Academia Rant

This whole rant begins with a Pod cast that the Mister was tuning into, where some of the comments were: “we need to pay our teachers more” or “their pay needs to be tax exempt” in order to attract and keep good teachers.

I disagree.

Not on the basis that they need a boost in their paychecks…..Lord knows we ALL need those….but on the basis of that being what needs to happen.

For decades upon decades, there have been teachers. Good ones, bitchy ones, funny ones and bad ones – those facts there shall always be. What makes the good ones stick is passion and their actual ability to TEACH – not just the paycheck and/or benefits.

I know for a fact, that teachers spend the bulk of their classroom time teaching children to test well and have very little time for anything else. Remarkably, the theory behind “No Child Left Behind” is the very substance that will undo it.

You cannot ready a child for life and learning by testing them to death. Teachers and school systems cannot get their funding if a certain percentage of their student body fails that testing.

Therefore, the schools push the teachers, the teachers push the students, and at the end of it, my kids end up with the knowledge of how to properly fill in a circle with a number 2 pencil. Meanwhile, they gouge budget dollars out of music, art, physical education, sports programs and extra curricular instruction. School becomes anything but a learning institution.

If you were a teacher and wanted to pass on your passion and love of a subject, does this sound like an environment to do that in?

Secondly…..this country has become so ultra sensitive and a blatant victim state, that discipline, care, direction, opinion, rules and standards have been beat out, sued out, and bitched out of existence. I could write an entire book on this subject alone and feel horribly repressed because I must limit this discussion here.

Look….here is the bottom line people:

Parents send their children to someone else to watch, (free of charge) teach, instruct, tolerate and inspire – all day, every day for nine months out of the year. They are asking these very people to teach subjects that are inherently boring to an adult, let alone a child, so that they may be functioning members of society.

Parents MUST give them the right to tell a child “no” or “that is unacceptable” when the boundaries have been overstepped. They have to have the right to expect: respect, good manners, proper dress and parental support.

Can you IMAGINE your neighbor from three blocks away, whom you have NEVER met, bringing their child into your home for the day and that neighbor expecting you to let that child run amok in your home?

Coaches should have the right to tell a child that they did not make the team. Children should be allowed to play tag on the playground and school nurses should be allowed to administer aspirin.


We had to sing in choirs, be able to climb the rope in gym, get in MAJOR trouble for mouthing off, dress by a code, sing the national anthem, take art classes, know the difference between <> signs, know all the fifty states in alphabetical order and who the hell Pocahontas was.

Your teacher was scary and had the authority to call YOUR MOM. Getting sent to the principal’s office was the worse offense EVER and people simply did not get to the point of expulsion. School was an extension of your home and your parents expected you to behave, follow the rules and play nice.

The point is…we lived. We made it into adulthood, mostly trauma free (I am SURE there are instances where this is not true indeed) and we had to play on equipment made out of STEEL that had lead-based paint on it to boot.

When did we, as a nation, fall asleep and wake up stupid?

*Sigh*

MichChick