So many teachers are too busy working to work.
Their contracted teaching and prep time isn’t remotely enough to grade the papers, plan the lessons, manage the interventions, collaborate with colleagues, and so much more.
So they give evenings and weekends to work. They use personal days to catch up on work. They spend their vacation days planning lesson plans, taking meetings, and paying out of pocket for their professional development.
Or they choose to take shortcuts – buying lesson plans and assignments, replacing thought-out assignments with easily gradable online tests, and using generative AI to speed up their grading.
That’s why I support millages, bonds, and whatever strategies we can find to support school districts paying teachers appropriately and finding ways to increase release time to do their work during work hours.
Public education isn’t a perfect system, and I support any and all strategies to improve it. But step one is always to support the humans who form the backbone of education – the teachers. Because all of the teachers I know are too busy working to work.