Study Reveals FCPS Teacher Career Salaries $142K Below Average of Regional Peers

[Anonymous]

When county employees have received larger increases how often do people go in front of the BOS and say, "Gee. You know what? I think school employees should get the same amount county employees are getting."? If they do, the BOS says its up to the school board. Then, when the school board does give a greater increase to their employees the BOS moan about it. Ultimately I too do not want to pit one group against the other. I think they both deserve decent market scale adjustments.

I have 20+ years with FCPS. I am doing ok. I must say though, in all of those years I have never seen a person at a BOS meeting or SB meeting say, "Hey. Times are good. Instead of a 1.5% COLA, you should make it 2.5%" or, "My employer gave me a 5% raise. You should give school employees the same.". I often hear the opposite.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why people choose teaching as a career if they dislike the working conditions and the pay? I have a lot of friends who are teachers and when they get together all they do is bitch about work. It gets old listening to it. I don't feel the need to burden my friends with the day to day complaints about my job.

Teachers as a collective enjoy complaining about their work and they are very vocal about not being paid enough. Teachers also have this misconception they are the only ones working hard. We as a society feed this negativity on their part and continually tell them they aren't valued, they don't make enough, they work too much. But what would be fair pay? If we gave them all $125K annual salary I still don't think they would feel adequately compensated.

But my question is this, what person ever thinks they are paid enough for what they do? We all want more money.

Really? Lawyers love to complain about their jobs, or quit and change careers or stay home. Doctors love to complain about how everything is harder now, more patients and less time, the money is gone, etc. But it does seem as if teachers have it a bit worse -- low pay and impossible administration.

I don't know that other professions have people outside of their field thinking they know how to do and telling them how to do their jobs.

Many time people see them as complaints, but a lot of the comments teachers make are made to refute misconceptions about the job brought up by somebody else.

This thread is specifically discussing pay. It's discussing a study done to compare teacher's salaries across the region. No one has ever bothered to do a study of pay across the US much less the region for my job position or field. Public School teachers are public employees with a lot of interaction with the community at the schools and also because of taxes to fund their jobs. Their job also gets a lot of publicity such as the article referred to here so many people are more aware of the current issues facing teachers than other professions. This is why they get a lot of comments from non-teachers. People make the same types of comments about police officers and politicians.

Understood. Here's the thing... Person A says, "It might be nice only having to work 7.5 hours a day for 180 days a year". The teacher responds with, "Well. I actually work about 10 hours a day for 194 days a year". Person A then says the teacher is complaining.

Person B says, "It must be nice getting free healthcare for life". The teacher responds with the fact that they pay $500 a month for their family and that it jumps to almost the whole premium in retirement and they are told they are complaining.

Person C makes a comment that teaching must be easy since she can just reuse the lesson plans from year to year. When the teacher explains about how much work goes into planning small group instruction, remediation, enrichment, etc. she is seen as complaining about her workload.

[Anonymous]

I'm willing to pay teachers a lot more.

But I want 8 hour school days that match working hours (8-4:30) and I want it to be year round with 4 weeks of break (2 in winter and 2 in summer). (I'll be generous with 4 weeks since normal white collar jobs only give 3)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm willing to pay teachers a lot more.

But I want 8 hour school days that match working hours (8-4:30) and I want it to be year round with 4 weeks of break (2 in winter and 2 in summer). (I'll be generous with 4 weeks since normal white collar jobs only give 3)

That's not what the OP is about. It's about how compensation compares with surrounding districts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why people choose teaching as a career if they dislike the working conditions and the pay? I have a lot of friends who are teachers and when they get together all they do is bitch about work. It gets old listening to it. I don't feel the need to burden my friends with the day to day complaints about my job.

Teachers as a collective enjoy complaining about their work and they are very vocal about not being paid enough. Teachers also have this misconception they are the only ones working hard. We as a society feed this negativity on their part and continually tell them they aren't valued, they don't make enough, they work too much. But what would be fair pay? If we gave them all $125K annual salary I still don't think they would feel adequately compensated.

But my question is this, what person ever thinks they are paid enough for what they do? We all want more money.

Really? Lawyers love to complain about their jobs, or quit and change careers or stay home. Doctors love to complain about how everything is harder now, more patients and less time, the money is gone, etc. But it does seem as if teachers have it a bit worse -- low pay and impossible administration.

I don't know that other professions have people outside of their field thinking they know how to do and telling them how to do their jobs.

Many time people see them as complaints, but a lot of the comments teachers make are made to refute misconceptions about the job brought up by somebody else.

This thread is specifically discussing pay. It's discussing a study done to compare teacher's salaries across the region. No one has ever bothered to do a study of pay across the US much less the region for my job position or field. Public School teachers are public employees with a lot of interaction with the community at the schools and also because of taxes to fund their jobs. Their job also gets a lot of publicity such as the article referred to here so many people are more aware of the current issues facing teachers than other professions. This is why they get a lot of comments from non-teachers. People make the same types of comments about police officers and politicians.

Understood. Here's the thing... Person A says, "It might be nice only having to work 7.5 hours a day for 180 days a year". The teacher responds with, "Well. I actually work about 10 hours a day for 194 days a year". Person A then says the teacher is complaining.

Person B says, "It must be nice getting free healthcare for life". The teacher responds with the fact that they pay $500 a month for their family and that it jumps to almost the whole premium in retirement and they are told they are complaining.

Person C makes a comment that teaching must be easy since she can just reuse the lesson plans from year to year. When the teacher explains about how much work goes into planning small group instruction, remediation, enrichment, etc. she is seen as complaining about her workload.

You forgot to discuss retirement pay.

Also FCPS teachers teach core lessons for about 4 hours a day. I find that hard to believe 10 hours is a daily standard of work especially beyond the first year. None of the teachers I know do much in the evening because they have young children. They just don't have the time. To me 10 hours would be more of a problem than the pay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our relative works for Fairfax County year round and makes $75,000 for 18 years of experience. There is no "Save Fairfax County Employees" petition or advocacy group to speak for him. Fairfax County raises were lower than teachers last year. Fairfax County and FCPS teachers are lucky that they still have a pension system in place. The salary increases should be similar to other Fairfax County employees, not just Arlington teachers.

I thought County employees got a 2.3% raise.

Didn't last year's teachers get a step and a 0.62% raise which equaled about 3.62%

Did some county employees also receive step? I hate to pit one group against another. There are years when county employees receive higher raises and years when the school employees receive more. Do we keep going back comparing one to another?

County employees don't get step increases. They haven't for years. Just a straight pay raise. Why does FCPS still have two pay increases?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why people choose teaching as a career if they dislike the working conditions and the pay? I have a lot of friends who are teachers and when they get together all they do is bitch about work. It gets old listening to it. I don't feel the need to burden my friends with the day to day complaints about my job.

Teachers as a collective enjoy complaining about their work and they are very vocal about not being paid enough. Teachers also have this misconception they are the only ones working hard. We as a society feed this negativity on their part and continually tell them they aren't valued, they don't make enough, they work too much. But what would be fair pay? If we gave them all $125K annual salary I still don't think they would feel adequately compensated.

But my question is this, what person ever thinks they are paid enough for what they do? We all want more money.

Really? Lawyers love to complain about their jobs, or quit and change careers or stay home. Doctors love to complain about how everything is harder now, more patients and less time, the money is gone, etc. But it does seem as if teachers have it a bit worse -- low pay and impossible administration.

I don't know that other professions have people outside of their field thinking they know how to do and telling them how to do their jobs.

Many time people see them as complaints, but a lot of the comments teachers make are made to refute misconceptions about the job brought up by somebody else.

This thread is specifically discussing pay. It's discussing a study done to compare teacher's salaries across the region. No one has ever bothered to do a study of pay across the US much less the region for my job position or field. Public School teachers are public employees with a lot of interaction with the community at the schools and also because of taxes to fund their jobs. Their job also gets a lot of publicity such as the article referred to here so many people are more aware of the current issues facing teachers than other professions. This is why they get a lot of comments from non-teachers. People make the same types of comments about police officers and politicians.

Understood. Here's the thing... Person A says, "It might be nice only having to work 7.5 hours a day for 180 days a year". The teacher responds with, "Well. I actually work about 10 hours a day for 194 days a year". Person A then says the teacher is complaining.

Person B says, "It must be nice getting free healthcare for life". The teacher responds with the fact that they pay $500 a month for their family and that it jumps to almost the whole premium in retirement and they are told they are complaining.

Person C makes a comment that teaching must be easy since she can just reuse the lesson plans from year to year. When the teacher explains about how much work goes into planning small group instruction, remediation, enrichment, etc. she is seen as complaining about her workload.

You forgot to discuss retirement pay.

OMG. You totally missed the point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our relative works for Fairfax County year round and makes $75,000 for 18 years of experience. There is no "Save Fairfax County Employees" petition or advocacy group to speak for him. Fairfax County raises were lower than teachers last year. Fairfax County and FCPS teachers are lucky that they still have a pension system in place. The salary increases should be similar to other Fairfax County employees, not just Arlington teachers.

I thought County employees got a 2.3% raise.

Didn't last year's teachers get a step and a 0.62% raise which equaled about 3.62%

Did some county employees also receive step? I hate to pit one group against another. There are years when county employees receive higher raises and years when the school employees receive more. Do we keep going back comparing one to another?

County employees don't get step increases. They haven't for years. Just a straight pay raise. Why does FCPS still have two pay increases?

Police, fire and rescue do. This article stated, "Under the proposed 2015 budget most County employees would receive a 2.3 percent pay raise. Bulova said public safety workers, including police officers and fire and rescue personnel, would receive step salary increases.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/fairfax-spending-plan-includes-tax-increases-pay-raises/2014/04/22/a636f8f4-ca3a-11e3-a75e-463587891b57_story.html

[Anonymous]

I didn't know this. Do they get a step and a cola increase or just a step increase? Why can't Fairfax just have a straight pay raise for it's employees? Why two systems plus a 3rd system through FCPS? FCPS does not want to give up salary control over it's employees so I doubt the BOS will ever be in charge of setting their pay raises.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If I were in Arlington I'd be asking why we are paying our teachers more but don't have schools as good as the top schools in FCPS.

Not sure what this means... Because it is isn't true...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm willing to pay teachers a lot more.

But I want 8 hour school days that match working hours (8-4:30) and I want it to be year round with 4 weeks of break (2 in winter and 2 in summer). (I'll be generous with 4 weeks since normal white collar jobs only give 3)

Teachers in FCPS already work 8 hours, and that's just contract hours. And NO ONE goes home at the end of contract hours in my school. Studies show average work weeks is 55 hours.

So if you want it to be like everywhere else, then maybe they should get overtime too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm willing to pay teachers a lot more.

But I want 8 hour school days that match working hours (8-4:30) and I want it to be year round with 4 weeks of break (2 in winter and 2 in summer). (I'll be generous with 4 weeks since normal white collar jobs only give 3)

Teachers in FCPS already work 8 hours, and that's just contract hours. And NO ONE goes home at the end of contract hours in my school. Studies show average work weeks is 55 hours.

So if you want it to be like everywhere else, then maybe they should get overtime too.

Technically contract hours are 7.5.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why people choose teaching as a career if they dislike the working conditions and the pay? I have a lot of friends who are teachers and when they get together all they do is bitch about work. It gets old listening to it. I don't feel the need to burden my friends with the day to day complaints about my job.

Teachers as a collective enjoy complaining about their work and they are very vocal about not being paid enough. Teachers also have this misconception they are the only ones working hard. We as a society feed this negativity on their part and continually tell them they aren't valued, they don't make enough, they work too much. But what would be fair pay? If we gave them all $125K annual salary I still don't think they would feel adequately compensated.

But my question is this, what person ever thinks they are paid enough for what they do? We all want more money.

Really? Lawyers love to complain about their jobs, or quit and change careers or stay home. Doctors love to complain about how everything is harder now, more patients and less time, the money is gone, etc. But it does seem as if teachers have it a bit worse -- low pay and impossible administration.

I don't know that other professions have people outside of their field thinking they know how to do and telling them how to do their jobs.

Many time people see them as complaints, but a lot of the comments teachers make are made to refute misconceptions about the job brought up by somebody else.

This thread is specifically discussing pay. It's discussing a study done to compare teacher's salaries across the region. No one has ever bothered to do a study of pay across the US much less the region for my job position or field. Public School teachers are public employees with a lot of interaction with the community at the schools and also because of taxes to fund their jobs. Their job also gets a lot of publicity such as the article referred to here so many people are more aware of the current issues facing teachers than other professions. This is why they get a lot of comments from non-teachers. People make the same types of comments about police officers and politicians.

Understood. Here's the thing... Person A says, "It might be nice only having to work 7.5 hours a day for 180 days a year". The teacher responds with, "Well. I actually work about 10 hours a day for 194 days a year". Person A then says the teacher is complaining.

Person B says, "It must be nice getting free healthcare for life". The teacher responds with the fact that they pay $500 a month for their family and that it jumps to almost the whole premium in retirement and they are told they are complaining.

Person C makes a comment that teaching must be easy since she can just reuse the lesson plans from year to year. When the teacher explains about how much work goes into planning small group instruction, remediation, enrichment, etc. she is seen as complaining about her workload.

You forgot to discuss retirement pay.

Also FCPS teachers teach core lessons for about 4 hours a day. I find that hard to believe 10 hours is a daily standard of work especially beyond the first year. None of the teachers I know do much in the evening because they have young children. They just don't have the time. To me 10 hours would be more of a problem than the pay.

I work 8 hours contract, and every moment of that is instruction except for one 30 minute lunch and one 45 minute prep (which I don't get every day). Almost none of the teachers at my school have small children. The job is incompatible with it. People usually leave when they have kids, so most are young and single or have grown children already. Very few in between.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm willing to pay teachers a lot more.

But I want 8 hour school days that match working hours (8-4:30) and I want it to be year round with 4 weeks of break (2 in winter and 2 in summer). (I'll be generous with 4 weeks since normal white collar jobs only give 3)

Teachers in FCPS already work 8 hours, and that's just contract hours. And NO ONE goes home at the end of contract hours in my school. Studies show average work weeks is 55 hours.

So if you want it to be like everywhere else, then maybe they should get overtime too.

Technically contract hours are 7.5.

Not at my school. I have to be there at 7:45 and can't leave before 3:45. Last year it was more like 7 hours 45 minutes, but the bell schedule added 10 minutes to our day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand why people choose teaching as a career if they dislike the working conditions and the pay? I have a lot of friends who are teachers and when they get together all they do is bitch about work. It gets old listening to it. I don't feel the need to burden my friends with the day to day complaints about my job.

Teachers as a collective enjoy complaining about their work and they are very vocal about not being paid enough. Teachers also have this misconception they are the only ones working hard. We as a society feed this negativity on their part and continually tell them they aren't valued, they don't make enough, they work too much. But what would be fair pay? If we gave them all $125K annual salary I still don't think they would feel adequately compensated.

But my question is this, what person ever thinks they are paid enough for what they do? We all want more money.

Really? Lawyers love to complain about their jobs, or quit and change careers or stay home. Doctors love to complain about how everything is harder now, more patients and less time, the money is gone, etc. But it does seem as if teachers have it a bit worse -- low pay and impossible administration.

I don't know that other professions have people outside of their field thinking they know how to do and telling them how to do their jobs.

Many time people see them as complaints, but a lot of the comments teachers make are made to refute misconceptions about the job brought up by somebody else.

This thread is specifically discussing pay. It's discussing a study done to compare teacher's salaries across the region. No one has ever bothered to do a study of pay across the US much less the region for my job position or field. Public School teachers are public employees with a lot of interaction with the community at the schools and also because of taxes to fund their jobs. Their job also gets a lot of publicity such as the article referred to here so many people are more aware of the current issues facing teachers than other professions. This is why they get a lot of comments from non-teachers. People make the same types of comments about police officers and politicians.

Understood. Here's the thing... Person A says, "It might be nice only having to work 7.5 hours a day for 180 days a year". The teacher responds with, "Well. I actually work about 10 hours a day for 194 days a year". Person A then says the teacher is complaining.

Person B says, "It must be nice getting free healthcare for life". The teacher responds with the fact that they pay $500 a month for their family and that it jumps to almost the whole premium in retirement and they are told they are complaining.

Person C makes a comment that teaching must be easy since she can just reuse the lesson plans from year to year. When the teacher explains about how much work goes into planning small group instruction, remediation, enrichment, etc. she is seen as complaining about her workload.

You forgot to discuss retirement pay.

Also FCPS teachers teach core lessons for about 4 hours a day. I find that hard to believe 10 hours is a daily standard of work especially beyond the first year. None of the teachers I know do much in the evening because they have young children. They just don't have the time. To me 10 hours would be more of a problem than the pay.

I work 8 hours contract, and every moment of that is instruction except for one 30 minute lunch and one 45 minute prep (which I don't get every day). Almost none of the teachers at my school have small children. The job is incompatible with it. People usually leave when they have kids, so most are young and single or have grown children already. Very few in between.

What grade do you teach? How is your day broken down?