Teachers are underpaid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we should offer a higher starting salary. What we need is the potential to get a great salary if you excel. Almost EVERY type of job rewards based on merit. There is no reason why we can't do that with teachers. You have a formula...I'm pulling this out of the air, but

5 % test scores
10% teacher ratings
10% student ratings
10% principal observations and interactions with teacher
20% score on competency tests in your area of teaching. Are you truly smarter than a 4th grader? Great, take a test on all the areas 4th graders must master. If you are a math teacher, you take math tests.
10% senior colleague observations of your teacher
10% special education teachers rating you on how well you manage to create an inclusive environment
5% how often you volunteer to take on extra
5% former student and parent ratings of your teaching

and so forth....you get the point. Sure politics may affect some aspects, but it's not as black and white as some people make it out to be. You can find a way to merit pay and give bonuses.

No other profession is subject to this level of scrutiny. Maybe we should stop infantilizing teachers and trust them to do their job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we should offer a higher starting salary. What we need is the potential to get a great salary if you excel. Almost EVERY type of job rewards based on merit. There is no reason why we can't do that with teachers. You have a formula...I'm pulling this out of the air, but

5 % test scores
10% teacher ratings
10% student ratings
10% principal observations and interactions with teacher
20% score on competency tests in your area of teaching. Are you truly smarter than a 4th grader? Great, take a test on all the areas 4th graders must master. If you are a math teacher, you take math tests.
10% senior colleague observations of your teacher
10% special education teachers rating you on how well you manage to create an inclusive environment
5% how often you volunteer to take on extra
5% former student and parent ratings of your teaching

and so forth....you get the point. Sure politics may affect some aspects, but it's not as black and white as some people make it out to be. You can find a way to merit pay and give bonuses.

HAHAHA. To your whole post but especially the bolded. Clearly you've never been involved in education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we should offer a higher starting salary. What we need is the potential to get a great salary if you excel. Almost EVERY type of job rewards based on merit. There is no reason why we can't do that with teachers. You have a formula...I'm pulling this out of the air, but

5 % test scores
10% teacher ratings
10% student ratings
10% principal observations and interactions with teacher
20% score on competency tests in your area of teaching. Are you truly smarter than a 4th grader? Great, take a test on all the areas 4th graders must master. If you are a math teacher, you take math tests.
10% senior colleague observations of your teacher
10% special education teachers rating you on how well you manage to create an inclusive environment
5% how often you volunteer to take on extra
5% former student and parent ratings of your teaching

and so forth....you get the point. Sure politics may affect some aspects, but it's not as black and white as some people make it out to be. You can find a way to merit pay and give bonuses.

No other profession is subject to this level of scrutiny. Maybe we should stop infantilizing teachers and trust them to do their job.

Thank you. You have no idea just how much we are scrutinized on a daily level, much less by those in an ivory tower and then also the general public. It's so tiresome. I teach in a title 1 school. You'd better bet that if we go on a merit pay system I'm going to a higher SES school. Not because I don't get results--I do. But I can't undo in 6 hours a day what poverty does to these kids. And ultimately my family is more important to me than the kids I teach. If you start tying my pay to variable factors (umm, human children, not widgets) then I'm not going to be a pawn in that game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Instead of talking about which professions are underpaid, I think it would be more helpful to talk about which ones are overpaid. They're the ones driving up the costs of everything and making others feel like they are underpaid. Maybe if society could get a grasp on which people other than CEO's are grossly overpaid, things would even out a bit.

This.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we should offer a higher starting salary. What we need is the potential to get a great salary if you excel. Almost EVERY type of job rewards based on merit. There is no reason why we can't do that with teachers. You have a formula...I'm pulling this out of the air, but

5 % test scores
10% teacher ratings
10% student ratings
10% principal observations and interactions with teacher
20% score on competency tests in your area of teaching. Are you truly smarter than a 4th grader? Great, take a test on all the areas 4th graders must master. If you are a math teacher, you take math tests.
10% senior colleague observations of your teacher
10% special education teachers rating you on how well you manage to create an inclusive environment
5% how often you volunteer to take on extra
5% former student and parent ratings of your teaching

and so forth....you get the point. Sure politics may affect some aspects, but it's not as black and white as some people make it out to be. You can find a way to merit pay and give bonuses.

No other profession is subject to this level of scrutiny. Maybe we should stop infantilizing teachers and trust them to do their job.

Thank you. You have no idea just how much we are scrutinized on a daily level, much less by those in an ivory tower and then also the general public. It's so tiresome. I teach in a title 1 school. You'd better bet that if we go on a merit pay system I'm going to a higher SES school. Not because I don't get results--I do. But I can't undo in 6 hours a day what poverty does to these kids. And ultimately my family is more important to me than the kids I teach. If you start tying my pay to variable factors (umm, human children, not widgets) then I'm not going to be a pawn in that game.

I think it's insulting how much we demean these people supposedly entrusted with our children's intellectual development.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we should offer a higher starting salary. What we need is the potential to get a great salary if you excel. Almost EVERY type of job rewards based on merit. There is no reason why we can't do that with teachers. You have a formula...I'm pulling this out of the air, but

5 % test scores
10% teacher ratings
10% student ratings
10% principal observations and interactions with teacher
20% score on competency tests in your area of teaching. Are you truly smarter than a 4th grader? Great, take a test on all the areas 4th graders must master. If you are a math teacher, you take math tests.
10% senior colleague observations of your teacher
10% special education teachers rating you on how well you manage to create an inclusive environment
5% how often you volunteer to take on extra
5% former student and parent ratings of your teaching

and so forth....you get the point. Sure politics may affect some aspects, but it's not as black and white as some people make it out to be. You can find a way to merit pay and give bonuses.

No other profession is subject to this level of scrutiny. Maybe we should stop infantilizing teachers and trust them to do their job.

Thank you. You have no idea just how much we are scrutinized on a daily level, much less by those in an ivory tower and then also the general public. It's so tiresome. I teach in a title 1 school. You'd better bet that if we go on a merit pay system I'm going to a higher SES school. Not because I don't get results--I do. But I can't undo in 6 hours a day what poverty does to these kids. And ultimately my family is more important to me than the kids I teach. If you start tying my pay to variable factors (umm, human children, not widgets) then I'm not going to be a pawn in that game.

I think it's insulting how much we demean these people supposedly entrusted with our children's intellectual development.

I think it's alarming how many people become teachers who themselves have not mastered the material they teach. It's alarming how easy it is to get top grades in education programs. We MUST improve the undergraduate and graduate education programs. We als MUST reward the good teachers-the sooner the better. People say that there is no way to evaluate, but that is bullshit. EVERYONE gets evaluated at their job. I think the best teachers should get bonuses and move up the pay scale faster. The bottom ones need to go and we need a more efficient way to evaluate poor performance and eventually remove the ones who need to go. We also need to establish a probationary period. If you are not performing up to expectations, then there needs to be remiation. More observations, seminars, etc to help those teachers improve. If there are no signs of improvement after a year ot 2...time to go.

Let's just get every teacher much more money is a waste of tax money. If you reward excellence, you will have more excellence. Save the high salaries for the stars and don't let the duds rise up to the top of the payscale.

[Anonymous]

Also....The countries where teaching is prestigious and the teachers are paid more have incredibly high standards. It's competitive to get positions and the teachers hired get results.

If you enter a job knowing that if you excel, you can make a great living it is a lot more motivating than knowing everyone moves up the payscale by years and classes and the uncreative, uninspired teacher in the classroom next door is going to collect the same paycheck if she has been there the same amount of years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

When I convert 10 months into weeks, I get at least 40 weeks.

Also, the teacher's salary is the teacher's salary -- unless the teacher supplements their income with a second job during winter, spring, and summer vacations. Yes, they get time off during winter, spring, and summer vacations. But time off doesn't pay the bills. The question isn't whether teachers get compensated what they deserve to get compensated, because few people gets compensated what they deserve to get compensated; that's not how compensation works. (If it were how compensation works, CEOs and lobbyists would be a whole lot less rich.) The question is whether the compensation is high enough to attract and retain highly-qualified people. What do you think is the answer to that question?

Hope you are not a math teacher. Please count the days on your contract. You do know that most people do not get Christmas vacation, all federal holidays, and a Spring break?

We're not paid over the summer. I begin work the week before the kids return. We work through mid-June. That leaves 2 weeks of June, all of July, two weeks in August w/o a paycheck. For folks who have been in the system long enough, there's enough to save up for those summer weeks. For new teachers, it becomes difficult. So many take on summer jobs.

And tbh, the hours we work AFTER school ends and on weekends more than makes up for the "free" summers we have. I get home around 4 or after and work to at least 8 pm. On weekends, I plan and grade. not much of a life, especially if you have kids

But yes, my children see me. We only worry about before care (nanny share), and I spend holidays and snow days with them. So while I'm working, I'm around. I sacrifice so that I don't have to place my children in any institutionalized daycare, nor do I have to rely on camps to watch them all summer long.

How many parents can say they see their kids this much?

not many

So that's my "revenge" when folks like you try to demean us.

[Anonymous]

For the product I am receving this year, if anything my child's teachers are overpaid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

When I convert 10 months into weeks, I get at least 40 weeks.

Also, the teacher's salary is the teacher's salary -- unless the teacher supplements their income with a second job during winter, spring, and summer vacations. Yes, they get time off during winter, spring, and summer vacations. But time off doesn't pay the bills. The question isn't whether teachers get compensated what they deserve to get compensated, because few people gets compensated what they deserve to get compensated; that's not how compensation works. (If it were how compensation works, CEOs and lobbyists would be a whole lot less rich.) The question is whether the compensation is high enough to attract and retain highly-qualified people. What do you think is the answer to that question?

Hope you are not a math teacher. Please count the days on your contract. You do know that most people do not get Christmas vacation, all federal holidays, and a Spring break?

We're not paid over the summer. I begin work the week before the kids return. We work through mid-June. That leaves 2 weeks of June, all of July, two weeks in August w/o a paycheck. For folks who have been in the system long enough, there's enough to save up for those summer weeks. For new teachers, it becomes difficult. So many take on summer jobs.

And tbh, the hours we work AFTER school ends and on weekends more than makes up for the "free" summers we have. I get home around 4 or after and work to at least 8 pm. On weekends, I plan and grade. not much of a life, especially if you have kids

But yes, my children see me. We only worry about before care (nanny share), and I spend holidays and snow days with them. So while I'm working, I'm around. I sacrifice so that I don't have to place my children in any institutionalized daycare, nor do I have to rely on camps to watch them all summer long.

How many parents can say they see their kids this much?

not many

So that's my "revenge" when folks like you try to demean us.

You do realize that many, many people, at the start of their careers, take on supplemental work, or have roommates, etc, to reduce expenses. And many, many people bring their work home, and don't get paid overtime.

It's not about demeaning; it's about the lack of understanding from teachers that they are doing no more than other people who are making a living. We all make sacrifices.

I think it's great (seriously), that you do what you do to see your kids more. That's my takeaway from this - that you planned well for your own children. I respect that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we should offer a higher starting salary. What we need is the potential to get a great salary if you excel. Almost EVERY type of job rewards based on merit. There is no reason why we can't do that with teachers. You have a formula...I'm pulling this out of the air, but

5 % test scores
10% teacher ratings
10% student ratings
10% principal observations and interactions with teacher
20% score on competency tests in your area of teaching. Are you truly smarter than a 4th grader? Great, take a test on all the areas 4th graders must master. If you are a math teacher, you take math tests.
10% senior colleague observations of your teacher
10% special education teachers rating you on how well you manage to create an inclusive environment
5% how often you volunteer to take on extra
5% former student and parent ratings of your teaching

and so forth....you get the point. Sure politics may affect some aspects, but it's not as black and white as some people make it out to be. You can find a way to merit pay and give bonuses.

No other profession is subject to this level of scrutiny. Maybe we should stop infantilizing teachers and trust them to do their job.

Thank you. You have no idea just how much we are scrutinized on a daily level, much less by those in an ivory tower and then also the general public. It's so tiresome. I teach in a title 1 school. You'd better bet that if we go on a merit pay system I'm going to a higher SES school. Not because I don't get results--I do. But I can't undo in 6 hours a day what poverty does to these kids. And ultimately my family is more important to me than the kids I teach. If you start tying my pay to variable factors (umm, human children, not widgets) then I'm not going to be a pawn in that game.

I think it's insulting how much we demean these people supposedly entrusted with our children's intellectual development.

I think it's alarming how many people become teachers who themselves have not mastered the material they teach. It's alarming how easy it is to get top grades in education programs. We MUST improve the undergraduate and graduate education programs. We als MUST reward the good teachers-the sooner the better. People say that there is no way to evaluate, but that is bullshit. EVERYONE gets evaluated at their job. I think the best teachers should get bonuses and move up the pay scale faster. The bottom ones need to go and we need a more efficient way to evaluate poor performance and eventually remove the ones who need to go. We also need to establish a probationary period. If you are not performing up to expectations, then there needs to be remiation. More observations, seminars, etc to help those teachers improve. If there are no signs of improvement after a year ot 2...time to go.

Let's just get every teacher much more money is a waste of tax money. If you reward excellence, you will have more excellence. Save the high salaries for the stars and don't let the duds rise up to the top of the payscale.

What system doesn't evaluate its teachers? And most systems do have programs in place to weed out ineffective teachers. In MCPS it's called PAR. It is a 2 year probationary period complete with central office support and multiple observations. At the end of the 2nd year you go before a panel who decides your fate with input from your mentor teacher and your principal.

Most teachers in MCPS have an observation year every 3 years. There is one announced observation and one unannounced.

What people outside the teaching profession don't know is that it is incredibly political. Principals vary from very ethical to very shady. If you get on a shady principal's bad side for any reason then your fate could be sealed and you have very little protection. No matter what measures you take to evaluate teachers there will be a lot of subjectivity involved.

I get great observation write-ups from my principal. But I work in a very high FARMS school. My students, in general, will not be as high-scoring as high SES students for a variety of reasons. I'd like to continue working with the high-needs population because I can make a difference but like another PP said, if my pay depended on it then I'm moving to a higher SES school where it is much easier to be "effective" and get rewarded for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: Also....The countries where teaching is prestigious and the teachers are paid more have incredibly high standards. It's competitive to get positions and the teachers hired get results.

If you enter a job knowing that if you excel, you can make a great living it is a lot more motivating than knowing everyone moves up the payscale by years and classes and the uncreative, uninspired teacher in the classroom next door is going to collect the same paycheck if she has been there the same amount of years.

Do you think that highly-talented people are going to pass up lucrative, high-prestige fields and decide to go into teaching instead, based on the idea that if they do really well, they might get paid more money than their untalented teaching colleagues?

How many of the doctors you know would have gone into medicine if the field only paid a quarter as much (at best), and the usual saying were, "Those who can, do; those who can't, practice medicine."?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

You do realize that many, many people, at the start of their careers, take on supplemental work, or have roommates, etc, to reduce expenses. And many, many people bring their work home, and don't get paid overtime.

It's not about demeaning; it's about the lack of understanding from teachers that they are doing no more than other people who are making a living. We all make sacrifices.

I think it's great (seriously), that you do what you do to see your kids more. That's my takeaway from this - that you planned well for your own children. I respect that.

Common belief: Teachers! They don't work! Short days! Constant vacations! And then they complain about pay!
Teacher: Actually we work a lot more hours in the day, and we work during the vacations, too.
Response: Teachers! Always whining about how much they work, when everybody else works that much too!

Teachers can't win this one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I think it's alarming how many people become teachers who themselves have not mastered the material they teach. It's alarming how easy it is to get top grades in education programs. We MUST improve the undergraduate and graduate education programs. We als MUST reward the good teachers-the sooner the better.

So true. The current way in many/most districts of teachers getting raises by getting Masters Degrees is a complete joke. Masters programs in education are a joke - they might as well be a certificate of some sort, that's how rigorous most of them are. It's a total scam - universities collect a lot of money for the MEd programs, teachers cruise through and get to have an "advanced degree" and get a raise, and the system continues to be self-perpetuating to the benefit of those in charge and the detriment of children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I think it's alarming how many people become teachers who themselves have not mastered the material they teach. It's alarming how easy it is to get top grades in education programs. We MUST improve the undergraduate and graduate education programs. We als MUST reward the good teachers-the sooner the better.

So true. The current way in many/most districts of teachers getting raises by getting Masters Degrees is a complete joke. Masters programs in education are a joke - they might as well be a certificate of some sort, that's how rigorous most of them are. It's a total scam - universities collect a lot of money for the MEd programs, teachers cruise through and get to have an "advanced degree" and get a raise, and the system continues to be self-perpetuating to the benefit of those in charge and the detriment of children.

How do you know this?