Editorial: Teachers group needs to hear from Superintendent Johnson, he NEEDS to hear from teachers
Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2018 -- The NCAE, by failing to DEMAND Mark Johnson's attendance, misses an opportunity to hold him accountable. Instead of making sure he explains himself, Johnson's been given a pass to idly roam the halls and go about his merry way. Neither teachers, nor their students are better off for the NCAE's petty slight of empty symbolism.
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It is the first time in 48 years that the state’s top elected education official hasn’t been asked to attend.
It’s not that the current superintendent Mark Johnson hasn’t deserved the ire of most public school teachers and their organization. He’s hid silently behind state Senate leader Phil Berger’s apron on money for the legislature’s unfunded classroom size reduction mandate. He’s championed private school vouchers and for-profit charter schools while remaining mum on stagnant funding for public schools and cuts at the Department of Public Instruction.
But the NCAE is letting Johnson off way too easily.
First, the association needs to have the superintendent present. It needs to hear directly from him about his aspirations and goals for public education in North Carolina and the specific steps he wants to take toward those ends.
The association should have a specific set of questions for the superintendent to answer publically, in front of all the teachers at the annual meeting, for example:
- Does the superintendent believe teacher pay in North Carolina is adequate and why or why not? What’s he going to do about it?
- Does the superintendent believe that the legislature had adequately funded its public school class size cut mandate – including costs for adequate physical education, art, music, language arts and other teachers as well as costs for additional space? What’s he going to do to fix it?
- Are taxpayer dollars being properly accounted for, and is instruction and student performance properly tracked, through the private school voucher program? What’s he going to do to make sure tax dollars aren’t being squandered?
- What is he doing to make sure classroom teachers have adequate textbooks, supplies and technology to help make sure students have full opportunities for successful learning?
Perhaps most significantly, the superintendent should be invited, and should attend the NCAE meeting so he can hear directly -- unfiltered through staff-arranged tours, staged media events and YouTube videos – from real teachers about how they struggle to get by on the meager wages North Carolina pays, how much of their own money they spend (or raise through “GoFundMe” style campaigns) to provide supplies for their students, the extra UNPAID hours they spend EVERYDAY working with students.
Mark Johnson isn’t going to know what it REALLY takes to be a good North Carolina public school teacher in the dictates he gets from state Senate leader Phil Berger’s office. He’s not going to get it from the folks he’s surrounded himself with in his office.
“All learning in school occurs in the classroom, between teacher and student. If we can focus as much as possible on supporting that relationship then we’ll get better results.”
In the year since, we’ve seen little progress toward those ends.
The NCAE, by failing to DEMAND Johnson’s attendance at their meeting, misses an important opportunity to hold him accountable.
Instead of making sure he goes to the head of the classroom to explain himself, he’s been given a pass to idly roam the halls and go about his merry way.
Neither North Carolina’s teachers, nor their students, are any better for the NCAE’s petty slight of empty symbolism.
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