Budget Cuts and Education--Layoffs for Teachers in Illinois

For March 16, 2010

In the local news on the morning of Tuesday, March 16, 2010, there was a report from School District U-46, the second largest school district in Illinois (after the Chicago School District).  The School Board, in a unanimous vote, laid off 1,079 employees of which 732 were full-time teachers.  These layoffs are effective at the end of this school year in June. 

Many of these cuts were caused by the withdrawl of $44 million in funding from the state of Illinois. The same news report says that class sizes are expected to grow to 37 next year.  I taught in School District U-46 for four years and was a middle school teacher working with English language learners (ELLs) for three years.  37 students  in a classroom with mixed learning levels (33 students in ELL classrooms because of a 10% dispensation in class size) does not allow students to learn what they need to learn.  The district serves an approximate 40,000 students from kindergarten through high school.

The budget cuts also apply to programs and support staff.  The end result is that students whom President Obama expects to be ready for work or college upon high school graduation will have even more challenges and less opportunities to learn what they need to learn.

Businesses lay off employees when facing budget crunches.  The concern for school districts--with this type of experience taking place throughout Illinois and the rest of the USA--is that not only is the education of students put at risk, qualified teachers are out of work.  The more highly qualified a teacher may be due to advanced degrees (with accompanying student loans), the higher their salaries (per union contracts) and the less likely they are to be hired by another school district facing budget shortfalls themselves.

This is certainly a "Catch 22" situation (a reinforcing problem without ready solution).  Again, due to the economy and high unemployment, residents cannot come up with more property taxes or higher income tax to fund local school boards.  Teachers (already dealing with low pay scales) cannot afford to take wage cuts and still pay their bills.

What does this mean for the future of education in Illinois?  While I cannot speak to the situation in the schools, I can say that both universities and businesses are going to have to gear up to help entering employees build learning skills they will not have picked-up by the time they graduate from high school.

(That type of learning happens to be one of my specialties.)  As a professional educator for businesses, I can see that, again, with this economy, businesses are not gearing up to meet what will be a greatly increased demand.

Online Language Learning and Global Business Opportunities

My research into an online language learning system to review my French language skills has led me to a new global business opportunity.  The online system allows subscribers to learn as many as nine languages during the period of their subscription (normaly six months or one year at a time).  One subscription is for an entire family and all of the course materials are online.  They are even interactive and you can record your voice and match it to native speakers.

The online system has been available for about five years and a different online English program is being released for use in China on November 1, 2009.

For the past six years I have been teaching English language learners (ELLs) in public schools in Illinois.  The English program could be of great benefit for almost 100% of the parents of these students.  While many of my former students did not have computers at home, some did and more purchased computers when it became clear that a computer with Internet access would help the students do better in school.

The even better news about the English language programs are that they can help students move ahead in their English skills and in their other academic subjects while allowing their parents to become more fluent in English to bring in more income for their families.

As you will see on my new website, http://www.drm-language.com, there are even programs to build business English and to prepare for the U.S. Citizenship exam and for college entrance exams.

I was excited about having a year's subscription to build up my French fluency and to review my Spanish grammar.  If I end up working with more people from the other six countries that have language courses in this online system, I can begin picking up even more languages.

I like the idea of having something affordable to share with non-native English speakers who are struggling to learn English.  I use audiobooks and eAudiobooks a lot with them and these online courses can focus on building essential vocabulary and basic grammar.  All of the courses focus on practical communication in the various languages.

What's more, I spoke today with Dr. Ivan Dulik who began with this program almost five years ago and who has spoken to about 1,200 people about the program.  Of the 1,200, about 300 decided to enroll in the program and of the 300, about 80 decided to focus on sharing the program.  The program offers free websites to subscribers.  When someone subscribes to the program by using a website of a subscriber, the subscriber earns a commission for each new subscription.  Of the 80 people who decided to share, 35 became really focused on sharing the business and, over five years, have generated almost one million US dollars for Dr. Dulik--see the link for "Two EN101 Success Stories" and remember that the date on Dr. Dulik's story is from 2007.

I don't expect to generate one million dollars anytime soon--though I wouldn't turn it down.  What I do see is that it is a worthwhile, affordable program that lots of people I know in the USA and outside the USA can benefit from.  As they learn, they can also help their families by sharing the program and earning commissions from the people who also decide to learn English.

English language learning is a major global market at this point and I don't know of any program that includes all the values and benefits of this new one at a very affordable price.

English Language Learning and Second Language Learning

English language learning and second language learning are big business.  The demand for English world-wide continues to grow.  Unfortunately, many of the people learning English around the world do not have the practice-time with native English speakers and either are too embarassed to communicate orally in English or literally do not have enough knowledge of spoken English to engage effectively in conversations in English.

Second language learners in the USA frequently have similar challenges when attempting to communicate in another language--Spanish, Italian, French, and many others.

Public or Private? Which Makes Most Sense?

In creating some MP4 videos using TechSmith's Camtasia software, I decided to post some publically on YouTube--with back-ups on TeacherTube in case of firewall problems with YouTube. 

It is a real question--whether or not to give the public access to some of the information we may want to share with others.  How many others?  For what purpose?

One of my videos is of a presentation I made called Using Audio Books to Improve Reading and Academic Performance.  That's the video I was working on yesterday.  It's up today on my website at http://www.joelmonty.net/education/education.htm.  (My computer may have been multitasking while I was making the video, so I'll have to double check to make sure that the audio is well synchronized with the video throughout.)  I may try to put that video on TeacherTube later because I want as many teachers to access the presentation as possible.  The information is important.

That's a major key for me to keep in mind.  Who do I want to have access to material I make available and why?  What do I need to do to preserve my privacy and copyright on the materials I share?  Both of these are decisions to be made on a daily basis.

I have another research paper recently published that I need to turn into a presentation.  It is about working with "reluctant" English language learners (ELLs) and encouraging them to produce higher quality in the classroom.  I'd like for that to be a video on TeacherTube as well.

It's amazing how many hours are required to keep these things going and available for others to make use of.

Reflections--My Life since September 11, 2001

September 11, 2001--The events of the day were a wake-up call for me that has had profound impact on my life.  That morning I went to a water aerobics class at the wellness center associated with my local hospital.  As I came out of the shower I saw the news broadcast of a plane flying into the Twin Towers in New York.  Our first thought was that it must have been an awful accident.  In just a few minutes, the second plane hit and it became clear that it was no accident.  The day progressed in slow motion.  I was due for an annual physical at my doctor's office later in the morning and was there when I heard about the atack on the Pentagon.  While in the doctor's office, I was advised that I needed a biopsy because I had an elevated PSA level in my routine bloodwork.  The biopsy revealed that I had prostate cancer in six of the twelve cores they tested.

Attacks from without and from within--this was truly a wake-up call for me.  A few days later (once the flight ban had been lifted) I flew to New York City for a second opinion about my condition.  I decided to have my prostate completely removed and, once I was cancer free, I also decided that it was time for me to make a difference for K-12 students.  I delayed my surgery only long enough to freeze some sperm at the University of Illinois at Chicago sperm bank, then had my surgery in November.  It was completely successful. 

When I had recovered I went to the local Regional Office of Education in Kane County, Illinois (where I live) and offered my services.  I had a doctorate in education, though it was for teaching adults rather than children.  I was advised that, because I had a doctorate, I must also have a bachelors--the degree required to be a substitute teacher.  I mentioned that I also spoke Spanish and was advised that, if I could pass the Target Language Proficiency exam for Spanish, I could get a provisional bilingual teaching certificate (a T-29 certificate) which would allow me to be a full-time teacher of English language learners (ELLs) for six years--with a possible extension of two more years while I worked on getting my credentials to teach children.

I substitute taught until I could take and pass the Target Language Proficiency exam in Spanish.  My passing scores came back in November, 2002, and in December, 2002, I was invited to be a mid-year replacement bilingual (Spanish) teacher at Larkin High School in Elgin (school district U-46).  I began my teaching there and have since then earned a post-doctoral Master of Arts in Teaching and have earned Illinois certification to teach children from Kindergarden through ninth grade (K-9) (an Elementary Teaching Certificate with endorsements to teach in middle school in the areas of language arts and social studies.  Last summer I completed five three-graduate-hour courses at the University of Phoenix Online to add to some coursework completed with my doctorate degree.  At the conclusion of those courses the state of Illinois gave me approval as a bilingual (Spanish) teacher and as a teacher of English as a second language.  I am now fully certified to teach in Illinois through ninth grade.

Beginning at Larkin High School, I have now taught in two high schools, an elementary school, and two middle schools.  I am still cancer-free and, in the six years I have been teaching, it has become a high priority to be available to spend quality time each day with my now 94-year-old mother who lives nearby.

Visit the profile page on my website to access a multimedia version of my digital portfolio for education.  For a copy of the digital portfolio without narration, visit http://joelmonty.wikispaces.com/ and scroll down to the digital portfolio for education link.

On September 11, 2009, I am still cancer free.  I have learned much from my years of teaching English language learners (ELLs) and have built what I have learned into the framework I offer to schools and businesses.  Visit my business-related digital portfolio on the same pages listed above for the education version of the profile.

Reading Challenge--Step "Outside the Box" and Make a Difference with Me in K-12 Education

"The Economy in 2009"‐‐at a time when students are graduating from high school reading at a third or fourth grade level, when employees need symbols on keys to enter sales at fast‐food restaurants, when beginning employees and students entering community colleges cannot read the textbooks, manuals, or follow written instructions well enough to be successful at their jobs, teachers are laid off in droves.

Many teachers who are not yet tenured and who chose to come to teaching as a second (or later career) to make a difference for students often command higher salaries due to education and, in districts already operating "in the red" are let go by some school districts and not hired by other school districts.

Beyond that challenge, many interventions designed to help struggling readers improve reading skills are not proving successful enough to produce a quality change in students' abilities to read. Research indicates that many students who have problems reading often engage in off‐task behavior and bring others off‐task with them so not to have to compete in academics. Schools invest money in "positive behavior intervention and support" (variations of discipline and rewards) rather than in helping students build solid social‐emotional skills appropriate to their grade levels and use "off the shelf" interventions to build reading scores (not necessarily skills or habits). (See http://joelmonty.wikispaces.com/research
for several research articles which support these claims.)

For the last six years I have been one of those multiple‐career teachers, working with English language learners (ELLs) in K‐12 school districts in Kane County Illinois. I have gone back to school to meet state requirements for teaching and completed a post‐doctoral Master of Arts in Teaching in May, 2008, then
took 15 graduate hours during the summer of 2008 to obtain state approval as a bilingual (Spanish) teacher and as a Teacher of English as a Second Language. I earned my doctorate degree in 1992 in adult education and human resources development. Before stepping into the K‐12 classroom, I had been a teacher of adults since 1968 (starting as a volunteer with the American Red Cross). I had designed innovative programs provided to employees of businesses and corporations in North and South America, Asia, Europe, and Australia. I had also been an organizational change consultant for organizations around the world for more than 40 years.

Most recently I have been focusing on the ongoing problem of below‐grade –level reading among middle school students and beyond. While prevalent among ELLs and students whose families are in the lower economic categories (receiving free or reduced lunches), it is more widespread than that. My research and practice have led me to explore a technology‐enhanced approach which had established a good track record in the 1990s and has even greater application today, leveraging the new technology. I am referring to the use of audiobooks and eAudiobooks (which can be downloaded to iPods and MP3 players) to encourage reading and improved academic performance. (See http://joelmonty.wikispaces.com/research for an article and a presentation on this subject.)


Today, at the beginning of the 2009‐2010 school year, I am looking for school districts who would like to partner with me to introduce this approach with small groups of students, teachers, and librarians at the middle school level and above.

This is a time to step “outside the box” and to find a way to support something new that has the potential to make a real difference for K‐12 students and employers and future families in this country.

If you are ready "step outside of the box" to work with me to meet this challenge, please let me know. The website linked to the title of this blog entry takes you to the project page for DrM‐Resources and this is the “Providing Access to eAudiobooks and Audiobooks to Improve Reading and Academic Performance” project.