Ahhh, I Remember It Well!

Mustang Bobby has an excellent job description of what teachers do on his blog.

The mythology of how easy a teacher has it -- they only work nine months out of the year and only work six hours a day -- has long since been disproved, but you still hear it among those who don't know what teachers do. In many states the school year has been lengthened to ten months; several years ago in Miami, school ended the first week of June and began again the last week in July. During the summer recess, many teachers must take classes to maintain their certification or earn a supplemental degree to keep their job. Those courses are not free and the school district does not pay them for them, neither do they help pay off the student loans the teachers incurred while earning the minimum degrees that the state requires to get the job in the first place. During the school year, most teachers report to work several hours before the first bell, remain in the classroom long after the last student has left, and quite often must return to the school in the evening or on weekends for events and additional coaching or club duties. Then they take work home with them. On the job they have more than their share of duties, and for the which they give up some pretty basic things most people in another workplace take for granted, such as going to the bathroom whenever they please, or getting a cup of coffee. Taking an hour for lunch or leaving a little early to go to the dentist is unheard of. Try enforcing those workplace rules at Goldman Sachs.

No one goes into the teaching profession to make a fortune; they do it to make a difference. A lot of people in the public sector work as hard as teachers do, and a lot of them put their lives and well-being on the line for a median salary and a pension that does not include a golden parachute. They don't ask for six-figure incomes, but the least they can expect is to be represented and protected by organizing and have the right to the same bargaining rules as the guy who installs the seats in a Chevy. And in a time when people on Wall Street are making huge bonuses for crunching numbers on a computer, now is not the time to be calling the people on the front lines of education and public well-being greedy.