Each year on the eve of the Teachers’ Day holiday, administrative teachers in the academic affairs office are extremely busy preparing celebratory activities. However, when it comes to making Teachers’ Day cards, only a handful of students write long and meaningful messages to their teachers. Most students simply go through the motions, writing a crooked “Happy Teachers’ Day” atop the card as if it is some kind of punishment.
Teachers need a friendly working environment. With a shortage of teachers throughout the nation, unreasonable hourly rates and working conditions chase substitute teachers away, making full-time teachers work overtime teaching classes for which they lack expertise.
Those at the top do not address the root of the problem — they just require that all schools have teaching positions filled before the start of the school year.
To fulfill students’ right to receive education, teacher recruitment has devolved into a system prioritizing quantity over quality — practically anyone with a college degree, regardless of their field of study, is guaranteed a position.
What teachers do not need are ineffective meetings and workshops. Workshops that teachers are forced to attend and meetings to discuss unnecessary topics are what I define as “ineffective.”
Last week, I received a notice for a workshop stating that schools with more than 40 percent of students needing exam score improvement must send representatives to participate.
Compare a teacher who has managed to lower the number of students whose scores need improvement from 60 percent to 40 percent with a teacher who increased that same metric from under 20 percent to 30 percent — it is obvious at a glance who the better teacher is. However, those at the top only see plain numbers, leaving grassroots level teachers bitterly disappointed.
Since the start of the semester, there have already been scores of ineffective meetings, with items dryly read line by line. Teachers are responsible for signing in and serving as a backdrop for photographs. Those who arrive at meetings on time must sit and wait for latecomers, much like how the dishes at a wedding banquet are never served on time.
What teachers need are adjustments to tutoring fees, special education bonuses and hourly rates. What they do not need are obligatory Teachers’ Day activities — you would ultimately find they do not make teachers any happier.
Lin Cheng-wu is a junior-high school teacher.
Translated by Kyra Gustavsen
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