Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

[Leo Lakio]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

We can't afford to write off the failures, because we need everybody.

Thank you for saying that.

[craigwatanabe]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

Thank you for saying that.

So we need to support our teachers by being good parents. Education really does start in the home.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

So we need to support our teachers by being good parents. Education really does start in the home.

No disagreement from this front. And being a good parent includes involvement with your childrens' education and schools. Teachers aren't babysitters; they need the families of their students to work alongside of them, to be supportive, and to pay attention.

[binu]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

its very impossible

[joshuatree]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

This may be under a separate thread but I think it fits here for now. Looks like Hawaii's teachers aren't underpaid at all. I'm sure there will be comments on what I just said.

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/ar...085273146.html

[scrivener]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

The article says Hawaii teachers' salaries rank eighth in the nation, but that equates to two hundred dollars above the average national teacher pay. This means two things: (a) Only a handful of states are making an effort to pay teachers decent salaries -- eighth best in the nation is only the average salary! and (b) Decent pay is about as good as it gets for teachers, when education is such a priority in our nation's consciousness that every child is guaranteed to get it -- not something every nation promises.

The study the Advertiser's story doesn't quite cite is here, at the AFT website. I would encourage those who are interested in this conversation to download the PDF of the report. Among interesting stats the Advertiser doesn't mention:

• In 2004, average teacher salaries were around $45,000, but salaries of people in comparable professions were over $70,000. True, that "comparable professions" tag is questionable, but I think it's fair to compare teaching to accounting -- about the same amount of schooling, about the same kind of rigorous testing to achieve licensure. According to the PDF, Accountants made $11,000 more, on average, than teachers.
• Engineers made about $78,000. May I repeat something I've said here before? "Engineering" may sound like a tough job for people who don't get math, but the teaching profession is FULL of people who DO get math -- well enough to teach it to sixteen-year-olds who refuse to learn it. If you know very many engineers, ask yourself how good those people would be at teaching. If you know very many math teachers, ask yourself how many of them could be decent engineers.
• Over the course of the ten years between 1994 and 2004, the salaries of full professors went up 14.4%. Buyers' pay went up 14.4%. Accountants' pay went up 10.4%. Attorneys and engineers saw pay increases of 9.4% and 8.6%, respectively. Teacher salaries went up 2.2%, which the Advertiser points out is lower than the inflation rate. Nationwide, teachers make less REAL money than they did ten years ago.
• After adjusting for inflation, the 2003-2004 average teacher salary is just $10,000 above the 1963-1964 average of $36,000 (I'm rounding). This equates to an average yearly pay increase of $252 per year, or $100 per paycheck.
• I'm not sure where the Advertiser got eighth as a national ranking, because the table I'm looking at, tited AVERAGE TEACHER SALARY IN 2003-2004, STATE RANKINGS, lists Hawaii at 17. The $45,456 average is footnoted to explain that this includes extra-duty pay and fringe benefits, such as health insurance.

Comments?

edited: Ah. The Advertiser is quoting the 2004-2005 numbers, which haven't shown up at the AFT website yet.

[PoiBoy]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

"let me look in my lesson plan for today"

[joshuatree]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

• Over the course of the ten years between 1994 and 2004, the salaries of full professors went up 14.4%. Buyers' pay went up 14.4%. Accountants' pay went up 10.4%. Attorneys and engineers saw pay increases of 9.4% and 8.6%, respectively. Teacher salaries went up 2.2%, which the Advertiser points out is lower than the inflation rate. Nationwide, teachers make less REAL money than they did ten years ago.

Teachers aren't the only ones facing pay inequalities. Engineer's pay went up 8.6%? Maybe in some areas I suppose. Check out the link below. I'll quote the important part.

"The median real household income fell to $74,293 in 2005 from $83,370 in 2000, a decline of $9,011."

I guess you can argue that engineers are still making $74,293 vs a teacher's pay of $45,000. But I can tell you this, teachers don't have to work 48 hours non stop right after 9/11 nor do they have to work on Xmas Day or New Years Day.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070329/...lley_jobs_dc_1

[scrivener]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

But I can tell you this, teachers don't have to work 48 hours non stop right after 9/11 nor do they have to work on Xmas Day or New Years Day.

Every job's got its unique unpleasant situations. No, I did not have to work 48 hours nonstop right after the World Trade Center went down, but I've worked until the sun has come up, with just enough time to drive home, shower, get into new clothes, and drive back for another day of teaching. This is not common for all teachers, I realize, but the point is that we all do things in our jobs that others don't have to do. I've worked Christmas Day and New Year's Day and made just over minimum wage.

What I'm suggesting is that the level of expertise, education, and skill in both careers is similar. Or at least close enough not to warrant a $30,000 pay difference.

[GnosticWarrior]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

The article says Hawaii teachers' salaries rank eighth in the nation, but that equates to two hundred dollars above the average national teacher pay. This means two things: (a) Only a handful of states are making an effort to pay teachers decent salaries -- eighth best in the nation is only the average salary! and (b) Decent pay is about as good as it gets for teachers, when education is such a priority in our nation's consciousness that every child is guaranteed to get it -- not something every nation promises.

Majority of the teachers I seen work hard and I don't think they are being paid what they are worth. However, I am assuming that today, everyone who's a teacher is doing it out of love and that the total package of the passion for teaching, with pay and benefits makes up for a higher paying job with no passion. Like the stats show, don't expect to be rich being a teacher. If money is what you need and want, then please choose another profession. Also if this would create a real shortage or lack of qualified canidates then there would be no alternative but to raise their salaries. So maybe wannabe teachers should boycott the profession until salaries come up to par?

Teachers, Police Officers, Firefighters, Water Safety Officers, and EMT's are some of the real public servants. I don't know how one could put a dollar amount on the service rendered during 9/11. Either that's your passion or its not.

[joshuatree]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

Every job's got its unique unpleasant situations. No, I did not have to work 48 hours nonstop right after the World Trade Center went down, but I've worked until the sun has come up, with just enough time to drive home, shower, get into new clothes, and drive back for another day of teaching. This is not common for all teachers, I realize, but the point is that we all do things in our jobs that others don't have to do. I've worked Christmas Day and New Year's Day and made just over minimum wage.

What I'm suggesting is that the level of expertise, education, and skill in both careers is similar. Or at least close enough not to warrant a $30,000 pay difference.

Here's a question I like to pose to you. This isn't about teachers vs. engineers, but are you honestly saying a 1st grade teacher's education and skill is on par with an engineer designing the chipset for the next wireless application? No doubt teachers can use a pay raise but I'm not sold that all teachers deserve a $30k increase. I can see special ed teachers or professors getting a bigger increase.

Besides, here's something I find teachers always neglecting to overlook when comparing wages. An engineer may make around $75k but there is no union, there is no guarantee of lifetime employment. I know people who were lied to by the company so they could help another group. As soon as this outsourced other group attain the same skill sets, the former group was let go on the spot. As for teachers, unless they royally screw up, they usually don't get laid off.

Lastly, why is it that people still like to make blanket statements that teachers do it for the love and passion of teaching? I am sure there are many but more and more, you see in the media of teachers having sex with the students, teachers selling drugs, etc. I gotta wonder if that blanket statement is merely a teacher's PR marketing spin?

[Leo Lakio]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

a teacher's PR marketing spin?

Funny - the majority of teachers I've known have actively DISCOURAGED most people from going into the profession, including the AF's parents (both teachers, from a family full of teachers.) It's not a choice to be made lightly, as the best teachers have a level of intensity, passion and commitment found in few other careers.

[scrivener]

Re: Teachers spend 15.5 hours at work daily

...are you honestly saying a 1st grade teacher's education and skill is on par with an engineer designing the chipset for the next wireless application?

Some of my best friends are engineers who do this kind of work. If given a group of twenty-five first-graders of varying skill levels, interests, family incomes, housing situations, and desires to learn, and asked to teach them a shopping list of skills in seven different subjects every day for six and a half hours, they'd freak. A friend of mine who teaches at a rural elementary school packs extra lunches for her students on class-excursion days because without that free lunch in the school cafeteria, she can count on a number of students showing up with nothing to eat. And that's just poverty we're talking about: Add to that learning disabilities, parental custody difficulties, and countless other factors that influence a child's performance, demeanor, and ability to focus in the classroom, and I hope you can understand that there's more going on when a good teacher is doing his or her job than just explaining the intricacies of eight minus two.

As for the education part: Sure, the skillset is different for engineers and for teachers, but a Master's degree in engineering is as difficult to earn as a Master's degree in elementary education. I'm in the process of earning my Master's degree now, and I had to pass four different standardized tests of some fair amount of difficulty just to earn standard licensure. How many professional tests does an engineer need to pass, just to be acknowledged as an engineer?