Choice words for trustee Mettler
| Wednesday, Jul 01 2009 09:07 PM
Last Updated Wednesday, Jul 01 2009 09:07 PM
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Appalled at pay cut
As a Republican and a Christian, I am appalled at the suggestion by Kern High School District board member Ken Mettler that teachers take a 5 percent pay cut. He's obviously out of touch with reality and clearly only thinking about himself and his higher aspirations for office.
I understand the KHSD has in excess of $50 million in reserve. If they're saving it for a rainy day, guess what? It's pouring! The hypocrisy also bothers me. Is Mettler donating 5 percent of his income to the district? After all, it's all about the students and the taxpayers. Why are teachers' salaries posted on the KHSD website but administrators' salaries and trustees' benefits are not?
I invite Mettler to fill my shoes for one day. First, he will need to develop an interesting and compelling lesson plan that is aligned with the state standards, walk into my classroom with 43 students, try to teach while also being a disciplinarian in the classroom, take attendance, record tardies, return parents' e-mails, deal with the administration. Then, after school, on his own time and own dime, he can make calls home to parents who blame him for all of their students' problems. He can purchase tissues, hand sanitizer, notebooks, pencils and more for students who do not come prepared to class. Then, finally, he can go home to grade papers and work on the next day's lesson.
Then, Mettler can ask me to take a pay cut. He values students? Then prove it and do your job.
ROBYN KILPATRICK
Bakersfield
Teachers have sacrificed
I would like to address Ken Mettler's suggestion that teachers volunteer to take a 5 percent pay cut over the next three years. Mettler does not seem to realize that teachers have already lost at least that much in supplemental programs this year alone.
As a 20-year veteran teacher in KHSD, I have been involved in the Beginning Teacher Support and Assessment Program for the past five years. I received a $3,000-a-year stipend for supporting teachers in their first two years of teaching. Guess what -- no new teachers, no BTSA stipend.
I applied for summer school to help supplement the month of August, for which teachers are not paid. Guess what -- even as a 20-year veteran, I didn't get hired. This was a loss of approximately $2,500, assuming I only taught three weeks. Other teachers have depended on these and other program supplements, which are no longer funded, to make up for the 12th month we are not paid.
At the same time, principals' budgets have already been slashed, causing teachers to spend even more of their own money to get the basic supplies needed to run their classrooms. Guess what -- we have already had a pay cut of 5 percent, if not more!
While Mettler's suggestion is theoretically a good one, I must say, respectfully, he doesn't know the sacrifices we teachers have already made.
LORRAINE LALONDE
Bakersfield
Trustees should pony up
In regards to local school boards and their dwindling budgets: Maybe all trustees should forgo their rather lucrative health insurance benefits to lighten the load on the budget crisis. I would applaud any trustee who is currently doing so, and I would encourage others to consider doing so in these extraordinary times.
MATTHEW C. CLARK
Bakersfield
Not helping the kids
Ken Mettler offers hope to those panicked JV sports advocates and suggests that maybe they can postpone the sports cuts for a year if teachers take a pay cut (since other public servants have taken cuts and he feels it would only be fair for teachers to take their fair share).
Not surprising that Mettler is playing the political game to the tee. What he fails to mention is that in the past, teachers haven't taken the same COLA that the other public unions have; the money has been placed in reserves for "hard times." The district has a large reserve set aside for "rainy days."
Teachers are already going to be taking an indirect pay cut because they will be teaching more students, picking up more responsibilities and supervising more activities simply because there are going to be less teachers on each campus (more work, same money, equals pay cut).
It doesn't matter to Mettler, however. He is going to do whatever gets him the most political push. He has always stirred the pot and seems to enjoy being in an adversarial position, probably because it keeps him in the news. It's time for him to get out of the education game, he's not helping the kids.
CATHY ADAMS
Bakersfield
Mettler at it again
Ken Mettler continues to show he is a shameless politician hungry for his next office, not a diligent school board member committed to what is best for the students. His decision to make public statements outside the negotiation process doesn't make him a good steward of tax payers' dollars as he would contend: It makes him a bully trying to pick a fight. We're not interested.
As the elected officers of the district's Teachers Association, my board and I have the responsibility of overseeing negotiations for the district's more than 1,600 teachers. The District's elected school board members have the same responsibility to the voters that put them into office. Of the 11 people given this duty for both sides, only Mettler has deliberately tried to undermine negotiations. We think the public deserves better.
The District and the Teachers Association have a 30-year-plus history negotiating contracts that both sides believe represented fair settlements. This history has served both the district's teachers and the community well, resulting in teachers who are happy with where they work and a community that gets the best of our labors.
Study after study has shown the most important investment a school district can make to improve student academic achievement is in motivated, engaging teachers. Mettler needs to get his priorities straight and commit himself to respecting the hard-working people who have dedicated their lives to educating this community's children. Our livelihood is not campaign fodder for his next office.
MITCH OLSON
President, Kern High School Teachers Association
Bakersfield
Do I take a 2nd job?
I can't believe that Ken Mettler is asking teachers to step up and take a 5 percent pay cut. I am sure that teachers are among the lowest-paid public employees, and now we are expected to give up our pay. We (teachers) will still have to buy gas and food, which continue to go up, and pay our mortgages, for those of us with a house. What about single, one-income teachers like me? What does he suggest I do, get a second job at McDonalds?
I have a suggestion for Mettler: Why doesn't he and the other school district trustees across Kern County give up their medical benefits (which are better than mine), their stipends, and all of the other perks? Then he can come to me and ask me to give up my salary. Otherwise, shut up.
THERESE E. MACY
Bakersfield
