Treat me like paper

As we started back to school the number one topic that was mentioned in our first week was how to conserve paper.  One of our administrators told me that it was one of his goals to go paperless which is admirable.  So I have heard a couple of ways that we can conserve paper but no ways in which we can conserve teacher time.

In the past three years many teachers have seen the total number of students rise by 30.  This is practically another class to grade, call parents, enter grades etc.  With this increase in student load we were hit this year with the fact that we need to keep a porfollio of what we do.  These would be artifacts of our lessons, student relationships, and our professional development.  It is basically a documentation of what we do which in no way will help student achievement nor develop me as a teacher.  In my opinion it is something that my bosses should be doing for me  We also have to understand a new evaluation and get our arms around a new curriculum (core)

Many of these increases on our time is out of our administrators control, they do not decide staffing, or when to roll out new evaluations.  However, I really do not see our administrators thinking about reducing our workload as hard as they are thinking about conserving paper.  A matter of fact they have increased our workload by making it mandatory for all of us to join a school committee.  Just for full disclosure this does not impact me since I have been on several committees.  However, that was my choice and not mandated to me

So what would be my suggestions to the administration.  Make every meeting voluntary, if the meeting are good people will come.  They have to plan one meeting a month you would think that it would be awesome, and that would bring the teachers.  They should try to inspire and motivate us to want to join these committees not mandate us.  I struggle to remember a meeting or committee that I attended last year that motivated me for school the next day.  Two, think of ways that we can get teachers out of duties and replaced by other members of the staff.  Finally, if the top two can not be done how about an honest and personal thank you.

Am I asking too much for my leaders to care about me as much as they do the paper?