Dr. Turner, this is no Teacher Shortage, it is a Teacher Flight from Insanity

 

Teacher shortage or is this teacher flight? 

Being from Jersey means you play until you fall, and if you get knocked down, you get back up and fight on. 

I am a 66-year-old-school teacher from Jersey. If you think I'm walking away? You don't know Jersey Boys. So, tune in on Friday 1/14/ at 11:AM on 103.5 FM for round 15 in the fight to save our public schools. 

From 2001 to 2022, I have watched some 2 plus trillion tax dollars spent on NCLB, RTTT CCSS, and ECSA, the most massive failing Public School Education Reforms in history. I have fought them every step of the way. Walked from Connecticut to DC twice, joined 2 Occupies of the United States Department of Education, marched several times on DC with Uniting to Save Our Schools and the Badass Teachers. March with Moral Mondays for Black Lives Matter because it is all connected. I sounded the Fire Alarm at America's Schoolhouse in December on the last broadcast. Our public education system is rightfully called a School to Prison Pipeline and is in danger of collapsing. 

Now, ask our policymakers, governors, and the United States Department of Education what they have? Trust me, it is more of the same failed policies, more testing, more for-profit charter schools, more school choice without equity scams.  

When I started 24 years at Central Connecticut State University. My teacher education courses were overflowing, and students were always at my door asking, please, Dr. Turner, let me into your course. 

2001 Then came No Child Left Behind, which reduced children to test scores. Classes were still full, but no one needed an override to be let in. Who wants to teach in a school where children are data points? 

2008 Then came Common Core State Standards, not created by teachers, but governors and testing company CEO(s). Who wants to teach standards written by non-educators? So, more students left.

2010 Next came Race to The Top. It promoted closing struggling local community schools. Not helping them but closing them down. Replacing them with for-profit Charter Schools. And non-elected school boards of education. After that, one-half of my students were gone. Who wants to teach to the test and thinks closing community schools is wise? So, the number kept falling.

2015 Then came the Every Child Succeeds Act, more of the same old same old failed Education Reforms. Who wants to teach in public schools led not by those teachers closest to children in the classroom? They keep leaving.

2019 Now comes COVID, and hundreds of billions of dollars were given to states to make schools safe, but teachers and parents have no clue where that money went. Who wants to teach in schools where there is no transparency in spending? Who thinks future teachers want to teach in a system that fails to fully fund our public schools? A system that spends more money on wealthy schools than poor schools? Who wants to teach in a system that fails to give teachers the resources and funding needed to make a difference?

2022 Come on up for the rising. This Jersey Boy is getting back up on Friday, and I won't be alone. I am bringing Dr. Julian Vasquez Heilig, Dr. of the School of Education University of Kentucky,
Dr. Denisha Jones, Director: Art of Teaching Program at Sarah Lawrence University, and Professor Cara Mulcahy, Author and Professor of Literacy, Elementary and Early Childhood Education at Central Connecticut State University. They are my A-Team, and we are fighting to save Teacher Education in America.

Get ready to hear us discuss; if this is a teacher shortage or a poor Education policy-driven flight from teaching.

Get My fight Song on, 

Dr. Jesse P. Turner 

Uniting to Save Our Schools 

Proud Badass Old School Teacher   

If you like to hear what tune inspired my morning walk today. It's Lulu singing To Sir With Love, with Sidney Poitier. > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EV1qmmMwc9M <

My wife left for work today

 

My wife left to teach this morning, worried about COVID spread and the children she teaches. She had no voice in their return face to face as Connecticut's positivity rate jumped over the 20% mark. She did what teachers everywhere are doing across Connecticut; she turned up, not because she thought it suitable for her students. She turned up because regardless of what the system throws at her, she turned up for her students, just like she has done for 20 years. She deserves better. Her students, colleagues, parents, and her community deserved better. I am the proud husband of one of the many teachers turning up every day for their students. I am not proud of policymakers and leadership that could not have waited another two weeks, Teachers are the first responders of our children, and leadership that does not listen to them is the wrong leadership. Respectfully,
Dr. Jesse P. Turner, whose university has chosen to go remote. Thank you to everyone turning up >

The boy brave enough to cry is the hero

 

English teachers teach "Points Of View".

I'm old enough to remember teachers who regularly hit their students. I remember things today's children would not believe.

 An old friend from Grammar School reached out on Facebook, we picked up right where we left off. He said do you remember 5th grade lining up outside school? Our teachers kept us in line until the bell rang. Remember that cruel old Bastard Mr. M? He would tell us boys to toughen up, prepare our arms, and he would punch us. He would hit our arm with all his might. Say don't you dare cry?  

He said he hated every day on that line, but one day. He said I remember that day. He hit me, and I cried; he called me a baby? Everyone laughed, but you called him a F---ing Bastard. And said, how about we all hit you. You put your arm around me and said to his face your not a teacher. You are just evil....then you put your arm out and said, gets your rocks off, Sir. Then all the boys put their arms out... You were brave enough to stand up to him. 

Jesse, strange as it may seem, that day is my only good school day. I read your posts about teaching regularly, never liked any of my elementary school teachers. However, I find great comfort in knowing you are not him. I think I would have enjoyed going to school with teachers like you. 

Finally, he said, remember that day? It ended the punching of arms. That day ended that sicko, and his punching. You did that. 

I said I did that for my brothers. Brothers who deserved real teachers. Besides, you did what we all wanted to do every day. We just didn't have the guts to cry. In my eyes David, you are the hero that ended the punching. You opened our eyes, and every kid and teacher saw him for what he was. Not a teacher, but a bully. 

I have set an empathy compass setting for my teaching. In some ways, Mr. M inspired me to not become another evil bully like him. 

Glad we connected again, and from where I stand, you were the hero who ended the punching,            Jesse, still a kid from the neighborhood

If you want to listen to the tune I listened on my walk in the rain this morning its "No Hard Feeling" by the Avett Brothers. > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFGs7HP15d4 <