BY: STAFF REPORT | BocaNewsNow.com
BOCA RATON, FL (BocaNewsNow.com) (Copyright © 2024 MetroDesk Media, LLC) — A reminder to parents and guardians of students in the Palm Beach County School District. Because a week isn’t enough time off for teachers to get ready for the final part of the school year, Monday is a teacher planning day. That means there’s no school for students. As always, we encourage you to drive by your local school during the day to see how many employee cars are in the parking lot.
The in-service day is followed by three days of school, before another day off for Good Friday on March 29th.
Palm Beach County public school education resumes on Monday, April 1st, and continues until another day off on April 10th. The next holiday after that is Memorial Day which is May 27t. The final day of school in Palm Beach County is May 30th. May 31st is a teacher planning day.
Teachers, according to the Palm Beach County school district calendar, will have worked 188 days during the 2023-2024 school year.
A friendly reminder that teacher pay in Florida is 48th in the nation. Teachers do not plan the calendar. The bias in this article is not a helpful perspective towards the educated people who show up every school day to care for and grow the young minds in our classrooms.
There are plenty of cars parked in the lot well after the end of the school day at the nearby elementary school in Boynton Beach. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they should connect with reality.
Very well said!! Talk about misleading information!
A friendly reminder the week off is a vacation for teachers who also have children, parents they care for, drs appts they can finally get done , housework neglected, and second jobs they have, etc. Many parents travel that week and return Sunday so it happens that many kids are absent Monday. Your disdain for teachers is evident which is why Florida is the number 1 state for teacher shortages. Be better.
Well said!
Thanks to gov DeSantis it’s no longer true that teacher pay in Florida is 48th in the nation.
No, that is incorrect. We went from FL being the 47th highest paying state before DeSantis was in office (2018-2019) to now being the 48th in teacher pay. We are worse having DeSantis. (from AP News)
All DeSantis did was increased pay for 1st year teachers and compressed salaries even more than they already were. A 1st year teacher straight out of college with no experience makes the same base salary as teachers in their 16th year.
FL is the state highest in teacher shortages. DeSantis thought focusing on 1st year teacher pay would recruit teachers but it only turned students off from entering teaching programs. Why would anyone want to be stagnant in their career for 20 years? And now veteran teachers are also leaving because we are so underpaid.
So if your child has a sub for next year or even larger class sizes – put the blame where it belongs.
This is how it works: Teacher unions declare they need a pay raise because their state is number 48 in pay -so they get a bump to say 15. Then the new state that is 48 says the same thing, and on and on. Some states will always be number 1 and one will be number 50. Look at what they make for a part-time job. and their benefits. Many teachers dropped out of a harder degree program to switch to education because it is easy. When I lived in NJ, the single teachers I knew were always the first ones at Happy Hour and the first ones at the beach and stayed for the summer. And then, of course, you have the strikes – which are always “for the children.”
Let’s see, as an English teacher, I need to plan creative lessons according to the established curriculum, I need to grade all 121 papers and provide feedback. I have to participate in workshops, conferences, and training sessions to stay updated. I have to offer additional after school assistance to students. I need to communicate with parents and guardians about the students’ progress. I need to collaborate with colleagues. Need I go on?
Teachers in Palm Beach County work very hard and your article insinuates otherwise. Spring Break is not a week for teachers to prepare for the rest of the school year. Teachers contracts dictate how many days they work and school holidays such as spring break are not contract work days. Most teachers work far more hours each week than they are paid to. If you want to attack teachers in your article be direct don’t insinuate they don’t work enough. Drive by parking lots in the afternoon when school is over and teachers are still on campus volunteering their time tutoring, accommodating make ups or just helping students with anything they need.
Boca news should be ashamed of the disrespectful attitude in this article. Teachers work hard and get paid little. Spring break is a break for everyone. Why would you imply that teachers should be preparing for the remainder of the school year during their time off. The author of this article must be one of those parents that sees school as a free babysitting service. Disgusting
This article is a pathetic attempt to undermine the hard work my colleagues and I put in every day. When did it become acceptable to show such an utter lack of support for educators?
You seem to misunderstand that this past week was spring break, and not teacher duty time. Are you expected to work during your vacation days? Cars in the parking lot are not the barometer for our work ethic as you seem to insinuate. I work on lesson plans and provide afterschool support to my students and parents via email until 9:00 at night several nights per week (with my car parked at my home). I question what your goal was in writing this clearly biased article. It seems at best grossly irresponsible and at worst unnecessarily inflammatory. Perhaps this past week wasn’t “enough time” for YOU to get your facts straight.
Obviously written by someone that has no appreciation for teachers. Next time you want to bash the hardworking and underpaid people striving against financial, political and moral barriers to educate and improve our young people, keep it to yourself. No one wants to read that nonsense.
There is always another side of the coin. There is no evidence that proves that MOST teachers work far more hours than they are paid for. And they do get more holidays than most workers and more than two months off during the summer and their work day is less than most other workers.
Comparing their pay with other workers who might get paid more is just not fair. And their pensions and benefits are more than competitive, as most workers don’t get any pensions. So, perhaps, if the teachers and their unions stopped complaining about everything, many citizens-who actually pay them- would stop ridiculing them. It would be nice to see test scores go up and have more students graduate high school.
The 4 Boca Raton High Schools had an average 98% graduation rate last year.
Who is complaining? This guy is. Do you understand in Florida teachers contribute to their own retirement? There is no awesome pension. You are thinking of states in the north. Honestly, the disrespect for women just oozes.
There have been multiple peer reviewed studies showing how many hours teachers put in outside contract hours.
Teachers are paid for the number of days on their contract. They don’t get paid for holidays. Their paid workday is the standard 8 hours just like every other American job. There is no teqchers union in Florida.
If you want test scores to go up and students to graduate, talk to their parents.
Well, a school day isn’t 8 hours so of course there will be teachers there after school hours – but maybe not all or even most.
This past week was spring break. It was a holiday for all. This is a teacher planning day. Specifically set up for planning and grading. Grades are due tomorrow for the report cards from 39 weeks.
They are also paid poorly. 48th in the country right now. And people who come from states that have state income tax just can’t understand why the schools are not the same as they are up north! I wonder.
I would encourage all teachers and anyone who supports education to take your subscriptions to news elsewhere. And those of you who need to drive into the parking lot to see how many cars are there tomorrow, you should also drive there every afternoon after school is closed. And on weekends. Make sure you also drive out to the fields that they coach in, the competitions they go to!
Also, I would encourage you to drive by any high school during open house tonight. Count those cars! It’s about 10 to 20% of the number of enrolled students! Very poor journalism here. In fact, I apologize for the word journalism for comparing this to that!
Teachers only get paid for 190 days, the days they work. They don’t get paid for the summer months, the pay for the 190 days is divided by 24 so we get checks in the summer. Please educate yourself because you sound like a moron.
It would be nice if parents supported the education of their children by making sure homework is done and helping student as needed. Also, parent shouldn’t blame bad behaviour on the teacher. It’s the student who is acting out, hold them accountable.
Kids are out of school more as every year passes. I get it , it’s a tough job babysitting other people’s children.
Babysitting other peoples children (AKA teaching) nowadays isnt worth much. Teachers just get ridiculed for everything they do and don’t do like in this post. Thats why theyre all leaving the profession in droves. Have fun homeschooling in the future.
It’s the same every year im Florida and has been since I was in school in broward in the 70s. 180 days. That’s per state law.
We used to get 2 days for Thanksgiving, Thursday and Friday, now they get the whole week.
So much for being the same.
We always were off Thursday and Friday for Thanksgiving, now they are off the entire week.
So much for being the same.
Mike is a dick
As a Palm Beach County school teacher, I am highly offended from your scathing reminder to parents and students about no school on Monday, March 25th.
This article was quite biased towards teachers. Yes, we work 188 days out of the year, but that does not take into account all the extra hours we put in after school, evenings, weekends, as well as on our much deserved spring break. We spend more time witj other people’s children than we do with our own families .
It is this kind of thinking and attitude towards teachers along with low pay, politics, and dealing with student and parent disrespect, that is driving our teachers to leave the profession all over our country. We are facing a nation that will be in a major crisis in the very near future as more and more teachers jump ship.
Our contract is actually 196 days.
I agree the teachers work hard and have a difficult job but at the same time they complain about their salary only work 2/3 as many days a year as the average person paying that salary they want more money work more days the average is 261 so they work 73 days less than the average American that’s over 2 1/2 months not including weekends sorry guys. I just think it’s ridiculous that you complain about how much you make and don’t work for it in days and kids need to be in school because our education system stinks. We’re ranked so low that we might as well. Be a fourth world country.
I’m a teacher at Emerald Cove Middle School in Wellington. If you’re in the neighborhood, look for my maroon Toyota RAV4.
Finding a parking spot will be easy tomorrow because many teachers will use their comp time. They’ve been coming in early or staying late to provide supervision. There’s no overtime or time-and-a-half, just comp time. Procedures vary, but in my experience, teachers must complete a form to get principal approval for comp time.
You’ll see teachers running the concessions or providing supervision when you attend a basketball game. They’re earning comp time. Some teachers come in an hour early to provide supervision, and others have duties after school. There are some paid positions, but not many. More than likely, I’ll hear an announcement that we’re short-staffed in the cafeteria because the buses are running late. Many of us plan to stay late on Fridays, particularly at the beginning of the year.
Many of us earned comp time before the school year started by volunteering as many as four days at a summer camp that welcomed incoming students to our school. Other teachers worked in their classrooms to prepare for their students, but that doesn’t count toward comp time.
I plan to stop by the car wash on my way to work tomorrow, so my RAV4 should be nice and shiny in the parking lot. If you come by, knock on the window. I’ll wave to you.
I thought the same thing as you did until I was Administrative Assistant in a high school. I then found out that teachers work many extra hours and then they go home and work more hours. Most of the teachers came in during the summer as well. I think this article was very disrespectful toward teachers and that you owe them an apology