Community Projects > Teacher's Pay Conversations Project
Teacher's Pay Conversations Project
Kerry:
Teacher's Pay Conversations Project
The Teacher's Pay Conversations Project is a series of conversations about acknowledgment.
The premise is that pay is an acknowledgment. So too is withholding pay. Pay is a communication. Making teachers pathetically beg for salaries or facility repairs or school supplies is the way we let teachers know (albeit it irresponsibly and covertly) that we don't know how else to communicate our deep-seated resentments for letting us slide—poor penmanship, incorrect grammar, lousy math skills, etc.
Unsatisfactory teacher salaries mirror the collective leadership-communication skills of educators. The leadership-communication skills it would take to produce financial parity with skilled laborers—electricians, plumbers and carpenters—are the same skills it takes to communicate subject matter.
Read about the Teacher's Pay Conversations Project.
Wolf:
So, are we subtly paying back all the teachers WE didn't like, by being unable to communicate our own high value to the community. Is this part of the perpatration withhold? Are we acting like a codependent abused party somehow has decided that he really deserves to be punished for years for some forgotten error or action, so we can (so I can) be right about how poorly educators are treated?
Kerry:
Hi Wolf,
Thanks for your post. I’ll reply line by line.
Re: “So, are we subtly paying back all the teachers WE didn't like,” I doubt if many would agree with your use of the word “we.” I can’t answer for you. For myself, it was never a conscious decision to write illegibly. Like most others, my poor penmanship has been an unconscious communication. I didn’t know it then but I was unconsciously reaching out to see if the teacher was worthy of me doing my best. In truth I never experienced being in communication with any teacher. My penmanship teacher communicated, nonverbally, that she did not mean what she said, “Turn in your cursive homework neatly or you’ll have to repeat the class.” What I do know is that there are very few, if any, teachers who could not work with a single student and cause that one student to have legible penmanship. Something happens when a teacher sells out and accepts more students then he/she is qualified to teach. Each teacher has his/her student load for which they know they can be held responsible to communicate subject matter. I.e. “You can trust me to be able to teach 10 students to be able to....” For certain there are some students with physical/mental/home-life problems that hinder coordination but a teacher (as opposed to someone in the process of becoming a teacher) knows to refer that student to professionals.
Likewise, I doubt whether many would acknowledge that they are paying back teachers for not teaching. Teacher pay is an unconscious impersonal communication. No parent is forced to make the judgment between say, paying teachers $39K or $89K, instead a parent irresponsibly sets it up for others (legislators) etc. to pay teachers as little as possible. This covert acknowledgment can't help but have undesirable effects. My experience as a communication-skills coach has proven to me that it has profound effects and that it does bother everyone at some level. I suspect if we were all doing well finacially that we'd be more than willing, in fact obligated, to pay each teacher an appropriate and satisfying wage.
Re: “Is this part of the perpatration withhold?” [sic] My understanding is that that each of us have a unique set of standards and ethics. What may be unethical or a perpetration for me may not be one for you. For example: Overdosing on sugar is for me a perpetration whereas for others it’s not. It may not bother the majority that teachers don’t make as much as carpenters but it does me.
Re: “Are we acting like a codependent abused party...” again, your use of the word “we” makes it difficult to communicate. What I got is that you don’t see yourself as acting like a codependent ...” This I can get.
Re: “deserves to be punished for years for some forgotten error or action,” I take it that you are not consciously punishing yourself or your penmanship teacher. During 3-hr consultations over the past 30 years I’ve never run across someone who, with coaching, was not willing to look at the possibility that they have in fact been punishing themselves for each and every verbally unacknowledged perpetration. We’re simply too honest to win (to achieve and sustain the experience of love, prosperity, and health) without cleaning up the messes. You’d be amazed at what it does for all of ones relationships to tell, say your mother, that you suddenly had the memory of lying to her when she asked if you had brushed your teeth (for most that’s one of the first lies.) —many honestly (arrogantly) believe it’s not effecting outcomes to this very day. I know of no education program for teachers that requires student teachers to participate in a life-time integrity clearing process; as such a teacher can't be certain if a misbehaving student is mirroring an out integrity of the teacher's.
Re: “...forgotten....” Consciously yes, however the memory of each action is recorded. Most of us pile more perpetrations on top of the firsts (first lie, first theft, first abuse of another, first deceit). As with all truths and all lies each have their own consequences. Many of us are still paying ourselves back, (however unaware we may be) for childhood perpetrations.
Thanks, for sharing your thoughts. For certain we need more of these kinds of conversations.
Kerry
Wolf:
My use of the word "We" is intended to show that I am including myself in the group. Including myself in the whole embarrassing show, which also includes looking for a better-paying low adjunct wages, sometimes. Why is it that the 'we' convention makes response difficult? I do not understand your use of the language. Am I hiding in a "crowd" of "We"?
Kerry:
Hi Wolf,
It’s a bit tricky communicating about “I” vs “We” because I don’t have your permission to coach you with your communication skills. You operate from what’s referred to as the adversarial communication model (it’s the one we learned from our parents who learned it from their teachers). I favor the intentional communication model. The two models are not just different, it’s as though they were English and Martian (truly outside the box). I’ve virtually lost my ability to communicate with educators (using their communication model) other than with those intent on communication mastery.
Re: “Am I hiding in a "crowd" of "We"?” Depending upon how powerful you’re willing to be it’s much worse than that. I’ll take your question to be rhetorical because if I say, “yes” or “no” then you will either accept it or reject it as a truth. The ideal is to shorten the amount of time it takes for you to arrive at your truth.
Thanks,
Kerry
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