No, there is no shortage teacher shortage. There is, however, a shortage of good Human Resources personnel.

To begin with, who came up with the term "Human Resources"? The only human resource you'll find in a Human Resources office are the cleaning people and the guy who comes in to refill the water cooler. The people that work in that office are definantly not a resource.

"You'll have no problem getting a job", I've been told. A degree in biology with a secondary education certification. No problem at all. And that would probably be the case, if it weren't for the fact that I have to go thru the Human Resouces department to get to the job. And I know this to be true because, well I've been out to see one principle already in this area, and they wanted to get me on the spot. Unfortunantly I was already offered an open contract with another district, closer to town, near public transportation, the kind of job I need to have. So I declined. Then the Human Resouces people realized that they didn't have the money to give me an open contract.

So I went back to sending out resumes. Lots of resumes. Just ask my last supervisor who had to fill out all the specific evaluation forms that each school district has.

So have I heard anything? Have I gotten a job yet. Well, no. And I've serious doubts that I will. Thanks to the Human Resources people.

I mangaged to get ahold of an actual person the other day. They only answer questions about applications during a certain part of the day (and the answering machine is apparently on the entire time during the period of the day). But alas I found a real phone number (I'm sure someone will hear about that) and talked with a real person. Now I've resigned myself to substitute teaching at this point (the children go back to school three days from now and I doubt seriously that I will get a call in those three days) so the person I was calling was the substitute teacher H.R. person. No, they didn't have my file, as a matter of fact they had nothing on me what-so-ever. Perhaps I should call the teacher admissions people. So I called them. Had I sent in my substitute teacher preference form. Well yes, to them, and they had gotten it and had told me that they had sent it down to the substitute teacher people.

Look, I could go on and on and on about every H.R. Department that I have been in contact with. The only people that I have talked to that have been worthwhile in this whole endeavour have been the principals that I have had the opportunity to speak to. Unfortunantly they don't hire people, their job is to deal with the shit that their H.R. Department finally hires. It looks as tho I am not going to end up being some of that shit.

So the next time you hear about the state of our education system, or the lack of teachers, or what teachers have to deal with, remember this. There are people in the system, getting in the way of good people who want to teach. Perhaps the first fix that needs to be made is to get rid of them.

And a little postscript to this whole thing. I took a look at the pay scale for the county that I am in (there is a secretary position open at the local elementary school, can you imagine...). Anyway, if you look you will find that the administrative positions start in the 40's while the teacher positions start in at 33. Yes there is a teacher shortage, and I believe there will be for some time. It is really a shame.