“Normally, schools hire substitutes to cover teacher absences. But there are so many teachers out with COVID-19 that the demand is much higher than usual. Pay for substitute teachers averaged $17 an hour in May 2020, according to federal figures. Assuming a substitute worked as much as possible — seven hours a day for 180 school days — that’s $21,420 a year, which is about one-third of the national average pay for full-time teachers. It is also below the poverty line for households with three people.”
- Teachers are being threatened from all sides — “You should work from home but control your classroom better.” “You should be in school teaching, but we’re still sending our sick kids in to school because we have to work.” “You should work in school, but we want to police what you teach, even though we barely graduated from high school, are barely literate ourselves and don’t want to bother to go to parent-teacher conferences.” Everyone’s telling the teachers what they can or can’t do — and they aren’t educated to be teachers, have not been in a classroom, and some can barely maintain discipline with their kids for what little time they are with them. After people in nursing homes, teachers were the highest other casualties in the virus-who-can’t-be-named war at the beginning because of schools unprepared for a pandemic, schools having little extra leeway in their budgets for precautions like masks, sanitizers, etc. and parents sending their kids to school no matter what — “It’s just a little cold” or “It’s allergies” and, surprise, everyone gets a 10-day break. Teacher pay is not very high if you compare it with other areas with the same education. Why should someone with a degree in chemistry become a chemistry teacher at $36,000, when a chemist starts at $45K or more, and doesn't have to deal with parents and kids threatening them? And it happens. — SalisburyWitch
Governor hopeful about ‘new phase’ of pandemic
Delaware is entering a “new phase” of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. John Carney said at the state’s weekly COVID-19 briefing Feb. 8. “All of the data is getting better and pretty dramatically so,” he said. That news has led to the removal of the state’s indoor mask mandate, effective Feb. 9. The requirement was put into effect Jan. 3, when Delaware reentered a state of emergency due to record-setting COVID-19 statistics spurred on by the highly transmissible omicron variant.
- The “new phase” is because Democrats see that the polls have them getting demolished in November. If the polls were in their favor, then they wouldn’t be stopping their mandates. — Ryan Fenimore
- It’s too late now. They are going to get demolished either way. — Lamar Liffridge
- Keep the masks on. It’s not over! — Linda Betz
- If you are vaxxed and boosted, you’re fine. If you want to keep your mask on, then do so. You want to lock yourself in your home, do so. Many of we, the people, are not. — Margaret Mclaughlin
- I’m not locked in my home. I go everywhere but wear a mask. I’m 80 years old with health problems. I had the shots. Some of my friends died from it. It’s my choice to wear it. You do what you want and be safe. — Linda Betz
