Math teachers only one chapter ahead of students

Pay really depends on which state u teach in. I'm a NYC public school teacher. I teach 2 grade. I make about $60,000 a year and I've only been a teacher for 2 years. My first year my starting salary was $55,ooo. To work about 10 months out of the year and make $60,000 I don't think that's bad. Also a big misconception is that teachers get paid more in private schools. WRONG in NYC they get paid ALOT less and are ALOT less qualified they only need a BA 4 yr degree. In NYC u need a Master's degree to teach Kindergarten. As far as not being qualified it's gotten to be insane many are overqualified. I'm sorry u do not need a PHD in Math to teach addition and subtraction to 7 year olds. After all we are teaching not building a nuclear bomb. A big problem though is the parents many r illiterate themselves or don't want to be bothered helping their kids. Teachers and schools can't and shldn't be expected to do everything. A mom told me once it was MY responsibility NOT hers to make sure her kid did his homework b/c anything to do with school was not her problem but mine. How is this possible when HW is done at home ? Does the kid pack me up in his school bag and take me home with the rest of his books? It starts at home and therein lies the problem. If u don't want to take care of kids DON'T HAVE THEM!!! We don't want ur kids and apparently neither do u. Yet these r the same people that have a new baby year after year.

i have been there... i have had math teachers that show up half an hour late teach for 15 minutes and let us go. this is in college.

i was outsmarting my teachers ever since i was in 7th grade. nothing new here

Teachers are unsung heroes, they are underpaid and understaffed. When they are assigning higher math to teachers that have not studied such subjects, then the whole school suffers.

haha oh the irony.

Would you take an underpaid and overworked position at an inner city Highschool where half the job is babysitting if you had an advanced degree in mathematics?

Only the selfless ones do and there aren't a lot of them.

It's embarrassing that our country went from setting the curve for international education standards to being the laughing stock. Kids in America do not think critically at all when compared to international students.

That's OK, in high school I often found myself explaining things to the math teacher.

I'm in 9th grade and sometimes we'll even get English teachers subbing for our math classes.

raise teachers' salaries

Teachers don't teach to get paid they do it because they happen to enjoy it. Our educational system is being to fail slowly due to the need for better test scores. We need to stop spending more time on getting the best test schools in the world and start spending more time on educating the kids.

maybe if we paid teachers more, it would attract higher quality minds...

This is why these government schools are failing the heirs to this nation. Complete, utter apathy and un-education. Is this The United States of Idiocracy?

Tayllerand...absolutely true.

I have a friend who happens to be a math teacher in a district with a large minority (and bi-lingual) population.

Those kids are more interested in movies, video games etc... Some of them were complaining one day about not "getting it" (the assignment) but they were spouting off lines from Superbad left and right and knew exactly what happened on the latest episode of A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila.

They aren't held to a higher level of expectation. Something that should start with their parents.

i'm willing to bet that there's a good number of math classes in which the students are one chapter ahead of the teacher.

The more you dumb down a nation the better will be to manipulate.
People in america are hook up to the TV and thats the only thing they want to see : American Idol,Fox channel,CNN ,Oprah ,etc.
People are brain wash everytime the sit in front of the tv, thats why they dont want to learn anything .
TV is like a drug ,stop watching the TV for a week and youll see the difference.
Here in america people spend hours watching the freaking tube , parents sit their kids in front of the tv and want the TV to be like a nanny.

I live in a county in florida who is so desperate for teachers that they advertise for substitute teachers in the newpaper. Thier only requirement for the job, is that applicants be at least 18, and have a highschool diploma or a GED. No wonder our kids are getting such a poor education. Real college educated teachers are so disrespected and underpaid that they have turned to teaching in the private sector, leaving public school students out of luck in many cases.... Much respect to teachers who serve in the public school systems. Thankyou.

That's quite shocking. They call this "out-of-field teaching" and according to the report, it happens for a few reasons:
"Teachers are not to blame for out-of-field assignments. Sometimes the problem is rooted in state or local teacher shortages or inadequate preparation of available teachers. But it turns out that out-of-field teaching is rampant even in disciplines in which shortages do not exist and in states with a surplus of teachers for available vacancies in all fields. Often, the problem occurs simply because of poor planning or administrative convenience."
Click thru to a link to the full report on this page.