Dublin Core
Title
Subject
Description
Creator
Source
Publisher
Date
Contributor
Rights
Relation
Format
Language
Type
Identifier
Coverage
Text Item Type Metadata
Text
There are more than 1,500 public schools in Kentucky, but they are not the only ones being affected by the state’s waning funds. Vocational schools are often forgotten in the mess of the education system.
There are 126 vocational, or trade, schools in Kentucky. Paducah Tilghman, in McCracken County is one of those. These schools are for children wanting an alternative to the classical academic landscape. They learn more through hands on activities and assignments. Trade schools offer that opportunity to students.
Garry Wheatley, a retired video production educator at Paducah Tilghman’s vocational school, says his pupils were not like the typical high school student.
“As far as the students that my program attracted, it was sort of the artsy students," he said. "They may not have done real well in the core classes, they weren’t above average students in their core classes as a general rule. Now, there were always exceptions.”
Vocational schools give students the ability to weld, plumb, run electrical wiring, and even shoot video. A new survey by bridging the talent gap, shows companies are having a hard time filling jobs requiring the skills listed above. Funding has proven to be a significant factor.
In 1988 when he started teaching, Wheatley was in command of a brand new program.
“initially, as far as startup money was concerned, it was quite a bit of money available," he said. "The yearly classroom budget was several thousand dollars, and it afforded me the opportunity of being able to buy the little knickknack type toys, that go along the with editing equipment and things like that. Microphones, mic con stand's, light bulbs for the studio and things like that.”
However, as time went on his budget would change. Each year after it would dwindle to the point where he sometimes had to dip into his own pocket to provide for his students. Wheatley says it was not unusual to spend about $200 a year. Asking for a reimbursement from the school was often too cumbersome. He says the paperwork that had to be done was not worth the hassle.
The skills vocational schools provide students often gives them purpose. Communities are benefitted by graduates of trade schools in that their infrastructure is upheld. Educational funding in Kentucky has become worse throughout the years, and the future is uncertain. Not only for public schools, but for the often overlooked vocational schools.
Original Format
https://drive.google.com/file/d/10FCYEYmAMvccIc9wrvXMbV9tn8plgMYx/view?usp=sharing
Transcript:
Garry Wheatley: My name is Garry Wheatley G-A-R-R-Y W-H-E-A-T-L-E-Y.
Interviewer: Okay. And what would you call yourself? Your title?
Garry Wheatley: Retired.
Interviewer: Retired. How about retired educator, is that all right?
Garry Wheatley: Okay. Yeah, let's go with that.
Interviewer: There you go.
Garry Wheatley: Retired educator.
Interviewer: So when did you first get into teaching?
Garry Wheatley: 1988 was my first year of teaching.
Interviewer: When did you get out of this station?
Garry Wheatley: I left WPSD at 1988.
Interviewer: 19 ... okay. So you left the station to go into teaching? I got you.
Garry Wheatley: Correct.
Interviewer: Why did you go into teaching?
Garry Wheatley: Well, a varied amount of reasons. My situation at WPSD basically consisted of being low on the totem pole. No hopes really of the people above me leaving or retiring anytime soon. The hours were not the best hours.
Interviewer: I understand.
Garry Wheatley: Another issue that I had in my family life of course was that I was working nights and weekends. I had two small children and had seen other people in the station out there basically put their family life on hold, while kids were doing plays and sports and things like that, and these people were always at work. So I just put a lot more emphasis on my family than a job. So I decided that going into education would much better suit my kids' schedules. So, I was able to go to plays, and in baseball games, and PTA president and all that sort of stuff. That was the main reason, or reasons.
Interviewer: Reasons. Did you like teaching?
Garry Wheatley: Oh, absolutely. The core of it all, of course was working with young people. I'm not sure that I could have worked with middle school or elementary. My disposition allowed me to work very well with high school students, young adults.
Interviewer: So what would you change about the way education works? If you could change something, I guess. How would you, and your experience with it? Because ...
Garry Wheatley: Well, my- [crosstalk 00:02:38]
Speaker 3: There you go.
Interviewer: Awesome. Thank you.
Garry Wheatley: My employment was through the state of Kentucky, in the Workforce Development Cabinet. So the vision that I had for education was through vocational education. My class being an elective, it was a not a core class, so students that were involved in the program that I taught, they had either an interest in it or just wanted to know more about it. Or was truly interested in going into that field. As far as the students that my program attracted, it was sort of the artsy students. They may not have done real well in the core classes, they wasn't above average students in their core classes as a general rule. Now, there were always exceptions.
Garry Wheatley: But, whenever they come into my classroom, one of the things that I wanted them to know was that we had a lot of equipment there early on, that was technologically advanced. I suppose really the thing that has occurred over time is that the technology's just grown by leaps and bounds, especially since 1988. But, students know so much more about technology now. By having that technology available to them, it allowed them to have a greater understanding of not only what they needed to learn, but what the future held for them.
Garry Wheatley: As far as how I would want education to change, I think it would go back to money, basically. Make sure that students in the classrooms have the kind of equipment, and the opportunities, and the quality of education that it takes from the vocational standpoint. Because that's what I'm honing in on here, is the fact that vocational education is an alternative student to students who may not want to go to a four year college, as an example. So if they have to work with their hands and their mind, then they need the proper equipment to be able to hone their skills. So by having the money available for equipment and things like that, I think is probably the one thing that I would immediately put my finger on.
Interviewer: Okay. I know you're funding probably came from the state, right?
Garry Wheatley: That is correct.
Interviewer: Do you know about how much funding they allotted, I guess, to you? Per year or whatever?
Garry Wheatley: Oh my goodness. Well, as time went on, in 1988 there was a lot of money available. Of course, I had a brand new program, it was sort of unique in the state of Kentucky. As far as I know, there were maybe two other television programs in the state at that given time. So initially, as far as startup money was concerned, it was quite a bit of money available. The yearly classroom budget was several thousand dollars, and it afforded me the opportunity of being able to buy the little knickknack type toys, that go along the with editing equipment and things like that. Microphones, mic con stand's, light bulbs for the studio and things like that.
Garry Wheatley: But, obviously as time went by, the budget was trimmed, and next year it was trimmed again, and the year after that it was trimmed again. In essence as it went through time, the supply budget was what it was called, on a yearly basis had to be shared throughout the entire building. In other words, the building was given an X amount of money from the state, and then it was up to the principal and the instructors to sort of divvy it up as to who needed it most. And of course there were some programs in that building over there that went through a lot of consumables.
Garry Wheatley: As an example, welding. You can't teach a kid to weld if you don't have no welding sticks, as an example. By having a program like that, that would use a lot of consumables, auto body, auto mechanics, and welding and carpentry, there was a lot of consumables that was ... I hesitate to call it wasted, but certainly used up.
Interviewer: For sure. Yeah.
Garry Wheatley: Some of those programs would tend to always have to have a certain operating budget, where in my world, once I had the basics, all I needed was electricity. So, that came out of a different potential.
Interviewer: Right. The power bill. Gotcha. So you started in 1988 and you retired in what, 2015? Is that right? Is it three years ago? Or 2016?
Garry Wheatley: It's been approximately two and a half, three years. Something like that.
Interviewer: Okay, Gotcha.
Garry Wheatley: I think it's actually closer to two years ago. And I've been enjoying every day of it.
Interviewer: Yeah. That's awesome. Let's see here. So how much of your salary did you on your students, or did you at all?
Garry Wheatley: You might ought to touch that or it will go to sleep.
Interviewer: Oh, yeah. Okay.
Garry Wheatley: Do that every now and again.
Interviewer: Okay.
Garry Wheatley: That's difficult to say. A lot of it would depend upon circumstances. I mean, as an example, if we had something special going on and ... it was easier in some cases, in the case of time, to just buy it out of my own pocket. Because the purchasing through the school was a little bit cumbersome. You had to fill out a purchase request, you had to get a purchase order, you had to jump through these little hoops to get something quite small, a box of batteries as an example.
Garry Wheatley: So it wasn't unusual at all for me to pay out of my pocket for little things, like batteries as an example. I went through a lot of batteries. But I will say that on a yearly average, it wasn't unusual at all for them to spend maybe a couple hundred dollars out of pocket at least, at least.
Interviewer: Gotcha. Did the school ever reimburse you for any of that?
Garry Wheatley: Some of it that could. Most of it, it was again, too cumbersome to even ask for. It was $5. I wouldn't want to-
Interviewer: Yeah. Paperwork and time.
Garry Wheatley: ... go through the hassle of trying to get $5 back. If it was $50 or so it would be worth it.
Interviewer: Right. I gotcha. Okay, let's see here. I'm not exactly sure how Kentucky's pension system works. But I guess how did that affect ... did they give you a pension through the vocational?
Garry Wheatley: Yes.
Interviewer: They did?
Garry Wheatley: When I started in 1988, at that point in time the vocational schools were divided into high school and what was know as post-secondary. We were sort of brothers in arms, in the sense that there was a cabinet level position in the governor's office that operated workforce development data. Several years later, later, and I don't recall the exact years, I'm going to say somewhere around 2000, 2005, somewhere in that window, the post secondary education division separated from the high school, and combined forces with a junior colleges and the PCCS of Kentucky. That's where the WKUCTCS.
Garry Wheatley: Because they were post-secondary and of course the two year colleges were post-secondary. So by combining those two, it made sense to me really for them to be together. But that sorta orphaned the high school schools. In essence, we were moved over into the Department of Education of HR. As far as the ... I don't know a good word here. The effect that it had on the pension, was that we were all still in the Kentucky Teacher's retirement system, even from the very, very beginning.
Garry Wheatley: But the catch to that, of course is, is that the people who left that was in the post-secondary education and moved in with the junior colleges, if I'm not mistaken, they get an option. They could either stay in KTRS or move into another pension system, which I'm not familiar with. It was state operated, But more than anything, the pension system with KTRS, Kentucky Teacher Retirement System was offered to me in 1988. In an essence, because I taught high school, I stayed at KTR system throughout the entire time. I hope that answered your question.
Interviewer: Yeah.
Garry Wheatley: Ask the same question again.
Interviewer: Well, let me see.
Garry Wheatley: It's ... had sort of a convoluted answer.
Interviewer: Has Kentucky's pension crisis affected your retirement budget? Is essentially what I was getting at.
Garry Wheatley: Well, I will say this. As far as an additional statement, the one thing that affected my pension probably more than anything was when Steve Beshear became governor, he immediately froze everybody's salaries. Sometimes it was convenient for the state of Kentucky for me to be a teacher, and sometimes it was convenient with the state of Kentucky for me to be a state employee. But from their viewpoint. Because I was a state employee my salary was frozen for eight years, and that was the last eight years of my work. Well, I don't wanna say last eight years. It was eight of the last nine years of my work, so it had a huge effect on my salary.
Garry Wheatley: Of course, it had a huge effect on my retirement as well. Right. Because the COLA raises for the state employees, which was state mandated, I believe it was a 1.5% yearly COLA raise. So, I wasn't given that raise for eight years running. Of course it was the Bush era term that caused that to occur.
Interviewer: That would have been '08, is that right? Ish, '08, '09?
Garry Wheatley: Well, I'm not sure when he was elected.
Interviewer: Yeah, I'm not either.
Garry Wheatley: I'm not sure of these dates.
Interviewer: Yeah, yeah, I'll look that up, okay.
Garry Wheatley: But anyway, the point is that, I mean, that was one of very first things he did was to try to get hold of the budget crisis in Kentucky, was to freeze state employees hours. Made a big difference in mine.
Interviewer: So how are trade schools affected by the pension crisis, like the school as a whole, if at all?
Garry Wheatley: Well, I would say that the number one thing would be to attract teachers to come into a vocational school that ... I mean you've got to have a big enough dangling carrot in front of him to leave their trade. Which typically, if they've been in their trade for very long at all, they're not only good at their trade, but they're probably making a very sufficient salary and et cetera, et cetera. For them to leave that trade and come into an educational environment, they're losing a lot of perks, shall we say. By leaving industry and moving into the education.
Garry Wheatley: Of course insurance is a valuable carrot to dangle in front of someone. And of course the state of Kentucky being a state of Kentucky, the insurance has changed over the years. And probably as a general rule, in my opinion, isn't as good as private sector insurance. Plus too, in my own case, I had to take a pretty good cut in pay to leave WPSD and go into education. The other side of that seesaw was, even though my salary level actually might have decreased, I had more "time off". I had time off on the weekends.
Garry Wheatley: To an effect, I did get some of that money back in the sense that I didn't have to pay any social security. While I worked at WPSD social security was taken out of my check, just like any private sector employee, or business employee. In the state of Kentucky and KTRS system, social security is not taken out of your check. Teachers, if that's the only thing that they've done in their life is teach, then come retirement time they will not be receiving social security. They receive Medicare at the proper age, but they won't be receiving any social security.
Garry Wheatley: But in my particular case, I worked enough in a business that I'm either right at or very close to being able to receive a minimal social security check, only because I've worked in business before I started teaching. I guess really, it all boils down to the fact that it's difficult to attract high level teachers into a vocational classroom, if they can't offer them almost the same thing that they were already getting working for a business. So what ends up happening is you tend to get maybe a lot of young teachers in a vocational classroom, that maybe doesn't have all of the experience that some teachers might have.
Garry Wheatley: Plus too, in a vocational setting the purpose is to hire people who know the trade, because they're going to be teaching the trade. It's not like you can go get a bachelor's degree in carpentry. They want you to know the skills of being a carpenter before you ever step into the classroom. And in essence, they'll teach you to be a teacher. So, the skIlls, trades that have good teachers, they're sort of foreign fee between, well I won't put it like that. It's difficult to find a teacher that has the experience and the desire be a teacher, because it takes a special person to be a teacher. And to be able to accept the circumstances of being in the classroom.
Garry Wheatley: It's hardcore, vocational education, to get good qualified people. And keeping them. Because over and over again, I've seen it several times, somebody would leave the trade, come into the classroom and be there for two or three years and say, "This isn't for me," and go right back into the trade. I've seen that over and over again.
Interviewer: Yeah, that's interesting, because it affects the whole ... it affects students so much. Like when they get into whatever it is, whatever trade that they're into, they might not be as prepared as they should be. So maybe they suffer a little bit too.
Garry Wheatley: Oh, I agree entirely.
Interviewer: Okay. Let's get into state testing a little bit. How did state testing work in your classroom specifically?
Garry Wheatley: Well, I guess the first effect that I saw in the vocational classroom is that students coming from the home high schools were held to a certain standard. An educational standard based on how well they did in english, math and sciences, and that sort of thing. So the home high schools put a lot of pressure on the vocational schools, on the ATCs to help them bring students up by incorporating the core class curriculum into the vocational education curriculum. So in other words, the vocational classrooms would incorporate more math, as an example, in their curriculum to help students get a better grasp of math and bring up their math scores for the home high school.
Garry Wheatley: The same thing was true of reading, and writing and arithmetic, the list goes on, science. We had to do a lot of curriculum rewriting to incorporate those things. I guess really that was probably the main injection into the vocational classroom. Read the question one more time. There was something else I wanted to bring out.
Interviewer: Oh yeah. How does state testing affect trade schools?
Garry Wheatley: Oh, and of course the "trade schools", vocational education, it's not really outcome based as such, but it is performance based. In the sense that, if you're taught how to cut a board at a certain angle, then the test is cut this board at a certain angle. By having a hands-on kind of outcome doesn't jive very well, it doesn't fit real well with the general education testing, if you will. You can take a multiple choice question test on how to cut a board. I mean, there is a place for testing like that, but it really comes down to can you physically perform the acts that I'm trying to teach you? The task.
Garry Wheatley: There was a lot of interaction that took place there. But in vocational education it's a different request of the student. So that the student can end up with a talent if you will, that it isn't taught at the high school.
Interviewer: Right. I gotcha. So when you're talking about rewriting the curriculum, did you do that yearly? Or how often did you do that?
Garry Wheatley: Well, truth be known, you continually rewrite your curriculum. Well now, I don't say your curriculum. You certainly rewrite your teaching styles. When you do something and it flops in the classroom, you don't do it that way anymore. You alter something, you change something, you add to, take away from, whatever, whatever. So you're always honing your teaching styles so that you're more effective. But, as far as the curriculum that I had for television production, I basically he had to come up with it myself.
Garry Wheatley: When I started in 1988. There was no television production at the high school level. So I was able to, to be captain of my own ship, if you will. As time went by, not only more television production [inaudible 00:26:19] sprung up throughout the state, but the state certainly saw a need of combining all these classrooms. In the sense that, there was no need for me to write all this curriculum here in West Kentucky, and someone in East Kentucky have to do the exact same thing. It goes back to carpentry and cutting that board.
Garry Wheatley: I mean, basically, there's only one way to cut this board properly, so why would Teacher A have to write a curriculum based on that, and teacher B have to write the curriculum too? So they wanted to combine as many of the curriculums as possible. A lot of my curriculum was based on the college level curriculum. Because there were television curriculums out there, it's just that they were not designed or really suited for high school as such. Of course in [inaudible 00:27:22] college, you've got students for much longer time period. You've got their attention much more too.
Garry Wheatley: A college student is much more tentative and willing to do the things that need to be done, as opposed to a high school student. You have to drag them along with you. They might not always want to be-
Interviewer: Cooperative?
Garry Wheatley: Cooperative, that's the word. Very good word. Of course, we all have good days and bad days. But high school students have a different attitude.
Interviewer: Yeah. What incentives did your school get based off the testing or whatever? Whenever you were talking about the yearly proof of performance kind of thing-
Garry Wheatley: Yeah. It wasn't called proof of performance. We referred to it as the black box. It was a set of measures based upon 21 standards that, how well you were able to obtain a high score in each standard. Part of the standards was, liKe I mentioned earlier, arithmetic, reading, science and there was another one that they were getting ready to do you incorporate to ... But anyway, that was just one of the 21 standards that we had to prove that we were doing well in.
Interviewer: So in the vocational school, they even had you do math and writing and things like that.
Garry Wheatley: Oh, absolutely.
Interviewer: OK.
Garry Wheatley: But I mean that's part of the trade. Now granted in television production there wasn't as much math, if you will. But you did have math in the sense of calculating times. When it come time to build a set, for instance, you had to be able to read a rule. You had to be able to ... well, I mean you use math every day. It's just that in different trades you use different kinds of math. So as an example, in the old school television equipment we had to have a lot of light.
Garry Wheatley: The equipment had to have a lot of light coming into the cameras, because they were 2 depth cameras. So, we had to use light level meters to light a set, for a person to be lit correctly. Of course that's the idea, is to not light them poorly, but to light them correctly. So we had to calculate foot candles, and all that sort of stuff. So, there was math. Oh, you don't touch it well enough, huh?
Interviewer: No, I didn't.
Garry Wheatley: I don't know what it's set on. I don't remember.
Interviewer: There you go. Thank you.
Garry Wheatley: I don't ever play with it too often.
Interviewer: Okay.
Garry Wheatley: What was that question again? [crosstalk 00:30:42]
Interviewer: Yeah. So like what incentives did you guys get, I guess? If any.
Garry Wheatley: wheatley finished.wma: http://gofile.me/47EOD/ZvbvVBicK.