Are teachers overworked and underpaid? Declining teacher retention rates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city pays elementary school art teachers six figures to work eight months a year. Hard to say that’s underpaid

*The city pays **SOME** elementary school teachers that much. Some.

What would you say they shoudl get paid? Have you tried to buy a house in DC? You don't think teachers deserve to live where they teach?

NP and while I don’t appreciate the tone of PP insinuating that art teachers shouldn’t be compensated appropriately, I really don’t think you can claim DCPS teachers aren’t paid well. They are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a DCPS teacher and I agree with most of PP’s list except that we are underpaid. I’ve never heard a teacher I know or work with say we are underpaid. In fact I know many teachers who would leave DCPS but stick around because the pay is better than the vast majority of other districts in the country and certainly in this region.

I would look at private school teachers. Especially those who can't afford to get their kids into their private schools even with the discount. Public school teachers also have a more prestigious education resume.

[Anonymous]

We have one of the worst public school systems in the country. Some of these schools are flaming dumpster fires. Sometimes you don’t get what you pay for

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have one of the worst public school systems in the country. Some of these schools are flaming dumpster fires. Sometimes you don’t get what you pay for

Sometimes I feel like railing against these angry ignorant people, but then I realize they think they're paying my whole salary. So instead, I say thank you as I enjoy this expensive beer I picked up just bc you've been so generous with your funds. I might order takeout tonight too just since your wallet is so open right now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have one of the worst public school systems in the country. Some of these schools are flaming dumpster fires. Sometimes you don’t get what you pay for

Sometimes I feel like railing against these angry ignorant people, but then I realize they think they're paying my whole salary. So instead, I say thank you as I enjoy this expensive beer I picked up just bc you've been so generous with your funds. I might order takeout tonight too just since your wallet is so open right now.

We just wish you weren’t so bad at your chosen profession

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have one of the worst public school systems in the country. Some of these schools are flaming dumpster fires. Sometimes you don’t get what you pay for

Sometimes I feel like railing against these angry ignorant people, but then I realize they think they're paying my whole salary. So instead, I say thank you as I enjoy this expensive beer I picked up just bc you've been so generous with your funds. I might order takeout tonight too just since your wallet is so open right now.

We just wish you weren’t so bad at your chosen profession

I'm actually incredible at it. That's why you pay me the big bucks.

Btw Kaitlyn, parents like these are why I left my W3 school for a Title 1 EOTR and I've never been happier and more fulfilled

[Anonymous]

These threads always turn ugly as around two parents hide behind screens to degrade teachers and try and determine what their salary should be. I don’t really know enough about teaching to determine if the art teacher should ever reach six figures, nor do I know enough about being a patent attorney to determine if my brother in-law deserves his half mil a year. Maybe stay in your lane?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hello all! I'm a journalism student at American University covering K-12 education in the D.C. area. For my final project, I am investigating the declining retention rates of teachers in the D.C. area. I am hoping to gain some perspective from parents, students, and educators about this decrease and potential remedies for this issue. Why are teachers experiencing burnout at much higher rates than other professions? Is this really the case? How do we best combat teacher burnout and maintain healthy, qualified teachers for the important work of education?

If you are interested in speaking with me, on or off the record, please reply to this thread. I would love to hear your thoughts. I look forward to hearing from you all! Thank you, Kaitlyn

Kaitlyn there is SOOOO much information out there about this already. It's not a mystery why teachers are experiencing burn out and what teachers say they need in order to stay in the profession. Really, this question does not reflect well on you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think restorative justice in DCPS is enabling a lot more behavior issues in the classroom and teachers can’t do a damn thing and so are leaving.

This! People don't want to acknowledge it, but this is a huge issue.

Certainly lack of options or support for better placement of violent students is a huge factor. DCPS makes it extremely difficult even if a student has harmed others on multiple occasions. I don’t actually know if this is DCPS-specific policy or federal laws that make it so difficult. But it’s breaking morale.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hello all! I'm a journalism student at American University covering K-12 education in the D.C. area. For my final project, I am investigating the declining retention rates of teachers in the D.C. area. I am hoping to gain some perspective from parents, students, and educators about this decrease and potential remedies for this issue. Why are teachers experiencing burnout at much higher rates than other professions? Is this really the case? How do we best combat teacher burnout and maintain healthy, qualified teachers for the important work of education?

If you are interested in speaking with me, on or off the record, please reply to this thread. I would love to hear your thoughts. I look forward to hearing from you all! Thank you, Kaitlyn

Kaitlyn there is SOOOO much information out there about this already. It's not a mystery why teachers are experiencing burn out and what teachers say they need in order to stay in the profession. Really, this question does not reflect well on you.

Kaitlyn don’t listen to these people. There is also a lot out there already on the war in Ukraine. Doesn’t mean we should stop covering it or there isn’t more to be said. Until the teacher shortage is solved, the topic needs to be covered.

Also, to the poster who said DC has the worst public schools, that is just not true. I work with public schools across the country. We have some many things better than others. Perfect? No. Still need to improve. Are some schools better than others? Yup. True in every district. The worst? Hardly. There is no need to be so dramatic and down about the situation.

Finally, Kaitlyn, RAND did/does a ton of studies in this area you may want as background. And they might be a willing interviewee as fellow academics. Here is an example. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA956-14.html

And here: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA1108-1.html

And there are plenty more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The city pays elementary school art teachers six figures to work eight months a year. Hard to say that’s underpaid

They work ten months and money is deducted from paychecks to cover summer pay. Get it?

[Anonymous]

I don’t think I’m underpaid for my work but I’ve been in the profession for twenty years. I’m ok with the stress burden- it ebbs and flows like any job. I imagine tax season is stressful for accountants, report card season is stressful for me.

With that said, here are two things that can make or break a good year for me:

1. The rare occasion I have a student who is so volatile and it takes months of red tape data collection to get the child into the setting they need to be in.
2. Incompetent school leadership that causes several small annoyances that snowball into a systemic problems. We are currently dealing with this at our school. It’s frustrating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think I’m underpaid for my work but I’ve been in the profession for twenty years. I’m ok with the stress burden- it ebbs and flows like any job. I imagine tax season is stressful for accountants, report card season is stressful for me.

With that said, here are two things that can make or break a good year for me:

1. The rare occasion I have a student who is so volatile and it takes months of red tape data collection to get the child into the setting they need to be in.
2. Incompetent school leadership that causes several small annoyances that snowball into a systemic problems. We are currently dealing with this at our school. It’s frustrating.

My school doesn’t want to admit to downtown that we have volatile children and buries so much under the rug that the kids never get the help they need. It hijacks the other kids’ education too.

[Anonymous]

Underpaid? Maybe, but not compared to many other districts.

Overworked? For the 17 years that I taught at DCPS, I would wake up at 4am every morning to grade papers and develop lessons. More often than not, my "planning period" would be spent attending meetings of dubious value or covering other classes. The small period of time between when we were required to report for work and when classes started was also often spent attending mandated meetings. After school, I would clean my classroom and call parents. I spent weekends at the library finding books for my classroom.

As the years went on, DCPS became more prescriptive about what and how we could teach, which robbed the job of much of the creativity and joy that I enjoyed.

I could have stayed for many more years but the deal breaker was IMPACT because it added so much unnecessary stress.

You can make extraordinary demands on your employees and if they feel that you appreciate them, they will deliver. But DCPS is not that type of work environment. This, I believe, is why retention is so low.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city pays elementary school art teachers six figures to work eight months a year. Hard to say that’s underpaid

*The city pays **SOME** elementary school teachers that much. Some.

What would you say they shoudl get paid? Have you tried to buy a house in DC? You don't think teachers deserve to live where they teach?

NP and while I don’t appreciate the tone of PP insinuating that art teachers shouldn’t be compensated appropriately, I really don’t think you can claim DCPS teachers aren’t paid well. They are.

I never said they aren't well paid. I was responding to someone saying they're OVERpaid. I believe teachers should be able to afford to live in the communities where they teach (if they want).