Marie Miguel
Sep 6, 2018 · 2 min read

First, I do feel bad about your experiences, especially when it comes to the Orchestra Auditions. That is something that need to be dealt with on another entirely different level. However . . .

How did you think that doing the job of an orchestra teacher would be easy? How did you think you wouldn’t have to spend nights and weekends preparing, with or without a stipend? How did you not take the time to research your school, their policies, and the requirements of your job. Why did you think you would get help? Do you live under a rock? Almost daily, there are articles, videos, tweets, what have you about the trouble in public schools, the sacrifices teachers make, the lack of funding, the lack of support, the incompetent bureacracy. Look at our Secretary of Education for goodness sake!

It is your responsibility to get the info, not anyone else’s. You said you had a friend who worked there. Really? If I was working at a school like that, I would not recommend my friend to work there. Unless they’re not really my friend.

The thing that bothers me the most about what you said is how upset you were about the extra time you’d have to spend on nights and weekends. Were you not in orchestra in school, or in college? Did you not, as the student, have to spend nights and weekends preparing and performing? If you were a performer, did you not have to spend nights and weekends rehearsing. If you are the orchestra teacher, that is part of your job. Around here, our band teachers don’t get stipends for the concerts and the extra rehearsals — it’s part of their job. I have been a theatre teacher for years — I only get a small stipend for our competition show that is sponsored by our athletic league. Everything else is on me. I worked professionally as well, and I didn’t get paid for the extra rehearsals. But, then maybe you were lucky to be making a living as a musician. I was not. I only got paid when I was actually working. And guess what? If I didn’t know my lines, or my music, or my dances, or my costumes weren’t finished, or my set wasn’t painted during my allotted pay time — I stayed and finished, without pay. Or took it home, without pay. Thus the old saying, “The Show Must Go On”.

Do things need to change in the charter school sector? Absolutely. Should teachers be treated this way? Absolutely not! But don’t blame others for things you could have done. Don’t ask people to feel bad for you because you were uninformed. Tell your story — if will remind people of the problems that exist. But please, do not assume you can do something you have no training to do, and do not expect others to fill in for your deficits.

    Marie Miguel

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