Hard to understand sometimes...

So, I kind of have a routine.

I wake up in the morning. I go to work. I do a lot of "computery stuff". At 5PM, I start my commute back to Columbus. On my ride home, I frequently call my dad to talk about the politics of the day. Last night, we got into some murky territory where our philosophies are starkly different.

I've always considered my father to be a progressive. Almost in a militant way, which is nice. But when you enter into a conversation with him regarding education, things start to get weird. My dad is not different than a lot of men from his generation. Access to higher education was reserved for old money. It was a distinguishing attribute that separated the "haves" from the "have-nots". Nothing drew more attention to income inequality than one's access to higher education.

Then came the Vietnam War. This only reinforced my dad's resentment for the affluent. He saw it as a means to shelter the wealthy from their duty to serve their country. That...somehow, because of their wealth, their lives were more valuable than someone who couldn't get a college deferment due to their inability to afford higher education. It wasn't fair. At this point, we are on the same page.

If you venture down the path of "teachers" with my dad, you will inevitably uncover his disdain for them. He probably wouldn't be that explicit about it, but he doesn't have the luxury of writing this blog. He doesn't like them. He never has. I remember him making comments about the teachers I had in high school, expressing his inability to put up with the airs that some of them put on. He felt that they looked down their noses at non-teachers, and that somehow, they were a cut above. Again -- for him --  this is, at the root, a problem with social class, not with teaching (per se).

Talk about the income of 1st grade teacher, and you will run headfirst into a wall of irrationality. HIS problem, as he articulates it, is that a person teaching first grade DOES NOT need a master's degree, and that just by holding that degree does not entitle them to twice the income of a similar educator WITHOUT a master's. He feels that it's entirely UNNECESSARY to have that level of education to teach a bunch of 6 year-olds. The insinuation he makes, without actually articulating it, is that addition and subtraction, the alphabet, and penmanship do not require more than 2 years of post-high school education. Further, that by becoming "career students", they are falsely inflating the value that they bring to the student and the community. I disagree entirely. First, I personally would never besmirch a professional that continually sharpens their skills to increase their take-home pay. A first grade teacher doesn't go back to school every summer to learn about new breakthroughs in arithmetic -- they go back to be better educators. In doing so, they should be compensated, and I disagree that "the value isn't realized at that grade level". Disagree WHOLEHEARTEDLY. That's where I want the most enthusiastic and passionate people to be. I want them to instill the best habits and skills early on...to connect with them at THAT age. I don't want someone to reach a ceiling of $37,000 without any incentive to improve. That's just bad policy, and the quality of students would reflect that.

The bottom line is that guys like my dad place very little value on educators at that level. Now, you discuss Scott Walker and Act 10, and he takes a different tone. THAT'S about collective bargaining, and you'll never find him arguing against one's right to leverage their labor against their employer. Never. Even for teachers.

But he still hates teachers.

It's weird.