About 10 years ago, my former wife was looking to move to Omaha and applied for a high school teaching position. She has early childhood credentials plus masters in English. She was teaching in a 1A school (Nebraska class C equivalent) district outside if Sioux City in Iowa. The OPS offer was was $10,000 less annually then what she was making. Millard district also less than Iowa 1A salery
The only problem with this statement is that I don't know of a poor teacher after they've been teaching for 20+ years. I look at all of my clients who have taught for 20+ years or are retired and they all live very well. This also goes for my old high school teachers from small town Nebraska who most have retired and none of them are hurting for money and live in nice homes, etc.
Nobody that starts out with a bachelors degree is at the top of the totem pole of wages. Heck half of new grads with bachelor's degrees in business can't even find a decent job. If you want to make more, you go to summer school and get your masters or you move to a school district that pays more. I'm tired of the whining about pay when they work 9 months, aren't on call and have some of the most attractive benefit packages in the workplace.
This.
From what I remember from a Lincoln Journal article from a number of years back, teachers START at LPS making 42k a year for full time. I could be wrong but I dot think I am.
Wow. You must have been a Composition teacher before you became a principal.
I did not mean to suggest that all older teachers are the most conscientious and best teachers in the schools. Our family's personal experience has been that we've lost some incredible teachers and replaced them with not so incredible younger teachers. In multiple cases the people who retired went on to double dip by teaching at an area small college. In particular we lost our Spanish, German, math and chemistry teachers in the past 8 years and unfortunately our youngest didn't get the benefit of the the math and chemistry teachers. With a couple of engineers and an aspiring medical student from our older kids, our youngest has vowed that she doesn't want anything to do with math or science in college. Unfortunately those course tracks seem to end up in the some of the best career paths. She's done well enough that we won't have to pay for college unless she chooses a couple of Ivy League schools that don't offer scholarships.
Wow. You must have been a Composition teacher before you became a principal.
There is a parenting/family crisis that will need to be fixed before public schools will get better. I taught for 12 years and was a principal for 3. So many kids come to school, in recent years, lacking the basics of Maslow's hierarchy, in terms of their personal formation, and schools are supposed to take so many of these needy, many times undisciplined and unfocused (yet entitled and given all the toys)/apathetic children...and turn them into virtuous, mannerly scholars, despite their upbringing. You bet.For the last 5 years that I taught, 33% of students were regularly on board, 33%, were sometimes on board and 34% rarely on board (never do homework, etc.).
My daughter is in college now and planning on getting her teaching certificate. She loved her public school teachers growing up and I also thought most were outstanding. I completely support her decision to become a teacher. There are many reasons for this but with respect to compensation and benefits, it can actually be a fairly lucratice career in terms of total compensation. I'm my opinion, this notion that teachers are grossly underpaid is a myth--at least here in Colorado. No, teachers won't get rich on their salary (neither will most retail bankers, accountants, and most corporate rank and file). But their retirement benefits are so far superior to the corporate world--it's not even close. I don't think I've known a career teacher here in CO that is receving a pension less than $50-60k/yr. or more with annual cost of living increases. If you simply calculate the present value of the pension alone it is around a million dollars or more. Throw in health benefits, and all the time off a teacher gets, etc.,--I think it's comparatively a pretty darn good gig.
In your (and other taxpayers') pockets. It's time to get rid of the pension systems. The idea that we have current liabilities for people who retired fifty years ago is ludicrous. We need to pony up and pay people what they are worth today and let them fund their own retirement. These public sector pensions are why cities (I'm looking at you Detroit) are going bankrupt. It is why some countries (cough...Greece) are in serious trouble.
Thats cute, you think the education problem is because we dont pay teachers enough.
I hear ya, it sucks when that happens. Im curious though, what do you think the problem is and how can that situation be solved?Wow. You must have been a Composition teacher before you became a principal.
Splitting hairs here, but education in America was first dominated by males, then females. But i get your point. I agree with your "boo hoo" comments. Carry on.
Well therein stands the elephant in the middle of the room. The "problem" was created by effective Union negotiating, less emphasis on cost containment in the public sector, and the magic of compound interest. I suspect the majority of taxpayers are completely oblivious to this phenomenon. Compensation and benefits as a % of a total school budget will continue to grow until it can't--plain and simple. In the meantime the disparity between the public and private sector widens. I hate to use this phrase, but it's appropriate: "it is what it is". I just hate having to pay for all the extracurricular activities, bus rides, etc., that used to be covered by my ad valorem taxes. Aside from that, keep up the great work educators!!
My wife suggested I become a little less involved in our children's education when I told a teacher at conference if "my kid gives you any problems just smack em". The "board of education" worked on me when I was in middle school. They should probably have done it more often. Weekly maintenance therapy might have been good. The funny thing is that for all the ADD screwing off the one kid did, 10 years later he's still the one the teachers come up and ask about. Most of them loved him but man he gave me gray hair.
Health insurance benefits? ours is close to 1K a month now for family. Not much of a benefit
My perception is that with some of the less motivated new teachers there's more of a "me first" attitude. I know that exists at all ages but some of us learned the idea of service to the public whether be it in your professional or private life. In my profession I often did things I didn't enjoy and that weren't monetarily rewarding because those things were a needed service and I felt a responsibility to the people I did work for. I watch the younger people in my profession and see them only wanting to take the gravy and not deal with the potatoes of what their clients need.
I'm not sure what was political about my post. It was simply the truth of what has happened. I didn't say if it was good or bad. People can take it however they want. Some people want a single payer government system and they are going to get what they want because there's no rolling back what was done to our system. Just a fact. As usual people want government to "fix" something and then are surprised at what the "fix" costs them. My post about health insurance premiums are completely accurate and NOT political in way. When you mandate certain things for business (private health insurers in this case) somebody has to pay for it and it is spread across the entire class of insureds. Just the facts. Pelosi and Obama (oh yeah and Nebraska's own Ben Nelson) are largely responsible for that. That is a fact. Some would want to give them medals for that. Others? Not so much. Iowa's last private insurer through the exchange is leaving the system. So much for "affordable health care". What's left? As I said, Obamacare was designed to fail so that people would clamor for a single payer government system.
