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loss of job

I have a lot of sympathy for the woman who wrote the following letter to the local Times:

Out with the new, in with the old

I'm an amazing teacher. I'm young, vibrant, love what I do each day and am knowledgeable about the best practices in education. In fact, my final evaluation, written by my principal, started with the line, "Jessica is one of the best teachers in this school."

Why am I writing to an editor then? On Monday, there will be a letter waiting for me at school -- a "Reduction in Force" letter. This letter means that next year I, along with hundreds of other young, vibrant teachers across Washington, will not have a job. The funny thing is we suspect we didn't get our letters on Friday because it was the last day of Teacher Appreciation Week.

Who are the people replacing us? They are the people with far more experience -- try 35-plus years. They are the people who are tired, who complain around the lunch table about their rowdy classes, the people who teach using the "best practices" from 1985. These are the teachers who will be teaching our children next year.

Me, I'm crossing my fingers that I'll hear back about an application I put in at Nordstrom. I hear those employee discounts are pretty great.

-- Jessica Hed ges, Ever ett

I've heard many teachers are opposed to performance-linked pay. This is ridiculous to me. Of course pay should be performance-linked! And of course the methods used for evaluation won't be 100% fair - but life isn't fair, and judging who gets fired based on experience only, and how much people get paid also on experience is crazy.

6:59 p.m. - May. 11, 2009

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the news

The local media went into a frenzy when a local supposedly died of sw*ine flu. It's been all over the news, including interrupting regular TV shows to alert the citizen lest they need to pack their bags and quickly leave the state. Now, apparently the family of the deceased is insisting that he didn't die of sw*ine flu. Fun.

And this. What a messed up story. I always have sympathy for the teen mothers, no matter what they've done. The media line is one of shock and horror - how could a mother kill her child?? To me, the answer is obvious. Fear, shock and trauma.

8:36 a.m. - May. 11, 2009