So Academic

We are fast approaching the moment we all live for. Everything we do from the moment we wake up until the time we go to bed is meant to prepare ourselves for this grandiose event. It happens only once a year, just like Christmas, the Westminster Dog Show, your birthday, or the day you find that lost sock behind the washing machine.

There is no need to fear the FCAT, though. Students have been bubbling their ignorance away since the third grade. They have become experts at designing masterful patterns on the answer sheet. They welcome the chance to be able to sit quietly for a few hours and to enjoy the feeling of a world devoid of the constant buzzing of their phones alerting them that “OMG, Joey dumped Katie. LOL.”

Unfortunately, this may be one of the last times we are administering the FCAT. Millions of students have taken it over the years. Some of those students may even have an actual job today. Millions of tax dollars have been given to publishers and “testing companies” that produced beautifully designed graphics and data that could be compared to art, in the sense that one can appreciate its beauty without quite understanding its real purpose. So, as we are getting ready to submit our students to this rite of passage, let us not forget that we owe it to ourselves to bask in the FCAT’s glory, to worship its magnificence, to give thanks to its grand priests, to recommend our souls to its makers, and to forever remember that we were there for the students when they needed us the most, giving them a freshly sharpened, untouched #2 pencil just as theirs had broken under the added pressure of test anxiety.

So Political

So, our state politicians are at it in Tallahassee, tackling the most important issues of the day. Remember, there is a gubernatorial election this year, so Republicans want to make it look like education IS important to them. How do you accomplish that while at the same time siphoning away an even greater amount of tax dollars from the school districts and into the pockets of your generous corporate donors? Easy. The solution is to set more money aside for charter schools, thereby sending less money to the public schools. Add to the mix more unfunded mandates for the public schools to follow and to finance on their own, and voilà! Another Republican tour de force will be played.

Of course, every effort will also be made to make veteran teachers leave the profession, now that newly hired teachers have no chance of getting tenure anymore. New teachers cost less and have a vested interest to comply with every idiotic mandate they are subjected to. Veterans tend to resist fads and have the interest of kids at heart. That is a very dangerous combination for the powers that be.

So, the solution is to take even more dollars away from our paychecks. The Florida legislature is attempting to increase the contribution that public servants make to the Florida Retirement System.
There is absolutely no fairness in the process. This is a pay cut, disguised under another name, but a real pay cut that hurts. At the same time, our excellencies in the state capital are considering allowing some teachers to be armed with something else than patience or creativity. They would allow some teachers to carry a firearm on school property. Yes, the same legislature that wants to make teachers seriously angry at a pay cut wants to give those teachers the ability to shoot people. Is that really wise? Would you be happy knowing that your child spends the day in a room with a person that is both angry AND armed? I guess our politicians will have to think twice the next time they visit a school for a photo-op... Meanwhile, I am going to invest in companies that make bulletproof vests.