TEACHERS' PET PEEVES 74 PERCENT SAY THEY MIGHT LEAVE IF GIVEN CHANCE

Utah teachers love what they do - and hate the conditions under which they are doing it. In a Deseret News survey, 74 percent say they would at least consider leaving the profession if they had a good opportunity.

"This survey confirms what education leaders have been saying," said Superintendent James R. Moss of the State Office of Education. "We have a ticking time bomb on our hands. The survey results are verifiable data that our teachers are being stretched too far. They can only absorb so much work, and they have absorbed what they can. We are worrying about money; we should be worrying about people."Thirty-four percent of the 531 respondents to the poll said they definitely would leave the profession if they had a good alternative; 40 percent said maybe; and only 26 percent that they expect they are in the profession to stay. (Figures have been rounded and may slightly exceed or fall short of 100 percent.)

Orem teacher: "Education is becoming a beggar profession. We beg for money. We beg students to do their work. We beg parents to help. We beg for recognition as a profession. We beg for respect."

Paradoxically, 482 of the respondents said they are either satisfied or somewhat satisfied with their careers as teachers. The level of satisfaction, however, for the great majority, is falling. Sixty-four percent said they are less satisfied now than five years ago; 15 percent the same; 12 percent greater; and 9 percent "don't know."

Salt Lake teacher: "I have been a teacher in Utah for 28 years. It WAS an honorable career at that time, but I would NOT enter the profession again. Education as a career is NOT a good choice today."

One in five (21 percent) of the teachers still rate the state's system as excellent, but the majority (58 percent) see it only as "good" and 18 percent rate it "fair." About 5 percent said the system is "poor."

Salt Lake teacher: "I have taught school in Utah for nearly 20 years and in the past three years, our system has gone backward 20 years. I feel overstuffed classrooms and lack of specialists in the elementary schools, along with a general lack of value placed on education by the community, spells failure in our schools."

Among the teachers' pet peeves are the number of children who fill their classrooms, the insufficient salaries they earn for what they consider a vital societal contribution, the challenge of dealing with a sick society's ills in the school setting and what they perceive as a lack of appreciation from the society they serve.