March 3, 2011--Ladies of Forest Trace: My Teachers

“I’m having a very difficult day.”

“What is it, mom? You sound sad.”

“I am. Soon I’ll be 103 and things are getting to me more. I don’t have the strength I used to. I probably shouldn’t be watching so much TV, except for the Miami Heat. But I can’t seem to help myself.”

I assumed she was agitated about what was going on in Syria as she had been with the events in Egypt. “You’re watching CNN all day?”

“Yes.”

“I thought we agreed it’s better if you limit TV watching to brief times in the morning, midday, and late afternoon. We’re trying to do the same thing, what with all the things going on in the Middle East. We don’t think it’s healthy to be inundated with this all day.”

“That too. But to tell you the truth, I’m more upset about what’s going on in Wisconsin with that governor . . . what’s his name?”

“Walker. Scott Walker.”

“Yes, him.”

My mother had been a teacher in the New York City public school system when the first of the large teachers unions, the UFT, had been organized. At the time, most teachers were women and it was thought that they did not need much money—they were so-called “trousseau teachers” who would quit once they got married—and they were paid accordingly. And two of her sisters had worked for the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. So I was expecting to hear from my mother about how unfair the governor was being to the teachers and other state and municipal workers unions and how this was upsetting her.

So preemptively I said, “It is very bad there. It looks to me that he not only wants teachers to pay for more of their benefits but also is trying to break the union.”

“They brought it on themselves,” my mother said softly.

“They? Who?” I was confused by this unexpected comment.

“I am sorry to say, my teachers.”

“I assume you mean that the cost of their benefits got out of hand and that, as they have already agreed, in these tough times they have to pay more for them.”

“That too. But by they I also mean the politicians who agreed to those salaries and benefits. Doesn’t collective bargaining, which I fought for in New York, doesn’t it mean give and take? To me it looks too much like all give and all take.”

“I am surprised to hear you say this, mom. You, after all, know how little you were paid when you began and there weren’t even any benefits back then. They expected all the women to stop teaching before retirement age so thought why give them benefits.”

“I do remember that and, yes, things needed to improve. To become fairer. Which they did. And now we have this.”

“This?”

“I’ve seen what you wrote about the retirement benefits of city workers. How policemen and firemen can get their full pensions after 20 years and don’t have to wait until they’re 65 to collect them. That doesn’t seem fair to me, especially when so many people working for companies are losing their benefits and if they are lucky have to work past 65. And for teachers it’s not so different.”

“In your case . . .”

“Exactly. In my case I retired when I was 65 and made as much, if not more, each year from my city pension than when I was working. If I manage to live two more years I will by then have collected my pension for 40 years. For a longer time than I worked.”

“But most teachers, mom, are not as fortunate as you.”

“All right, so they’ll collect for only 25 or 30 years. It may not be nice to say this, but when these retirement systems were set up they weren’t expecting us to live so long.”

“But aren’t teachers still underpaid? Aren’t they providing as vital a service to society as doctors and lawyers who make much, much more?”

“True, what they do is essential and the pay could still be better. Here in Florida teachers are not paid what they deserve. But they can still retire when they’re 50 or 55. Who else is eligible to do that?”

“I don’t think the statistics would show that teachers typically retire that young.”

“Many do and continue to work at something else. But, even if they don’t retire that young, they can; and I’m not sure how fair that is. And how fair is it that city and state and federal workers get tenure so it’s almost impossible to fire them even if they get lazy or aren’t any longer good at what they do?”

“About this we are in agreement. Even the leaders of the teachers unions are saying it has to be easier to remove ineffective teachers.”

“That’s what they’re saying now since they’re under attack. When things calm down it will be back to business as usual. When I retired, all the UFT cared about was getting the mayors to agree to giving us more and more, including how many minutes we were required to be in the classroom every day—they fought for as few as possible—and protecting teachers who couldn’t teach. I could tell you stories.”

“And you have. Including how one of your principals, protected by his own union, spent all day locked in his office so he could call his bookie to place bets on the horse races.”

“Everyone knew about it but it was impossible to get him out of there. The principals union, the Council of School Supervisors it’s called, covered up for people like him.”

“I can see why you’re sounding sad.”

“And what’s more, back in my day we were trained to teach. I didn’t go to college or a college of education. I went to a training school. The Maxwell Teacher Training School in Brooklyn. I know ‘training’ is not now considered an appropriate word for how to think about preparing professionals. But doctors are ‘trained,’ aren’t they? What’s so wrong with being trained to do a job well?”

“I have no problem with that,” I said.

“At Maxwell we were taught methods for teaching reading and arithmetic and the other subjects. Now, they spend too much time teaching theory. Theory is fine, but knowing what to do to be effective with children is even more important. And we spent many, many days and weeks and months serving as student teachers in the classrooms of the very best teachers. Now, they don’t do enough of that and those preparing to teach are encouraged to be creative in the classroom. As young people would say, to ‘do their thing.’ Creativity is fine—I feel I was a creative teacher—but above all else we were trained how to teach every child to read and do math. And, I think, for the most part we did.”

“I had nothing but excellent teachers when I went to public school in Brooklyn. They really knew what they were doing and how to run a classroom.”

“One more thing and then I have to run.”

“Sure.”

“Between us, do you think they would be going after teachers the way they are in Wisconsin and Ohio and even New York City if all their children could read and write and do their math? Part of the problem is that our public schools are no longer the envy of the world. In fact, aren’t our children doing worse and worse on tests that compare them with children overseas?”

“This is true.”

“So how can the teachers, my teachers, make the case that they should be protected with tenure, get decent salaries, and very generous benefits when so many of them are obviously doing such a poor job? Can you answer that?”

“No,” I said.

“Please don’t misunderstand me. I am not against unions. We need them. I told you about my sisters. But a school is not a sweatshop. Teachers’ unions are necessary to fight for fair wages and benefits but not to bankrupt government budgets or run the schools or cover up for those who are not doing a good job. What is happening to the children has to be front and center. Everything should be focused on that. But we have lost that. It has become all about teachers’ so-called rights and working conditions and extravagant benefits.”

“Now you have me feeling upset and sad.”

And with that she hung up.