No need for shouting in teachers’ dispute

You know people are excited about something when they start using a lot of CAPITAL LETTERS and exclamation marks!!!!!

Really, there’s no need to yell when you write a letter to the editor. There’s no difference in meaning between, “This is NOT fair!!!” and “This is not fair.”

All that capping and exclaiming reflects, though, the anger, frustration and stridency characterizing the divide between our teachers and those who are cheerleading the government in putting the boots to them.

Everybody is walking around with calculators trying to figure out — literally — what teachers are worth.

Take the hours they work in a day, add preparation time, subtract summer, winter and spring breaks, divide by time off for compassionate leave, multiply by professional development and take the square root of dedication, experience and training and, supposedly, we should be able to come up with a number.

It’s all so silly. We’re trying to compute a value for something that can’t be computed.

As a whole, teachers are no different than any other employee group. Some are very good, some are terrible, and most are average. From my own experience and that of my children, I can remember the names of the good ones and the really dreadful ones; the rest I’ve forgotten.

Becoming a teacher doesn’t make you special, any more than any other career choice. If you want to be special, empty out your bank account, sell your home and your belongings and give it all to charity.

Teaching is a job, one that requires a particular set of skills combined with a desire to do the work. If it pans out, you’ll love what you do and will feel you’re doing something worthwhile.

You’ll feel blessed that you have a job you enjoy, unlike the many or even most who must work at jobs they don’t much like but do it to put food on the table.

This doesn’t give your employer the right to take advantage of you. Reasonable ground rules are needed. You deserve to be paid fairly within the range of what others in similar jobs are paid. Working conditions need to be fair, too. Expectations must be clear.

It needs to be in writing — it’s called a contract. You get the best deal you can within the labour marketplace. Sometimes things go wrong.

The best work place is one in which an employer can say, “There’s a job here that needs to be done and this is what it is, and this is what I’m willing to pay you to do it. As long as you do it well, we’re even.”

Believe it or not, there are workplaces in which trust, flexibility and teamwork exist. Our schools used to be such places; not now.

Since everyone’s asking questions, I have two.

To those who think so little of teachers: do you really believe people are in the business of teaching out of greed, and that as a whole they don’t give a rat’s patoot about what’s best for their kids?

Of the teachers, I ask this: Is it possible we might all be better off if teaching got back to being a little more like a profession and a little less like just another way to put food on the table?