A Parable for Teachers

"But he answered one of them, 'Friend, I am not being unfair to you.  Didn't you agree to work for a denarius?  Take your pay and go.  I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you.  Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money?  Or are you envious because I am generous?'"

The parable of the vineyard workers in the Book of Matthew is a great lesson for teachers and their unions who begrudge math and science teachers signing bonuses.  I'm a social studies teacher.  I'm grateful for my salary.  I'm grateful for the raises I've gotten.   If my school wants to pay math or science teachers more because they're harder to find, what harm does that do to me?  And don't I want my students to also have good math and science teachers?

Comments

[G. Cross]

Actually, Curt, math and science jobs are not the hardest to fill. Speech and Langauge Therapists are probably the most difficult followed by several categories of special education, especially teachers with both education and experience in autism. There is also a shortage of foreign language teachers. I am curious if you are advocating "signing bonuses" and/or "hard-to-fill" stipends for all hard-to-fill positions or just math and science? We may have another point of near agreement?

[G. Cross]

Quick follow-up on my previous comment. As of this evening, SchoolSpring lists 18 openings for special education teachers in Vermont, 4 speech and language therapists, 1 autism specialist, and 2 math and science teachers. I did not count the various para postions advertised.

[Curtis Hier]

Point well taken. I just used an example of an area where our school has been experiencing difficulties. Lately, it seems that CSC has been cranking out the special ed. teachers from among its trads and non-trad Act II students. We've been snapping them up.

The military uses signing bonuses very effectively to fill critical positions. It's not fair sometimes. (Right after I signed up to be a mortar gunner, the signing bonus increased for that position.) But oh well. The soldiers don't whine about it.