Teachers’ pay, body cams are different
I cannot believe we have finally come to a point where a reader is complaining that the salaries of teachers are too high ["Educators’ pay an issue, not body cams," Letters, July 8]. This is a first.
For nearly the entirety of my 25-year teaching career, I have heard teachers and nonteachers say that teachers deserve more respect and should make salaries commensurate with the important and tough job that teaching is.
Many school districts on Long Island have managed to heed those urgings — and now we are suddenly making too much?
Whether or not you agree with extra pay for Nassau County police officers who wear body cams, conflating that issue with educators’ salaries is absurd. The reader should find another way to make his case.
— David Shaw, Valley Stream
The writer is a high school English and journalism teacher.
I don’t know if the reader has or had any children in school this past school year, but if he did, he should be aware of the way teachers had to teach.
My daughter and two nieces had to teach in ways they never dreamed of. To say it was "difficult" is not the right word. It was frustrating, hard and technically challenging. Teachers had to learn how to communicate in many new ways — in the classroom and at home.
They had to go to classrooms taking carts up and down staircases and hope they had all the necessary materials. Teachers were bunched together in one room to review their work, eat their lunch, etc. They earn every penny they receive in their paychecks.
The reader should have been in a classroom to see what challenges educators had to face this past year, and the toll it took on their personal and professional lives.
God bless all the teachers who survived this past school year.
— Camille Morselli, Islip Terrace
Apparently, the reader who claims he would gladly pay for police body cams over "excessive" teacher salaries has absolutely no idea what it’s like to run a classroom, nor has any knowledge of what it was like to teach a hybrid plan these past 15 months. I’d challenge him to teach any high school class for a week. I don’t think he would last two hours.
— Tom Sena, Merrick
The writer has taught in the Lynbrook school district for 24 years.
Add penalties if cops’ body cams are off
While people are up in arms about the police and their body cams, in a classic case of "what-aboutism," a reader chooses to blame teachers and educators for their high salaries. Teachers in many districts have to pay out of pocket for school supplies, but police are getting a nice little perk — approximately $60 a week — to wear body cams.
Should the police be paid to wear a camera? Or should it just be a part of their uniform and carry no extra stipend?
What’s missing, however, is what to do when the police might "forget" to turn on their cameras, which seems to happen often in this nation, especially when an arrest turns controversial. If you’re being paid to wear the camera, there should be a penalty for not turning it on.
The $3,000 figure lends itself to an easy solution. How’s this: "Forget" once and it costs you $1,000; second offense, $2,000, and third strike — you’re out, fired. I know it sounds harsh, but if you’re going to take the money, then you should also take the responsibility that comes with it.
— Peter Larkin, Bayside
High-speed rail would be a dream come true
It is heartening to read about plans moving ahead for a high-speed rail line between New York and Boston via Long Island ["LI high-speed rail plan moves ahead in D.C.," News, July 3].
It is something I have been dreaming about ever since making an unplanned one-day road trip to Boston in mid-January several years ago.
During the entire drive, I kept thinking how nice it would be to hop on a train in Mineola or Hicksville and be in Beantown 90 minutes later.
It would be fitting if it is built in time for the Long Island Rail Road’s bicentennial in 2034.
— Ellis Simon, Oceanside
