The purpose of teachers' meetings

I would like to respond to Karen Dittman's letter, "Teachers skip service meetings" (Jan. 11). I believe that Ms. Dittman is confused as to the use of the new teacher meetings. Ironically, this does not affect me, as I am an elementary teacher. We still continue to meet in grade levels on our own time.

However, when I read the letter by Ms. Dittman it truly bothered me because it seems that Ms. Dittman is attacking my middle and high school colleagues. What Ms. Dittman does not understand is the reason for these new meetings. Not one teacher has "refused to attend in-service meetings" after school. That would be against our contract.

The new meetings are being used for subject area teachers. In other words, teachers are sitting down in subject area departments to further their understanding of how students are achieving in their classrooms. They are able to look at data and plan lessons to further student achievement according to subject areas.

When teachers go to inservice meetings or staff meetings, we are all together as a school or district. We learn new ways to engage our students as a whole. However, if we are to work as grade levels or departments during the day, we have to do it on our own time. We are contracted for a 7-hour day. Any work done after those hours are not paid for. We do not receive overtime like other professions.

I also would like to point out that teachers are not paid for all of the grading and planning that they have to do. Our weekly one-hour staff meetings after school are part of our contract and not paid for. We continue to get paid our regular salary.

If you happen to see cars in the parking lot of any of the schools after hours, except for Tuesdays during our staff meetings, please understand that teachers are working overtime to further enhance their curriculum and the lives of the students in Moorpark. It is not uncommon to see teacher cars in the Flory parking lot until very late into the evening or even weekends. I am sure that this is the same for other campuses as well.

Don't get me wrong, we choose to do so out of the love for our profession and our students. Unfortunately, when we chose this profession we knew that our pay would be different then other industries. We continue to try to change that.

To conclude, when I see an attack on teachers for any extra paid time it breaks my heart. I know that the one-hour per week is an inconvenience- my son is a high school student and it throws off my schedule as well. But I believe that one small hour in a week will further my son's education. We all need to somehow get used to the change for the benefit of our students in Moorpark. Donna Mockenhaupt Math specialist Flory Academy of Sciences and Technology