the classroom, because there are rotten apples in every job. But good teachers can no longer focus on teaching, because they must spend most of their time doing crowd control and trying to keep the disruptors from completely preventing the serious students from doing any work at all. And, of course, what little time is left must be focused on test prep for NCLB.

I have an article on my Teacher, Teacher site entitled “The Inmates Are Running the Asylum,” which I wrote in response to the year I spent substituting in the local elementary schools to augment my meager salary as an adjunct college instructor. Here’s the link if you are interested:
http://www.teacherblue.homestead.com/inmates.html