LAUSD chief tells unions to accept pay cuts, furloughs, or face...

JoeReader wrote:

More LAUSD Kabuki theatre...the wildly inflated # of RIF notices...the Unions will then break out the red shirts and the chants/protests around Beaudry...and finally, after all the crying and wailing, a few hundred layoffs max...the DBreeze shouldn't even report on this nonsense.
Next up: look for a massive parcell tax proposal to pay for bloated salaries/pensions/beaurocracy.

I doubt that any increase in a parcel tax would last court challenges. Voter approved bonds have usually been passed by apathetic voters who push them through without really knowing enough about them.

Voters think school bonds are the solution, but they still have to pay the principle and interest and that adds up to real money.

Beginning in late 1978, Californian began paying for the schools they now have. While I understand other homeowners' wishes to have their property taxes limited, they just didn't realize what the future held in store for their children and their children's children.

I voted NO on Prop. 13 because I saw the threat to education all over California. It came to pass years ago and it continues its slide down the slippery slope oiled by voters 31 years ago.

So the story continues; They voted for it. They hate the problems with the schools. They won't learn from their mistakes. Now, we all have to deal with it.

I am currently employed by the LAUSD in the Maintenence and Operations department which is a fancy way of saying the custodial staff, and cuting my salary by 12% plus the 10% the goverment is going to be taking is really leaving me with nothing.

Fire Cortines!!!!!! He's just following his puppet master Villaraigosa and using the the same tactic/threat the city took on it's employees. Teachers and unions need to stand up to his BS and make him find a better way out of the mess, otherwise he'll make it worse.

SEIU- What a joke. Talk about corrupt. Makes ACORN look decent.

Were all f--cked wrote:

<quoted text>
Why would a teacher take minimum wage for their job when they could get more working somewhere else? Furlough days are tolerable - but not a 12% cut to salary.

Hey, here is an idea: if they can make more someplace else, let them GO someplace else!!!! The teachers whine and moan endlessly about how miserable their jobs are. They are underpaid overworked and generally have it tougher then a nickel steak. When lay offs roll around you CAN NOT get rid of them. It would seem a chance to take their oh so much in demand skills into the REAL world and get a REAL job and get the BIG bucks would be just the ticket. The teachers are like barnacles, you have to scrape them off.

The district pays brewer $500,000 after he decided to QUIT and not honor his contract, and now they want hard working teachers to take a 12% pay cut! Cortines can go to hell!

Vic wrote:

<quoted text> Hey, here is an idea: if they can make more someplace else, let them GO someplace else!!!! The teachers whine and moan endlessly about how miserable their jobs are. They are underpaid overworked and generally have it tougher then a nickel steak. When lay offs roll around you CAN NOT get rid of them. It would seem a chance to take their oh so much in demand skills into the REAL world and get a REAL job and get the BIG bucks would be just the ticket. The teachers are like barnacles, you have to scrape them off.

Hey Vic you have no clue as to what you are saying. I would gladly give you a thousand dollars of my own money if you could go into my classroom and efficiently teach my class for ONE day! Man, you wouldn't even last an hour! People think teaching is so easy, but it must not that easy or else you would be doing it too! Think about that Vic the dick(head)!

As I have said in the past, and as a teacher in LAUSD, there is one solution that is not looked at: break up LAUSD. The district is too large to be run effectively, and corruption is rampant. I like how the school board and Cortines are not included in the area of pay cuts because what would Cortines do if he had to pay for his own transportation or housing? What would the board do without their LAUSD paid blackberries. All one has to do is look at the top of the city (Villaraigosa) and see how far his hand extends. Cortines and the board are his lap puppies and will only go along with what he says. They should get a backbone and do what is right.

Now, as for the teachers, the 12% cut in pay is ridiculous. Already in CA, it is difficult for 2 teachers to live on their salaries with a family and a decent house in a decent area. There is a lot more that can be cut (bussing out of area kids) rather than the salary. I know change is needed and both sides do not have the correct answer. All UTLA will say is STRIKE (like the boy who cried wolf) and the district will say "Layoffs". Personally, I am tired of it, but think charter schools with their mix of "teach our belief and ideologies" are worse off than LAUSD.

So break the district up, this way Villaraigosa can run the schools in the downtown area and not mess with the Harbor area.

If anyone should take a 12% pay cut it should be the administrators. Furlough days seem more reasonable. Get parents to help out since they are so concerned about their children's free education. Sacrifice has to come from all sides. Eliminate all those programs to provide free breakfast for children at the schools. That's a parents responsibility. Put more responsibility on the parents for their children's welfare. Why do so many people think all these things should be free, free free? No free lunch....

UTLA stop supporting teachers who are relieve of duties because of drug use, harassment, etc. those teachers take away from what you good teachers do. you lose money on those pathetic instructors who do not have the interests and trust we parents give to them when our children come to classes. invest your monies into good teachers and cut off the parasites. So stop protecting ineptitude and teachers abusing the system...same goes for administration...how can a recent principal from gardena high under his leadership fail to bring up testing scores and motivate his own campus be promoted to head projects and district to bring up low academic achievement schools. how can an administrator be in charge of an important role and mission to improve our schools when he cannot promote improvement in a great school...where he came from...saving money is not the problem in our school district...it is having the leadership to cut out unnecessary garbage within...

Vic Basher wrote:

<quoted text>
Hey Vic you have no clue as to what you are saying. I would gladly give you a thousand dollars of my own money if you could go into my classroom and efficiently teach my class for ONE day! Man, you wouldn't even last an hour! People think teaching is so easy, but it must not that easy or else you would be doing it too! Think about that Vic the dick(head)!

The taxpayers already pay about a thousand dollars a day for you not to teach your class efficiently, but effectively. If the objective were efficiency, your classroom size would likely double with no proportionate loss in effectiveness. Vic had fun making a real cornball of a post and then you write something as corny.

Vic Basher wrote:

<quoted text>
Hey Vic you have no clue as to what you are saying. I would gladly give you a thousand dollars of my own money if you could go into my classroom and efficiently teach my class for ONE day! Man, you wouldn't even last an hour! People think teaching is so easy, but it must not that easy or else you would be doing it too! Think about that Vic the dick(head)!

Thanks you so much for proving my point! The original questions stands "If teaching is such a horrible horrible job why is it so hard to get ANY ONE to quit?". You can bash and call me names all you like, I expect this anytime anyone says anything negative about the teachers. Teachers cannot stand having their little kingdoms questioned. You seem to be a foul mouth bunch as a rule. If you have it so hard take your "in demand" skills into the real world, see how teaching looks from there. I hope you do not teach my kids, I want them taught my a professional, which you clearly are not.

Ok Cortines, administrators make twice as much as teachers so you take a 24 percent cut and we'll consider a 12 percent cut. That is every staff memeber at beaudry, every, accountant, lawyer, consultant, and overpaid principal in LAUSD. Gee if that happened maybe teachers wouldn't have to take a cut at all. You're huge 6 figure salary isn't deserved if all you can come up with is a 12 percent salary cut. You don't deserve your salary, if all you can do is butcher teachers and schools. Get creative man, hold fund raisers, on the income tax form ask to put a box for volunteer education donations, ask the community to come up with creative ideas to help schools. Don't just butcher the people who work for so hard for too little already. You don't deserve th title of leader if you don't help the people God gave you to lead.

Ah Vic, teachers are givers, not takers they love to help, to serve to inspire, and aren't necessariy interested in huge salaries, like say Bankers, and the greedy corporate types who took down our economy. We only ask to be given enough to live on, so we can have the joy of teaching and helping others. Someone like you, who doesn't have that conciousness, who is a rather ungenerous, mean spirited kind of guy couldn't understand that. We would appreciate it if the budget would stop be balanced on our backs, we do a heck of a job, the last bastions of morality in our schools, and we deserve respect and a decent wage. Whether you believe this or not is of no consequence, you've never walked in our shoes, done our job, or taken 6 years of university course work to be shoved onto the street by a govenor who made millions making trashy foul mouthed movies, that no kid should ever watch. Oh and you'd be surprised how many teachers gave up working for greedy banks and corporations so they could serve and help others. They are happy, most teachers are very happy with the job, but the lack of respect, and the lack of enough money to live one, is something we have to stand up and fight out of self respect, and decency. Something else you wouldn't understand.

julie wrote:

Ah Vic, teachers are givers, not takers they love to help, to serve to inspire, and aren't necessariy interested in huge salaries, like say Bankers, and the greedy corporate types who took down our economy. We only ask to be given enough to live on, so we can have the joy of teaching and helping others. Someone like you, who doesn't have that conciousness, who is a rather ungenerous, mean spirited kind of guy couldn't understand that. We would appreciate it if the budget would stop be balanced on our backs, we do a heck of a job, the last bastions of morality in our schools, and we deserve respect and a decent wage. Whether you believe this or not is of no consequence, you've never walked in our shoes, done our job, or taken 6 years of university course work to be shoved onto the street by a govenor who made millions making trashy foul mouthed movies, that no kid should ever watch. Oh and you'd be surprised how many teachers gave up working for greedy banks and corporations so they could serve and help others. They are happy, most teachers are very happy with the job, but the lack of respect, and the lack of enough money to live one, is something we have to stand up and fight out of self respect, and decency. Something else you wouldn't understand.

let's see, whiny, self righteous attitude, check. Absolute intolerance of any criticism, check. Wallowing in self pity, check. Yeah, you are a teacher all right, Julie, even without the foul mouth most teachers seem to display. One of those God like creatures that us mere mortals can even presume to understand. Every time I have opened my mouth to question a teacher I have been attacked, called vile names, had my character impugned and generally been made out to be a horrible person unworthy a teachers blessings. I have two questions Julie, why do teachers seems to hold themselves above ANY criticism? If the job is sooooo lousy why don't they quit in droves? Can not seem to get those questions answered! Eagerly awaiting your answers.

Eliminating ignorance is no easy task, as vic proves with each of his one-dimensional posts. But that is what teachers do every day in a myriad of ways. We do not ask where a child comes from, or judge them because of the color of their skin or the fact that they are surfing from one rundown apartment to crashing with their relatives in another overcrowded and rundown apartment. We give them safety, we give them knowledge, when they are hungry I even shell out to buy them some food.
People like vic have given up on the youth of our nation. Apparently he would be happy with an uneducated subclass that he and his ilk can continue to exploit or send to jail. This type of enforced ignorance will only crush us.
Teachers will not let that happen.
That is why we should get paid and not have our meager wages cut. That is why charters and privatization signify the collapse of American education. Here is an idea that actually might work: let's take few hundred billion from the Pentagon (who cannot seem to win any wars anyways, except for Grenada) and use it to make the future of our nation and the education of our children better.

exile the 1 percent wrote:

Eliminating ignorance is no easy task, as vic proves with each of his one-dimensional posts. But that is what teachers do every day in a myriad of ways. We do not ask where a child comes from, or judge them because of the color of their skin or the fact that they are surfing from one rundown apartment to crashing with their relatives in another overcrowded and rundown apartment. We give them safety, we give them knowledge, when they are hungry I even shell out to buy them some food.
People like vic have given up on the youth of our nation. Apparently he would be happy with an uneducated subclass that he and his ilk can continue to exploit or send to jail. This type of enforced ignorance will only crush us.
Teachers will not let that happen.
That is why we should get paid and not have our meager wages cut. That is why charters and privatization signify the collapse of American education. Here is an idea that actually might work: let's take few hundred billion from the Pentagon (who cannot seem to win any wars anyways, except for Grenada) and use it to make the future of our nation and the education of our children better.

The above shows the kind of ego that strolls into the nation's class room every school day. The teachers see themselves as above it all. Anybody who DARES to question the nobility of the teachers is immediately attacked. Anybody who does see the divinity of the teaching profession is labeled as the lowest of scum bent only keeping people in ignorance and exploiting them. I saw this "you do not dare to judge me" attitude from the teachers when I was a student and I see it now. I WILL NOT be intimidated by the teachers or their unions, you people are NOT Gods. The teachers are crass cowards who hide behind the children of this country. "Give us what we want or your kid goes stupid".

Vic wrote:

<quoted text> The above shows the kind of ego that strolls into the nation's class room every school day. The teachers see themselves as above it all. Anybody who DARES to question the nobility of the teachers is immediately attacked. Anybody who does see the divinity of the teaching profession is labeled as the lowest of scum bent only keeping people in ignorance and exploiting them. I saw this "you do not dare to judge me" attitude from the teachers when I was a student and I see it now. I WILL NOT be intimidated by the teachers or their unions, you people are NOT Gods. The teachers are crass cowards who hide behind the children of this country. "Give us what we want or your kid goes stupid".

I'm sorry you had such a bad experience in school. Too often the teachers do not realize the power of their words. For some reason you were not well liked. I hope you got the counseling you needed. You really should visit you childrens schools. Volunteer to work in the classroom one day a week... even for half a day! You should not be judging all teachers like the ones who did not like you.

feels bad for vic wrote:

<quoted text>
You should not be judging all teachers like the ones who did not like you.

Pretty good. But, if you had only erased the rest of your post and if you had not used a passive verb,you could have received a better review.

Vic wrote:

<quoted text> let's see, whiny, self righteous attitude, check. Absolute intolerance of any criticism, check. Wallowing in self pity, check. Yeah, you are a teacher all right, Julie, even without the foul mouth most teachers seem to display. One of those God like creatures that us mere mortals can even presume to understand. Every time I have opened my mouth to question a teacher I have been attacked, called vile names, had my character impugned and generally been made out to be a horrible person unworthy a teachers blessings. I have two questions Julie, why do teachers seems to hold themselves above ANY criticism? If the job is sooooo lousy why don't they quit in droves? Can not seem to get those questions answered! Eagerly awaiting your answers.

Vic, I am not a teacher nor have I bashed you so the blanket generalizations need to stop. Yes, I accept criticism from my administrators and use it to help me progress. However, uneducated criticism that is without merit I do not stand for. When a parent came in yelling at me and why I held his child less than 10 minutes after school (which was for a disciplinary reason since the child was fooling around and not on task and asked to get to work) the parent thought I was crazy. That type of criticism from that parent I do not stand for. They did not know what happen and even the child admitted to goofing around to the father. This parent had no merit to their argument and were angry that I had him wait for 7 minutes.

Second, I guess I am glutton for punishment and enjoy the challenge. I have gone from teaching ESL students one year, to GATE the next, then back to the lowest 20% of the school the following year. That is 3 separate ways of teaching, and uncountable modifications to make the curriculum challenging enough, but not too tough. I enjoy the challenge, and I enjoy watching the children succeed.

Now, in regards to the Cortines issue, why doesn't the [public ask him why LAUSD pays for his cell phone, housing and transportation. I will tell you this, Cortines is not living somewhere cheap or "Middle Class" (LAUSD officials housing is in the Pasadena hills). How about he moves "downtown" where he is in the heart of the action with his district. or maybe move him to Mar Vista, Carson, Wilmington, or South Gate? Oh wait those places are not good enough for him. What message does that send the public? So Cortines takes a cut, then the board, then all the lazy office staff in the district offices. Then we can look at the school sites.