Wall Street Journal: Bad Press!

The Wall Street Journal, attack dog for the righteous marketplace, apostle of “bang for the buck” for civil servants, and conscience of the all-day businessman’s lunch for dividends gluttons, decried in an April 28 piece the alleged statistic that public school teachers tend to exhaust their annual ten-day “sick bank,” especially in poorer areas of the city.

They suspect that teachers’ claim of sickness is often a ploy and mask for their contemptuous attitude towards professional duty. They see teachers who get sick as slackers who if they cared about kids would have immune systems better able to repel microbes. They plainly feel that unions are the enablers of teachers’ audacity.

Perhaps it’s true about teachers burning through their ten days over ten months. But a fragment of truth without context is no truth at all, but as an instrument to exploit the public’s gullibility, it’s more serviceable than an out and out lie.

Does anyone, other than the founder emeritus of the Flat Earth Society, trust the WSJ to be a pure journalistic enterprise that seeks and accepts the truth wherever it may lead? Would their editorial board ever disseminate an unvarnished and verified truth that would make public school educators look good? Of course not. And neither would sectors of the erstwhile “progressive” movement who have attached like barnacles to the rusted hulk of “reform.”

Quite apart from contractual entitlement, ten “sick days” allowance per year is neither generous, charitable or unrealistic. Most teachers hoard the days, if they can, as “insurance” in case they get sick, are in an accident, must follow-through on paperwork after being the victim of a crime, or simply need to attend to some important family matter. What that may be they have the maturity of judgment to define and pursue without a supervisor’s imprimatur.

Teachers actually get fewer “sick days” than do law enforcement officers and many other workers. Because teachers have high-intensity and continual exposure to children and their multitudinous infections, teachers should get more “sick days” than almost anyone else, including police.

And students in high poverty areas are more often sick, directly attributable to the conditions in which they live, and their teachers are therefore exposed to more illness than teachers in other schools.

Some folks say that more stressful jobs should permit greater attendance flexibility.

No job, none at all, is psychically and emotionally more stressful and often physically draining than is teaching, even at its most rewarding. It may take a long time to take its toll, but some chronic and potentially life-threatening illnesses, such as high blood pressure, are endemic among teachers.

And conscientious educators need make no apology for taking, at their own discretion, an occasional “mental health day.” This is my personal view and not the declaration of any organizational position.

Naturally no teacher should take days off for frivolous or defiant purposes. Of course they should make arrangements to ensure the viability of classroom instruction in their absence. Regrettably, very often, even when the teacher has left a perfectly crafted lesson plan, it is useless because school administrators fail, whether out of laziness or ineptitude, to provide tactical support for substitute teachers who are traditionally given a hard time by students.

All in all, teachers are most likely to maintain a positive pattern of attendance in a friendly workplace. Self-treating a sinus infection should not be construed as sedition. Attending to one’s health is a matter of self-preservation. Does the Wall Street Journal begrudge teachers that right? Of course they do. Will they ever have a kind word about public school teachers and their union? Of course they won’t.

Wall Street Journal: bad press!

Tagged: absenteeism, sick days, Wall Street Journal