City Teachers Facing Digital Future

They had all heard the story before, although with different names and places. Many of the 100 Cambridge public school teachers listening to Michael Michalski on Saturday had lived the story themselves.

"I got into teaching just when education started winding down," Michalski said. "I went from job to job, permanent substitute to permanent substitute. I had a strong commitment to education. My plan was to get my foot in the door, and gradually work my way to a position where I could use my innovative skills to do the things I wanted to do.

"After six years I began to realize I wouldn't have that opportunity. I was just going from available job to available job."

The Cambridge teachers gathered at the Rindge and Latin High School listened intently as Michalski and three other former colleagues talked of their new careers in the high technology industry.

The program was designed by the school department to assist the 276 teachers who will lose their jobs next year due to Proposition 2 1/2 in their impending search for alternative employment.

When the discussion ended, the teachers had a simple question for the panel members: would you ever consider returning to education?

For answers there was one unequivocal "no," two "probably nots," and one response that drew a burst of applause from the teachers.

"I would not take any educational job until society was ready to value me as a teacher," Kevin Sullivan, currently a computer programmer for Computer Vision, explained.

Sullivan, who began teaching in Cambridge in 1973, said that after four years of teaching math, he realized that "the system was not interested in educating children or providing support for teachers who were."

Teachers looking for a new career in computers need more than anger at local taxpayers for credentials, though. "You can't walk into an interview with your tail between your legs, sour about what education has done to you and sour about Proposition 2 1/2," James Wisdom, a former teacher currently employed by Data Inc., said.

"The companies will let you know that you're valued as an economic resource," Michalski said. "They know if they don't, you'll walk across the street to their competitor because of the excess demand."

Jon Perroni, the president of Data Inc., told the teachers, "You are underpaid for what you do, and that's the type of people companies are looking for."

The company spokesmen also tried to undermine many of the stereo types of computer programmers. "I thought it would be a dehumanizing environment, working in a cubicle, attached to a terminal," Charlotte Hoppe, a former teacher now employed by Wang Laboratories, explained. "But I enjoy my work; for me it's like solving a puzzle."

Many of the teachers attending the conference said they were seriously considering employment in the high tech industry.

"My problem is that I am the sole supporter of a three year old child and I can't afford not to work," an eight-year veteran of the Cambridge schools explained. "If this is where jobs are available, this is where I'll look for work."

Sick

"I'm just sick of what I'm doing," one teacher who has worked in Cambridge for 20 years said. "Teaching in the inner city has changed so drastically--you don't get feedback from students--that I don't feel valuable anymore."

Another teacher who has spent 20 years in Cambridge said he had thought about leaving, "but you always go through the moral dilemna of abandoning a ship while it's sinking."

All of the teachers thanked the high tech representatives for their help, but at least one noted what he called "more than a coincidence."

He said the computer companies supplied much of the funding for the Citizens for Limited Taxation, which sponsored Proposition 2 1/2, which in turn is creating a pool of skilled workers.