See that handwriting?

I'm usually in bed at this time, since, as I have complained many times before, 5 AM is friggin' early.

And I am heading there momentarily.

I was just sitting here thinking about stuff.
And things.
And the handwriting on the wall.

I'm getting fed up with the company I work for. I realize no company is perfect, and that no one does things exactly the way I do them. But it aggravates me that they think getting us all t-shirts (and making us wear them... really we already have shirts, I think I have about 10 in my personal collection) is going to fix anything. That we're suddenly going to appear professional.

What we need is a person who does training full time. (Yes, I know, you and you and you over there in the back row... you've all mentioned it. And told me that I'd be good at it.)

I wouldn't necessarily be good at it, I'm a little impatient with stupidity and incompetence. I've lost my ability to look at an adult treating a child disrespectfully and walk away, too.

But a full time training position and some goddamn standards of care. Things we should never allow at sites (like the whole gymnastics thing I wrote about the other day)
and ways of dealing with children that are demeaning, demoralizing and degrading.

It really bothers me that the people who are doing those things don't even see anything wrong with it.

I actually asked someone recently when she was talking about giving good behavior tickets to her group for doing things like cleaning up their toys or organizing the books or whatever, "Are they kids or donkeys?"

When she didn't get the reference (and really why would she) I tried to explain briefly that kids want to help, they are generally predisposed to doing the right thing and don't benefit from incentive programs. Carrot and stick are not good for anyone. That in fact, research has proven the opposite.

The trouble is that people who handle things that way aren't deep thinkers and wouldn't understand the research anyway.

It frustrates me.

I looked at the website of my former employer this evening. Of course they're hiring, they always are. But what got me was the list of schools. There are a lot of them in Portland Public Schools that used to host programs run by my current employer. And now those schools have their programs instead.

It pisses me off on so many levels. First, of course, is the fact that they don't put children first. In fact, children aren't even on their list of priorities. They're a profit-driven organization, and the ONLY thing they care about is making money.

If you're sufficiently interested, look through my blog archives ('my job' is the category) from 2005 to 2016 and see how they changed over those years. Employees were treated with less respect every year, it became harder to get basic supplies and hey, let's not forget the Cavalcade of Cunts that eventually made things so ridiculously intolerable that I finally left. Along with 11 out of 15 people in just  one year.

Right now there isn't even one person working there who worked with me. We've all gone on to different things.

Of course there's a complete redesign of logos and a new business model about every seven years. This is for them to get out from under the pile of lawsuits from employees. It's not hard to find this information, by the way. I'm not saying anything here that isn't all over the place on the web.

Bunch of assholes from the top down. And I could never work for them again even if I hadn't burned the bridge while I was still standing right in the middle of it. I have too much self-respect and too much respect and admiration for kids.

My current employer is a much better fit.

But unless they do some serious changing, and I don't think I'd waste a whole lot of time getting around to it if I were them, we're going to end up being booted out of all of the schools in the metro area and then I'll be out of a goddamn job again.

Ugh.