Parker Live News from the Parker Strip since 2009.
Blake Primary School teachers staged a “Walk-In” today to show support for the “Red for Ed” movement in Arizona, showing solidarity with the statewide movement to increase teacher salaries in Arizona.
The state’s teachers are among the lowest-paid in the nation. Adjusted for local cost of living, federal figures show Arizona elementary teachers rank 49th in earnings and high school teachers 48th.
Arizona Educators United is a grassroots organization with a reported 40,000 members. They say the state is spending nearly $1 billion a year less on schools than before the Great Recession. Their stated goal is to ensure that students have access to highly qualified and experienced teachers, that educators are compensated fairly, and to improve the educational environment in the state of Arizona.
I’m a Blake alumnus & I stand with you! ????????
I think it’s time parents started paying more for there childrens education. I can understand the social good of the state using taxes to pay teachers salaries…but to a point. Parents more and more take advantage of school as some sort of free daycare. I’m all for teachers getting paid more, get $3 a day from your students & there’s your 20% raise.
Standing up as a collective to push for higher pay is commendable but c’mon, everyone knows that teachers get paid little comparatively to other careers.
I’d respect your movement more if there was some real common sense approach to it. A catchy logo & staging walk out/ins just make you look self absorbed & unaware of the reality that teachers wages have always sucked and always will unless parents foot more of the bill. Internet backed, hashtag movements are a cliche… get a different career or write some legislation
49th out of 50th, sounds about right for AZ. Disgrace. And then all these same people will tell you they can’t find any good candidates for work.
What does “walk in” mean?
It’s a less heavy-handed alternative to a walk-out. From AZCentral:
“For now, teachers and supporters ‘walk-in’ by coming together in front of schools before class to protest low pay and school funding shortfalls. The group then walks into school together in a show of unity.”
For those that teachers salaries have always sucked that is not true. Teachers up till the 90’s earned good money and schools were fully funded by the state. It has only been in the last 18 years that teachers salaries were no longer a living wage. Don’t believe me I have 4 children ages 30,28,27,18 and I am raising my granddaughter. My older kids only needed new backpacks,binders,3 ring paper, and pechi folders for school supplies. My 18 year old needed those plus a ream of copy paper, her own crayons, pencils,pens, markers, chalk (chalk not for her but for her teachers). Now my granddaughter has to supply all this plus Kleenex,glue sticks not just 1 package but 3 , notebooks (and we are not talking 1 but 6 1” and 3 5 subjects) and this all goes to the classroom. At the end of year anything not used stays with the class. So for anyone saying parents need to pay for public school we already are plus paying our taxes.
“If your plan is for one year, plant rice. If your plan is for ten years, plant trees. If your plan is for one hundred years, educate children.” – Confucius
The teachers at Blake are amazing!!!
And this year at Wallace my son has an awesome teacher!
Yogi Berra, you picked a good alias. The real Yogi Berra was famous for saying stupid $#%& too.
@nicole… comparatively, yes 18yrs ago teachers salaries were better & I could say the opposite for 28yrs ago. I’m close to forty, my mother was a teacher & many friends were & still are so the constant sob story of I gotta buy this & I gotta buy that. Everyone knows that the fact is parents aren’t doing there job & purchasing what their kid needs. Sorry but if you have kids in school, you should pay more in taxes & don’t even get me started on how the state purposely allows mismanagement in the districts in order to justify their budget shortcomings by pandering to PACs & special interest groups. You want more money for teachers? Then do some common sense legislation like what Kevin McCormick is proposing for AZ.
@randyhartless…you should talk with your blithering comments all the time.
@nicole… What’s that tax write-off by the way for a kid for a year, 2k? Oh & don’t forget all the supplies for school. Gimme a break, most people make money around here just by having kids & that’s part of the problem too. I also think that the 35k I paid in taxes this year fully entitles me to question the system & put my opinion out there. How many kids do you have? How much did you pay in? How would you like to be forced to subsidize things for me without a choice or even voice?
Thanks for that, Yogi. I RARELY comment on here so you truly have no basis for your statement. Plus, I at least have enough sack to use my real name. If I had a moniker like yours I’d be spouting all sorts of idiocy, too. Keep it real, brother.
And just for clarity, the definition of “blithering” is “Talking foolishly.” Perhaps the lady man doth protest too much, me thinks.
32K starting for 9 month a year job translates to 42K year fresh out of college. Not bad for low cost area like La Paz County. Cops and most county fulltime jobs start off lower………