Teachers

The Banneker School Legacy Committee of Catonsville, known as the Banneker Reunion Committee of Catonsville, enjoyed a three-day weekend Sept. 23-25 with students, who attended or graduated from Banneker. Our vision is to empower and preserve our community. Our mission is to locate and preserve historical African-American landmarks, recognizing those who contributed to maintaining the legacy of Catonsville history. Our theme is "Preserving the past to ensure the future.

Now that the teachers have ratified their union contract that implements pay for performance ( "City teachers OK landmark pact," Nov. 18), what about the other two parties to the educational contract, the students and the parents? Where is the contract that would implement some form of punishment on the students that do not perform? Where is the contract that would penalize the parents if their darling sons and daughters do not do the assigned homework, disrupt classrooms, skip school, and do not put forth 110 percent effort to be educated?

I am a teacher at Fallston High School, and I read in the newspaper about the recent work-to-rule action at Bel Air High School. Last Thursday afternoon, teachers at Fallston High School as well as other schools across the county decided to adopt a similar action. Friday morning at Fallston High School, approximately 40 teachers met outside the school and walked in together at exactly 7 a.m.. At 2:20 p.m., we met in front of the main office and marched out together. This action included teachers who are members of the HCEA (our local education association or union)

Harford County teachers are confused. They were getting bonuses. Now they're not. They're not totally sure why they didn't get the $625 Harford County Executive David Craig proposed for them, and gave to all Harford County employees except those represented by the Harford County Education Association. In the end, however, what the teachers are sure of is they would prefer the one-time bonus to the nothing that they're getting. While few teachers are commenting publicly, many behind the scenes are chastising HCEA President Randy Cerveny for making the bonuses political when they should be seen for what they were intended - a one-time gift.

"You have reached the homework hot line. Sorry, but the teachers who normally handle the phone have been furloughed. Please call Roger Hayden to express your concerns."For a short while yesterday, before a caller complained, that was the message recorded to greet students who phoned the homework help-line the Teachers Association of Baltimore County runs. A lesson in diplomacy it was not.Many Baltimore County teachers are depressed, wtih good reason. They're facing essentially the third straight year without any pay raise.

I recently joined a fitness club in Baltimore and was thrilled to learn that there was a $20-a-month membership fee reduction for educators. Then I found out the truth: teachers got the corporate rate. I have worked as a full-time professor at a small liberal arts college in Maryland for 13 years now. I love my job — the students, the autonomy, campus life, summer breaks and whole semesters off for research and writing. Indeed, I could not imagine a profession better suited to my unconventional interests, not to mention work habits which require discipline, but on one's own schedule.

IT HAPPENS every spring.As sure as robins eat worms, somebody bemoans the fact that baseball players make a lot more money than teachers. This is a pitch that's so fat that conservatives fall all over each other getting to the plate to knock it out of the park.They ask: When did 50,000 people ever pay good money to watch a bunch of teachers teach? Why, those players have valuable talent. That talent, one commentator said recently, actually makes teachers possible. See, the players draw fans, creating a taxable profit for team owners, and jobs for groundskeepers, hot dog vendors, etc., and all those people pay taxes on the money they earn, and it's all those taxes that pay the teachers.

When you think of superheroes, you might imagine those fellows in tights flying and leaping through the air. Or maybe you think of police officers, firefighters and servicemen and women who risk their lives to protect us. But I'd like to nominate another group of people -- those brave men and women who teach Maryland tweens about human sexuality. In Baltimore County, the fifth-grade teachers spend the last couple of weeks of the school year teaching kids about sexually transmitted diseases, HIV/AIDS and basic information about how to care for their changing bodies.

Chicago. -- Congress is rightly acting to have the laws it enacts for others apply to itself. By the same admirable principle, teachers should submit to what they prescribe for others -- tests.For years teachers have been truants when it came to testing their own knowledge of the subjects they teach.When Governor Bill Clinton tried to get Arkansas teachers to take qualifying exams, the teachers' union fought him in strident ways that only Hillary Rodham Clinton finally overcame with a patient campaign of public education.

Is gubernatorial candidate Parris Glendening trying to curry favor with teachers by criticizing aspects of the Schaefer administration's public school reforms?Some of his Democratic opponents think so. And, indeed, the Prince George's County Executive's criticism of these much-needed reforms has paid off: the Maryland State Teachers Association voted to give its influential endorsement to Mr. Glendening.But at what cost?Efforts by the State Board of Education and School Superintendent Nancy Grasmick to make students, teachers and schools accountable for meeting specific standards of achievement must go forward.