With the advent of privately run charter schools, we've managed to create an economy in teachers. Once upon a time, you had the public school system, MAYBE a really expensive private school, and religious-funded schools. With charters becoming more common, the publicly-paid MPS teacher has options where she didn't have any before.
Effective education is as much about good teachers as it is good administration, good envrionment, and small classes. The MPS can't AFFORD to pay their teachers well below area average, or all we'd get is the fresh-out-of-school teachers with very little real experience. The MPS would be the first rung on a carrer ladder. I personally have met very, very few public employees who consider, "the feeling of a job well done for the good of all," to be adequate compensation for getting markedly less than they could in the private sector. Yes, we do tend to have better health packages; but all that means these days is that our premiums are increasing faster (in absolute dollars) than our private bretheren. Yes, we do tend to have paid-vacation, AND paid-sick-leave (on top of paid holidays). The paid time-off alone is worth a few bucks off the ole pay-check, but not a wholloping chunk. Unions do NOT like pay-for-performance systems because it is terribly hard to create an objective performance-measure of the same reliability as seniority. And where you have increased complexity, you get increased chances for Management to diddle the system. And management diddling is a large part of the reason that Unions continue to exist. And aren't we in the middle of a teacher shortage right now? Laying off 150 or whatever teachers does flood the market in the near term, but once the economy rebounds and is reflected in tax revenues we're probably in the same boat we were in before. Once demand starts exceeding supply, costs start going up. Greg Riedesel SSP Stacatto signals of constant information A loose affiliation of millionares, and billionares, baby These are the days of miracle and wonder -- Boy in the Bubble, Paul Simon REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
