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Teaching: Contract Renewal

The reality of being a public school teacher is that you will have to face an annual deadline called the contract renewal.

• If you are doing a good job, this yearly rite should not present any problems.
• The district will notify you that it is renewing your contract, and that will be that.

Canva generated this picture of a teacher seated at her desk.

But what if things are not going well?

• You're unhappy. You sense that things are not going well.
• Perhaps you have even received a written communication indicating that things are not going well.
• What to do? If issues remain unresolved, it's best to complete the year and part ways amicably.
• After all, you will need the district to give you as good a reference as possible.
• In any case, let's look at the renewal process from the district's point of view. Why, then, should we renew your contract?

This video looks at the pros and cons of signing a new teaching contract.

Give me lots of reasons why we should do so.

We hired you in good faith. You interviewed well and seemed enthusiastic about teaching here. Your transcripts and references were sound, and everything checked out. Consequently, we had great expectations.

• For the most part, you have not let us down.

School Safety: Shootings

As I began my research for this article on school shootings, I thought it best to look at the history of shootings in American schools. I expected the timeline to cover the 19th and 20th centuries, but I wasn't prepared to discover that the first shootings dated back to the 1700s.

• First, read K12 Academics' . That article covers from colonial days through to 2010.
• Then, to take us up to 2015 read Maria Esther Hammack's . Reporting in the New York Times, Christine Hauser's article chronicles the first five months of 2022.

Having documented shootings, let us look at what you and I can do to keep our children safe in schools at every level.

Inspired by past school shooters, some perpetrators are . However, most school shooters are motivated by a generalized anger. Their path to violence involves self-hate and despair turned outward at the world, and our research finds they often communicate their intent to do harm in advance as a final, desperate . The key to stopping these tragedies is for society to be and act on them immediately. from

After a year and a half struggling to survive a global pandemic, the world is finally starting to get back to normal. Though challenges brought by the rising Delta variant still exist, many schools are planning to return to in-person instruction in the coming fall. This news comes as a welcome relief to parents who have had to juggle supervising their child’s remote education while continuing to work their own jobs.

Though the COVID-19 pandemic left no one unaffected, it exacerbated a number of existing issues within the public school system and created some new challenges. Returning to school in the fall of 2021 won’t be smooth sailing and parents had better start preparing themselves (and their children) now to ensure as seamless a transition as possible.

In this article, we’ll explore some of the effects the COVID-19 pandemic had on public school systems and talk about what the future holds. We’ll also provide helpful tips for students, parents, and educators as they anticipate their return to school in the fall.

Impact of the Pandemic on 51�Թ�������

In March of 2020, the World Health Organization declared the spread of COVID-19 a worldwide pandemic. Being in the middle of their second semester, schools across the country (and around the world) were sent scrambling to make adjustments. Many schools closed for in-person instruction entirely, switching to virtual learning, and many parents withdrew their children from schools entirely in favor of teaching them at home.

In a

The term “special” is typically used to describe something that is better or greater than the average. In terms of education, however, the term is often used to describe students who are different or differently abled. Special education focuses on helping children with disabilities learn and, just as every student is different, so are the various approaches to special education.

Parents and teachers have always had their work cut out for them when it comes to educating and caring for special needs students, but the COVID-19 pandemic has created new challenges that may last for years to come. In this article, we’ll discuss the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on special education and provide useful information for both parents and teachers.

What is Special Education?

The term “special education” generally refers to a set of services provided to students who have unique learning needs. In terms of federal law, according to the (IDEA), however, special education is defined as: “Specially designed instruction, at no cost to parents, to meet the unique needs of a child with a disability.”

In order to qualify for special education services, students must have an identified disability that affects their ability to learn. Eligible disabilities may include the following:

• Intellectual disabilities
• Speech or language impairment
• Hearing impairment
• Visual impairment
• Serious emotional disturbance
• Traumatic brain injury
• Orthopedic impairments
• Autism spectrum disorder
• Developmental delay
• Specific learning disabilities

Federal law requires schools to provide an appropriate education for all of their students with disabilities, regardless their disability