A Retort to Awesome Matt Polazzo's Retorter

My mother told me two things. Always wear clean underwear in case you are in a car accident, and never argue with crazy people. Well dear old mom, I am about to break one of those rules. FYI, the underwear is clean.

So I wake up with a wicked headache at 2 AM and check the blog. And "anonymous" starts off thusly:

"You are an example of everything that is wrong with incompetent teachers. You are like the teacher "who had given a 100 to a student who claimed that Abraham Lincoln had won the Revolutionary War."

Wow, interesting. Doesn't even know what I teach but is able to deduce my teaching method, style and grading system. But, and this is a big but, something even the Awesome Matt Polazzo failed to point out. When I was in high school passing on a regents was a 65. It is now 55, or 50? Are students being serviced by this? Standardized tests have been dumbed down. Again, how does this benefit the students? And what is the deal with this credit recovery thingy? That was implemented by the wonderful people at Tweed. Isn't that just as bad, if not worse than the teacher who gave a 100?

"Not only did you completely fail to interpret Mr. Polazzo's piece, you are focusing your blog on the wrong things, the trivial things that don't count."

Yes junior, the trivial things do count. I am sure if you wrote a paper for the Awesome Matt Polazzo and left out facts he would let you know.

"you are just a UFT sycophantic suck-up."

ROTFLMFAO!!!! Obviously you have not read the entire blog.

"Explain yourself Matt. You mean the literacy coach? The math coach?..."
"@He explained himself full well if you read the damn article--teachers in the rubber room; teachers getting paid full time to play cards for 6.5 hours..."

Second sentence in his article; "Even hotter is the buzz about what to do with teachers who get paid for staying outside the classroom." He failed to right then and there qualify his point.

"Curious, you had an out of classroom position, and with an office no less. Matt, you are contradicting yourself here aren't you?"
@You know full well he means rubber-room teachers."

Please read above.

"Perhaps you should check out rubberroomovie.com."
"@What? You back up your claims with some nonsense movie? Is that how they taught you do support your arguments when you were in school?"

Isn't this statement a tad bit specious? Have you even bothered to check out that website?

"Define incompetence. Please. Or better yet, define why you think you are so wonderful."
@Incompetence is your blog post. He didn't make any comments about his post. He is merely expressing his disgust at the incompetence of teachers. By your train of thought, a parent who complains must also express why they are wonderful?"

Again, explain incompetence, and explain why Awesome Matt is not incompetent. It is totally probable that one day (and I truly hope this does not happen) that Awesome Matt will be labeled incompetent by a principal that just does not like him.

"As far as the chemistry teacher weeping, what was the question Matt?"
"@"What was the question Matt?" You're kidding me right? You focus way too much on the things that aren't important."

What is the big deal? Why did the teacher weep?

"Hey Matt make you a deal. If and ever you are brought into your principal's office, or are investigated, do not take any advantage of your chapter chair, or any legal services the UFT might offer you. But you won't. You will be the first to whine and beg for the UFT to take care of you."
"@Maybe Mr. Polazzo is man enough to stand up for himself. You're a full grown person. Have some pride; if you're incompetent, go find something else. Earn a living on your own merit; don't freeload off society."

No Awesome Matt is not man enough to stand up for himself. He will want all the protections of the contract if he is ever accused of anything. However, I will respect him more if he came out and renounced any union benefits.

"If true, wrong, but again you do not supply the context. As far as making 3X your salary, SBSB has done some math. You have been teaching about 9-10 year so your salary is somewhere around 65K..."
"@This part pissed me off the most. Quote-on-quote "My first year of teaching". It shows just how little attention you paid to Mr. Polazzo's op-ed. 'Nuff said."

Hey I stand corrected. But. If this was Awesome Matt's first year teaching I would say he was making about 32K. The maximum salary when Bloomberg in 2001 was 70K. Again Awesome Matt was incorrect.

"The contract mentions only two year-end ratings for a teacher: Satisfactory and Unsatisfactory. No other ranking is covered and thus allowed for."
"Wrong!!! There is also N/A. Dang, Matt read the contract!!!"

"@Dang, A Teacher in the Bronx, you're an idiot for even mentioning N/A." Matt was incorrect here. He said only an S or a U can be given, he fails to mention the N/A as well as mentioning that there is space for comments.


So there you have it Junior. If a may paraphrase, "Let us not go blindly into the endless winter night."

"A facts a fact from Nome to Rome."