school fundraisers

On Nov 29, 12:05Â*am, toypup wrote:
On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 20:41:16 -0800 (PST), Chris wrote:
On Nov 28, 11:05�pm, Ericka Kammerer wrote:
Donna Metler wrote:
"Ericka Kammerer" wrote in message
om...

Agreed. �However, as I said, it's certainly the case that
you can find tutors, academic support classes, test prep courses,
etc. all over the place and a whole lot of people are paying a lot
of money for them. �If you want to hire a tutor around here, you're
looking at $50+/hour for someone with any credentials, unless you
can work a deal with a friend. �And the tutors are working about
as many hours as they're willing to work.

And if you go to almost any of the established test prep/tutoring
businesses, that $50/hr tutor will make maybe
$12.00/hr.

Just because people pay a lot of money for a test prep class doesn't mean
the person teaching the class sees the money.

� � � � I understand that. �I was talking more about the
individual tutors around here. �There are organizations for
tutors here that are sort of like a clearinghouse for tutors.
You call them and tell them what you want, and they hook you
up with a few people who meet your criteria. �You interview,
decide whom you want, and pay the individual directly. �They
seem to start out around $50/hour and go up from there.

Best wishes,
Ericka- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

If it's an honest tutor, meaning reporting that income on taxes,
darned near half could go to taxes.

Everyone is taxed, not just teachers. Â*$50/hr is a good wage in most areas,
even after taxes.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Have you ever paid your own taxes as a self-employed person making
this awesome $50/hour rate AND carried overhead expenses? I have, and
depending on what tax bracket the gross income puts you in, almost
half can go taxes, whether you believe it or not. Usually at least
1/3, which is not the case for an employee. And no included medical
benefits, which happen to be astronomical when self-employed; no paid
vacations, if any vacation at all; no paid sick days, if any at all;
no maternity leave, FMLA, etc. An employer pays half of the SS and
Medicare expense, but when you are self-employed, you pay the whole
amount yourself...The self-employment tax rate is 15.3%. The rate
consists of two parts: 12.4% for social security (old-age, survivors,
and disability insurance) and 2.9% for Medicare (hospital insurance).

On Nov 29, 12:46�am, toto wrote:
On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 07:45:36 -0800 (PST), Beliavsky

wrote:
Therefore I don't think the pay of government workers
should be set according to a more generous system based on "fairness".

Teaching children is NOT the same kind of job as making widgets.

--
Dorothy

There is no sound, no cry in all the world
that can be heard unless someone listens ..

The Outer Limits

Of course! lol. I've heard many teachers refer to any other profession
on the planet as lowly, undeserving, and not-as-important positions;
hence, my dancing-monkey comments. As if worker B making that widget
isn't contributing to society on any level, especially considering
that *widget* could save or improve your life. Not everyone takes a
*lowly* widget-making job because that is all they can get. Rather,
the lowly widget-making worker is more than likely working in a hot
manufacturing shop in 100-degree temperatures with tendinitis and
arthritis in various joints, and it isn't stress-free either. But,
heck, they do get to not be annoyed by others during work time since
they are wearing ear plugs and safety goggles and can just be inside
their own head. lol. Most of them *teach* new trainees as well.

Again, effective time management/planning skills would be necessary in
order to avoid *any* UTI that *may* be brought on by holding in urine.
There are *many* factors that go into the development of one as well.
I've personally had many jobs where I was not able to go to the
bathroom without another physical person backing me up, and I never
developed a UTI as a result. That isn't to say it doesn't happen, but
to imply that this factor is at all worthy of higher pay is funny to
me.



Sure, teachers *can* and do manage to call others to cover when they
must go, but the fact is that I have had many other jobs and never had
to do this in any of them except for teaching. �

I suspect that you want to compare factory line workers who would also
have to do this with teachers, but factory line workers don't have to
have college degrees nor do they have the same kind of professional
skills. �It would be fairer to compare teachers to middle managers and
I have yet to see a middle manager in a corporation not be able to
take a bathroom break when s/he needs to do so.

Oh brother. @@

On Thu, 29 Nov 2007 12:36:26 +0000 (UTC), enigma wrote:

toypup wrote in
:

I also agree that it is more high stakes now than it was
when farming was a lifestyle.

snort
you say that like farming is a simple thing. even before
high-tech agribusiness farming was never something the less
intelligent could do successfully. there is more brain than
brawn to farming successfully.
lee

I did not say that at all. However, when the family farm was the norm,
going to college wasn't a big priority for a majority of the population.

Chris wrote:
On Nov 28, 11:05�pm, Ericka Kammerer wrote:

� � � � I understand that. �I was talking more about the
individual tutors around here. �There are organizations for
tutors here that are sort of like a clearinghouse for tutors.
You call them and tell them what you want, and they hook you
up with a few people who meet your criteria. �You interview,
decide whom you want, and pay the individual directly. �They
seem to start out around $50/hour and go up from there.


If it's an honest tutor, meaning reporting that income on taxes,
darned near half could go to taxes.

As it would for anyone, no?

Best wishes,
Ericka

Donna Metler wrote:

Don't forget that if you're an independent contractor,

I know. I'm an independent contractor myself.

I doubt anyone who is tutoring is getting rich by it.

What I keep trying to say is that *AROUND HERE* there are
some tutors who are doing very well, by any measure. There is a
significant community who will do just about anything to get their
kids in what they perceive to be the best programs. That "anything"
includes some extraordinarily high priced tutors. The *average*
private tutors around here start around $50/hour, but there are
some that are making *much* more--easily double or even triple
for those with a significant reputation. I am not saying this is
characteristic of everywhere, but it is happening here because
there's a market for it that can afford to pay those sort of
prices.

A full-time tutoring job for Sylvan or Kumon here will pay less than
teaching in the public schools does,

Agreed--the folks working that those sorts of places are
not earning the big bucks (though there are lots of those places
around here as well). I'm talking about private tutors.

Best wishes,
Ericka

On Nov 29, 9:51Â*am, Chris wrote:
On Nov 29, 12:46�am, toto wrote:

On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 07:45:36 -0800 (PST), Beliavsky

wrote:
Therefore I don't think the pay of government workers
should be set according to a more generous system based on "fairness".

Teaching children is NOT the same kind of job as making widgets.

--
Dorothy

There is no sound, no cry in all the world
that can be heard unless someone listens ..

The Outer Limits

Of course! lol. I've heard many teachers refer to any other profession
on the planet as lowly, undeserving, and not-as-important positions;
hence, my dancing-monkey comments.

Maybe what toto meant is simply that productivity is harder to measure
in education than factory work. The economic payoff of education may
come decades later, and it is impossible to precisely allocate it
among the various teachers. There are also important non-economic
payoffs of education -- educated parents can take better care of their
children, other things being equal.

A previous poster said:

"In any case, the Coleman Report found more than 40 years ago that
differences in school funding explain very little of the variance in
student performance across schools. Parental background was much more
important. I think this is because intelligence has substantial
heritability --estimates are in the 0.5 - 0.8 range."

A more likely factor than herital intelligence would be total investment
in education. The K-12 school investment is only one portion. If you
included investment in baby care, preschool and after-school activities,
you might find a fairly tight correlation between investment and
results. One could go into this in great detail and at great length,
but suffice to say that heritability of intelligence may easily be
overshadowed by the quality of the infant environment, of the preschool,
and of extracurricular opportunities for the child. The amount of money
spent on these things may be considered a proxy for their quality (in
large populations).

My two cents,
--Beth Kevles
-THE-COM-HERE
http://web.mit.edu/kevles/www/nomilk.html -- a page for the milk-allergic
Disclaimer: Nothing in this message should be construed as medical
advice. Please consult with your own medical practicioner.

NOTE: No email is read at my MIT address. Use the GMAIL one if you would
like me to reply.

On Nov 29, 9:22 am, Beliavsky wrote:
On Nov 28, 7:37 pm, Caledonia wrote:

snip

I think that the overarching constraint is that for many places in the
US, teacher salaries are more closely tied to local (not state, nor
federal) taxes, as local taxes are (becoming) the primary source of
revenue -- hence, a town that does not generally support education can
perpetuate that unhappy situation by not increasing its tax rate to
encourage teachers to remain.

You write as if this is a recent trend, but historically education has
never been the primary responsibility of the Federal government in the
U.S.

True -- using Massachusetts as an example, though (we're either 43 or
47th in state funding for education), most of the schools budget is
floated by local taxes. I had always thought that those parents
shopping in Staples for school supplies were sending their kids to
private school, or perhaps shopping for demanding high schoolers. Then
I sent my kid to a public school for K....

He who pays the piper calls the tune, and there is an argument
for keeping education funding primarily at the local level, since
residents can much better judge the quality of what they are paying
for.

This is where it gets tricky, though, as some costs (such as special
education) are reimbursed by the state, yet the standards are federal
in some cases (e.g., transportation), the reimbursement is state-
driven (in MA, that'd be not reimbursed for special education
transport), and the funding source is local taxes.

Taxpayers will be more willing to pay higher property taxes if
they think doing so will improve the schools. Parents have a direct
interest in this, and other homeowners have an indirect interest,
since higher perceived school quality boosts house prices.

When confronted with taxpayers who can't fathom why their tax bills
are so much higher now (hey, we're almost back to receiving the same
dollars -- NOT inflation-adjusted -- we received 8 years ago from the
state for education, and our enrollment has been flat), it's a hard
sell, even in a very high-performing district. Even good teachers will
be swayed by market forces to pick up and go if their salary is
significantly lower than those of their peers in lower-performing
districts -- moreso given that most teachers can't afford to live here
anyway, so a commute is a commute.

Trust me, house prices are quite boosted -- so boosted that sales are
nonexistent.

In any case, the Coleman Report found more than 40 years ago that
differences in school funding explain very little of the variance in
student performance across schools. Parental background was much more
important. snip Charles Murray's intrusion

I don't think Coleman was muddling into Murray's IQ land -- parental
income and aspirations as the true drivers in his estimation, with
peers following...

Caledonia

On Nov 29, 9:09 am, "Stephanie" wrote:
"toto" wrote in message

...





On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 08:06:37 -0800 (PST), Chris
wrote:

She has to call for backup and wait
for a replacement before she can go, as do some teachers. I mean, my
gosh, you're implying teachers have a high rate of accidents/wetting
their pants and that they are prisoners in their rooms, when I've seen
first hand they do excuse themselves from time to time, even diabetic
teachers, AND middle school and high school teachers always have a few
minutes in between classes just as the students do. lol.

Teachers have a much higher rate of urinary tract infections than most
other professions as a result of having to hold their urine in for
longer periods of time.

Sure, teachers *can* and do manage to call others to cover when they
must go, but the fact is that I have had many other jobs and never had
to do this in any of them except for teaching.

I have heard that this is also common in nursing.



I suspect that you want to compare factory line workers who would also
have to do this with teachers, but factory line workers don't have to
have college degrees nor do they have the same kind of professional
skills. It would be fairer to compare teachers to middle managers and
I have yet to see a middle manager in a corporation not be able to
take a bathroom break when s/he needs to do so.

Just out of curiousity, where are the teacher's unions in all of
this? They have been *extremely* successful in certain respects; it
seems to me that if most teachers really aren't able to use the
bathroom with a reasonable degree of frequency -- and I have no reason
to doubt you on that -- that's an issue that the unions really do need
to address during contract negotiations.

OTOH, I think its a red herring to look at this in terms of education
level meriting autonomy. Really, its more a function of job
requirements.

And BTW, I've been before judges who refuse to grant bathroom breaks
to counsel.

Barbara