Shortage of Teachers

The teacher shortage across the nation is getting more critical, following two years of an extended and mishandled pandemic which affected education in public schools significantly. Unions have made unreasonable demands for their teachers who did not want to teach in a classroom due to an irrational fear of death from a virus.

Some teachers quit because they refused to teach the divisive and racist critical race theory (CRT). Other teachers refused to be vaccinated against Covid-19. Students older than 12 were also forced to vaccinate against the highly ineffective Covid-19 injection to attend school and other school-related activities.

The teacher shortage is exacerbated by the license required by each state’s Department of Education in order to teach in public schools, even for seasoned teachers with a Ph.D. in a non-College of Education degree and a lot of years of experience teaching in higher education – they must have the approval of the vaunted Department of Education or else they are not qualified to teach.

Knowledge and content of a particular subject are not as important as a license. Due to the teacher shortage, licensed teachers are now teaching subjects they know nothing about.

The license, a piece of paper issued by each state, guarantees that the prospective teacher is good at making adorable and colorful bulletin boards and lesson plans - the paperwork with objectives must be completed, posted, and turned in to the administrators in a timely manner and placed on visible bulletin boards. Whether there is actual teaching and learning of those objectives in the classroom, that is a different story! And the students’ performance on standardized states proves the lack of learning.

The teaching profession has attracted students who had a harder time passing science and mathematics classes in college. Stronger math and science students were not interested in a College of Education degree because they knew that the pay was and still is lower when compared to employment with an Arts and Science degree.

Teaching has never been easy – it takes dedication, long hours, knowledge, and the pay is quite low. The school day never ends for a teacher at 4 p.m. The briefcase is full of papers to grade, lessons to plan, and reading materials to keep up with new developments, good or bad, required by the Department of Education.

I cannot imagine what must take place in most classrooms today! Judging by the woke teachers posting on TikTok, the situation in the elementary classrooms, with the most impressionable students, the teachers are bent on grooming kids into their depraved and delusional lifestyle. People with obvious mental issues oversee vulnerable kids.

Gone are the days when teachers were mostly positive role models, imperfect humans outside of the classroom. They came to class cleanly dressed, men were shaven, cared for their appearance, respected their students, and taught them how to be respectful to adults and peers alike.

Parents were sure that their kids would be safe in the classroom, would learn to read, write, do basic mathematics, home economics, learn life-long lessons of civics and citizenship, and skills applicable throughout adulthood.

Students were able to tell how many states form the United States, what the capital is, knew geography and history, the Constitution, their presidents, could write a cogent paragraph in proper and correctly spelled English, and knew their math tables.

Now students must spend time with social activism, social justice, learning Common Core math which reduces their performance on standardized tests even more; they must read sexually explicit stories, so explicit that the boards of education do not allow parents at meetings to read aloud the content of their children’s homework assigned by teachers following the Common Core curriculum.

Less than two decades ago, even without a college degree, high school graduates could read, write, do basic math, cook, balance checkbooks, could do simple math in their heads without a calculator, knew basic geography, basic history of their country, how to survive, fix a flat tire, change the oil in cars, cook, sew, learn useful skills in shop classes, raise a family, understood clearly the two biological sexes, and be respectful of life, born and unborn, and be generous and kind to others.

At the turn of the twentieth century, eighth graders could pass a difficult exam which most high school and college graduates today would be hard-pressed to even score in the lower fiftieth percentile.

In 2022, the pink haired, nose-ringed, lip-ringed, and heavily tattooed woke teachers are upset because they are not allowed to talk to their kindergarten and elementary school students about their sex partners, graphic sexual orientations, being transgender, and other immoralities. The mental and sexual baggage is so depraved that one wonders what is going to happen to our future generations exposed to such perversions in the classroom, often without parental knowledge.

It used to shock us when people with criminal records, liars, pedophiles, and habitual drunks became teachers and counselors in our public schools. Teachers who had sex with their underage students made headlines for months and years and they went to prison for their crimes against minors.

It was shocking to see college professors have steamy affairs with their students, yet nobody punished them in any way – liberals rolled their eyes and said, it was consensual sex. Never mind that the issues of professorial ethics and sexual harassment were not addressed.

It is now seen as tame for a public-school administrator to invite an imam to speak to students about the wonders of Islam shortly before his son and fiancé were caught trying to join ISIS. What exactly would American Christian students learn from such a speech that the attendance was made mandatory? And when did proselytizing for a non-Christian religion became compulsory in public schools? Liberals have been telling us for decades now that we cannot mix religion with public schools - we must be politically correct.

There is a shortage of teachers in our public schools because they have been habituated to “teach” from home in front of a computer and refuse to be in the classroom; they are afraid of a virus and want to wear a mask in perpetuity.

There is a shortage of teachers because the best, the brightest, and the most knowledgeable among them chose to leave the profession and pursue other ways to earn a living. With notable exceptions of the most dedicated and stellar teachers, the worst and the least prepared among the licensed ones chose to stay – they have few other avenues of employment.

There is a shortage of teachers because student discipline and behavioral issues caused by bad parenting or lack thereof have driven many teachers to renounce the profession. Administrators expected them to be first responders, doctors, nurses, counselors, and social workers, and to give students passing grades even though they had not earned them.

If you ask the National Education Association, the teacher shortage in all states can be explained by underfunding, poverty, and inequality. “Policymakers must take action to fix the underlying issues – underfunding, poverty, and inequality – that have dug us into the deep hole that we’re now in.” Teachers view the classrooms as “dangerous,” following the pandemic. “Teachers often have master’s degrees, even doctorate degrees, and yet they earn far less than other college graduates.” The Teacher Shortage Can Be Addressed — With Key Changes | NEA

The deep societal divide pushed daily by the mainstream media and Democrat politicians via their divisive policies is reflected in the classrooms. “Poverty, segregation, and inequality are huge issues, deeply embedded in American societies, and manifested in classrooms. Students come to school unprepared to learn, hungry or sick; parents have life circumstances that make it difficult for them to engage in their children’s learning; teachers’ safety and mental health is threatened.” The Teacher Shortage Can Be Addressed — With Key Changes | NEA

Societal issues reflect the sad reality that young generations now are not ready to be parents, have not learned how to be responsible adults themselves and are still relying on their parents for their survival. Some are hooked on drugs, alcohol, and on their smart phones, constantly taking selfies to post on TikTok, hoping that they will become the next Internet “influencer.”

Their role models are immature, entitled, narcissistic and whiny individuals, and are thus not ready to be parents. The main ingredient of a successful adult, personal responsibility, has never crossed their paths and lips. And their wild and misbehaved children, unfortunately, are now in the classrooms. Why would a low paid teacher deal with such parents and their children, in addition to teaching them?

Sadly, as a profession, teachers, good or bad, command little respect from society as a whole, even though they are the ones shaping America’s future by virtue of having your children’s ears and minds longer than any parent.