MONTREAL – As Quebec struggles to recruit enough teachers to fill its classrooms ahead of the new school year, a major union is warning that it’s proving equally hard to find enough suppor...
40% more pool repairers are inconsequential if they will only work on residential pools and what you have is a commercial pool. You haven’t dug deep enough into the data yet.
That’s my point, the data on why we need more people for the same education isn’t available. The data on why we have fewer educators per child, despite more pers in the industry isn’t available. We’re only told there is a shortage of educators.
That data can generate insight into how to mitigate or reduce the educator to student ratio deficit.
That data could also generate insight into reducing the cost per student, or increasing educator:student ratios at the same cost.
Note: I’m using educator to teacher and support staff, I’m not sure if this is the correct terminology?
Perhaps they are who disappeared? Either by leaving the workforce or by becoming employees, rebalancing with any employees who left the workforce in the same period?
That’s a plausible explanation. Probably doesn’t apply to education. Perhaps we’re seeing reductions in parental volunteerism within education, as a byproduct of increasing cost of living?
capital could do most of the work and people could laze around most days, having little to do. But that’s not the choice we made.
Here in lies my greatest problem. Not necessarily that we made that choice, but the byproduct that we have increased the costs to participate in society. Which comes with the third order effect of increasingly minimizing those who cannot afford that participation cost.
We’ve also reduced jobs/trades that were historically available with a low work : high idle time. For example, farming has historically had high idle time (with backbreaking surge to be sure) but with all the innovations I don’t think anyone doubts the long, year round hours farmers are reporting.
the data on why we need more people for the same education isn’t available.
Not available because it doesn’t exist, not available because your request to see it was rejected?
Probably doesn’t apply to education.
It would not apply to teachers hired by a public school board, but that’s hardly where teaching ends. Guitar teachers, for example, are quite likely to not be employees. We don’t know the breakdown of what kind of teachers are involved.
For example, farming has historically had high idle time
Modern farming has high idle time, for the most part. Which is why 80% of farmers today have off-farm jobs. Being a farmer myself, I’m able to be here right now thanks to that idle time. Historically, not so much. There was always something needing to be done – stuff we can sick capital at nowadays.
but the byproduct that we have increased the costs to participate in society.
The byproduct is that you get to participate in society. Historically, that farmer you speak of maybe got to town once a week to stock up on supplies and got to see his neighbours at church on Sunday. Otherwise, that was his only real interaction with the outside world.
Not available because it doesn’t exist, not available because your request to see it was rejected?
Because I wouldn’t know where to ask.
We don’t know the breakdown of what kind of teachers are involved.
We don’t know numbers for each subclassification, but we know what subclassifications exist. For guitar teachers, for example, while 61161 - fine arts schools exists as an NAICS code, it seems to be US only.
Being a farmer myself, I’m able to be here right now thanks to that idle time
Fair enough, all the farmers I know are non-owner mushroom farmers, so that likely biased my view. They also bitch a lot, so it’s not the most accurate information. I appreciate the new insight
The byproduct is that you get to participate in society.
IF you have the capital to do so. That is very much still based on luck. Someone born to a poor family in a factory town where school ends at grade ten, is going to have a different opertunities than someone born to the wealthy family, regardless of the real potential of each individual or their ability to successfully handle capital.
Even if you don’t, it society is much more accessible today. Look at how dramatically the cost of food has fallen as a prime example. Not that long ago, food took up around half a typical family’s budget. Now, more like 10-15%.
In the 1920s, a bushel of wheat was worth around $1 USD; or $15 USD today. Today’s price is $6 USD for a bushel of wheat. That’s a decline of $9 per bushel in real dollars over the past 100 years. And wheat is inflated right now due to the conflict in the Ukraine. Should that come to an end any time soon, that $9 will grow even larger.
That stark cost reduction enables things – like being able to subscribe to telephone and Internet service, which opens whole new doors to engage with society. Nearly everyone has phone and/or internet service today. That historic farmer most certainly didn’t. They had church on Sunday. That’s about it.
Today, if you live your life with nothing but church on Sunday, you really can laze around for most of the rest of your time. But, indeed, almost nobody is content with having nothing but church on Sunday anymore. For a lot of people today, church isn’t even considered an activity worthy of their time because our standards for what makes for a good social activity have been able to rise so much higher.
That’s my point, the data on why we need more people for the same education isn’t available. The data on why we have fewer educators per child, despite more pers in the industry isn’t available. We’re only told there is a shortage of educators.
That data can generate insight into how to mitigate or reduce the educator to student ratio deficit.
That data could also generate insight into reducing the cost per student, or increasing educator:student ratios at the same cost.
Note: I’m using educator to teacher and support staff, I’m not sure if this is the correct terminology?
That’s a plausible explanation. Probably doesn’t apply to education. Perhaps we’re seeing reductions in parental volunteerism within education, as a byproduct of increasing cost of living?
Here in lies my greatest problem. Not necessarily that we made that choice, but the byproduct that we have increased the costs to participate in society. Which comes with the third order effect of increasingly minimizing those who cannot afford that participation cost.
We’ve also reduced jobs/trades that were historically available with a low work : high idle time. For example, farming has historically had high idle time (with backbreaking surge to be sure) but with all the innovations I don’t think anyone doubts the long, year round hours farmers are reporting.
Not available because it doesn’t exist, not available because your request to see it was rejected?
It would not apply to teachers hired by a public school board, but that’s hardly where teaching ends. Guitar teachers, for example, are quite likely to not be employees. We don’t know the breakdown of what kind of teachers are involved.
Modern farming has high idle time, for the most part. Which is why 80% of farmers today have off-farm jobs. Being a farmer myself, I’m able to be here right now thanks to that idle time. Historically, not so much. There was always something needing to be done – stuff we can sick capital at nowadays.
The byproduct is that you get to participate in society. Historically, that farmer you speak of maybe got to town once a week to stock up on supplies and got to see his neighbours at church on Sunday. Otherwise, that was his only real interaction with the outside world.
Because I wouldn’t know where to ask.
We don’t know numbers for each subclassification, but we know what subclassifications exist. For guitar teachers, for example, while 61161 - fine arts schools exists as an NAICS code, it seems to be US only.
Fair enough, all the farmers I know are non-owner mushroom farmers, so that likely biased my view. They also bitch a lot, so it’s not the most accurate information. I appreciate the new insight
IF you have the capital to do so. That is very much still based on luck. Someone born to a poor family in a factory town where school ends at grade ten, is going to have a different opertunities than someone born to the wealthy family, regardless of the real potential of each individual or their ability to successfully handle capital.
Even if you don’t, it society is much more accessible today. Look at how dramatically the cost of food has fallen as a prime example. Not that long ago, food took up around half a typical family’s budget. Now, more like 10-15%.
In the 1920s, a bushel of wheat was worth around $1 USD; or $15 USD today. Today’s price is $6 USD for a bushel of wheat. That’s a decline of $9 per bushel in real dollars over the past 100 years. And wheat is inflated right now due to the conflict in the Ukraine. Should that come to an end any time soon, that $9 will grow even larger.
That stark cost reduction enables things – like being able to subscribe to telephone and Internet service, which opens whole new doors to engage with society. Nearly everyone has phone and/or internet service today. That historic farmer most certainly didn’t. They had church on Sunday. That’s about it.
Today, if you live your life with nothing but church on Sunday, you really can laze around for most of the rest of your time. But, indeed, almost nobody is content with having nothing but church on Sunday anymore. For a lot of people today, church isn’t even considered an activity worthy of their time because our standards for what makes for a good social activity have been able to rise so much higher.
Those are all fair points, if we’re looking with a generational lens. On a more micro scale, at least with food, it’s more bleak.
In 2007/8 and 2011/2, food insecurity was 7.1% and 7.8%. 2018 was 16.8% and 2021 was 18.4%.
So perhaps the average metric tracks up, but the lower echelons are being further marginalized.