Today I participated in a 6-hour training for the new IEP program our district is planning on rolling out on Monday. And all I can say is that the training itself was a waste of time and money.
To start off, I could have spent the day in my classroom actually doing something productive and catching up on the work that's stacked up because I was out sick for a week and a half and because I have an incompetent instructional aide (but that's another blog post altogether). Many of our district's special education teachers opted out of coming today - because this "voluntary" training violates our union contract in about 10 different ways. Unfortunately, as much as I wanted to stay behind and work, I couldn't because I am not yet tenured with the district. And I am POSITIVE that our special education director would have seen my absence as non-compliance and not asked me to return next fall despite exemplary evaluations from my site administrator.
So, I was bitter about attending this whole training from the get-go.
On top of that, though, the district failed to offer any sort of waiver for those teachers who are tech-savvy and/or have advanced degrees in technology (like myself) that would allow for us to figure out the program on our own. By not doing so, the district is basically paying me to sit in a computer lab for 6 hours and chat on Facebook or pin new ideas on Pinterest. Now that's being fiscally conscientious!
I was hoping that this training would be beneficial. It wasn't.
Every piece of information that was presented was something I could have figured out independently or by looking up in the program manual. It was a waste of time.
It really upsets me that with all these budget issues happening within the school districts, administrators and program directors aren't doing everything possible to save the district money. Like paying for one trainer instead of three and only training those teachers who feel they really need the training in order to be successful? There's an idea!
Or giving a 3-hour training instead of a 6-hour training, because, really...it could have been done in two.
Now while the technicalities of the training flat out sucked...I do like the new program that the district is using. It really streamlines the information and eliminates the amount of paperwork that is processed in special education. It is very user-friendly and will hopefully eliminate some of the errors the district has faced in the past with IEPs.
To start off, I could have spent the day in my classroom actually doing something productive and catching up on the work that's stacked up because I was out sick for a week and a half and because I have an incompetent instructional aide (but that's another blog post altogether). Many of our district's special education teachers opted out of coming today - because this "voluntary" training violates our union contract in about 10 different ways. Unfortunately, as much as I wanted to stay behind and work, I couldn't because I am not yet tenured with the district. And I am POSITIVE that our special education director would have seen my absence as non-compliance and not asked me to return next fall despite exemplary evaluations from my site administrator.
So, I was bitter about attending this whole training from the get-go.
On top of that, though, the district failed to offer any sort of waiver for those teachers who are tech-savvy and/or have advanced degrees in technology (like myself) that would allow for us to figure out the program on our own. By not doing so, the district is basically paying me to sit in a computer lab for 6 hours and chat on Facebook or pin new ideas on Pinterest. Now that's being fiscally conscientious!
I was hoping that this training would be beneficial. It wasn't.
Every piece of information that was presented was something I could have figured out independently or by looking up in the program manual. It was a waste of time.
It really upsets me that with all these budget issues happening within the school districts, administrators and program directors aren't doing everything possible to save the district money. Like paying for one trainer instead of three and only training those teachers who feel they really need the training in order to be successful? There's an idea!
Or giving a 3-hour training instead of a 6-hour training, because, really...it could have been done in two.
Now while the technicalities of the training flat out sucked...I do like the new program that the district is using. It really streamlines the information and eliminates the amount of paperwork that is processed in special education. It is very user-friendly and will hopefully eliminate some of the errors the district has faced in the past with IEPs.
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