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Here are some excerpts from an article taking to task some of the Wisconsin teachers who chose to put themselves in the public eye by speaking out to the press during the protest.
If we annualized the above compensations based on the fact that these amounts are earned by working the equivalent of 3/4 the full year most of us work (9 months instead of 12), we're looking at some pretty high compensation numbers for a job that provides a pension-style retirement and near air-tight insulation, once tenured, from being fired if you're lousy.
I'll use the first person in the example: Lechleiter-Luke makes $54,928 in base salary and $32,213 in “fringe benefits,” which include health insurance, life insurance and retirement pay.
54,928 + 32,213 = $87,141. Then divide by .75 to get $116,188 for a gal who says "I will need to find part-time work again".
This salary analysis also doesn't factor in the imputed income derived from the generous Fall, Christmas and Spring vacations plus all the other federal holidays, on top of the entire summer off.
...
Steve
That's an awful oversimplification of teacher compensation - or any compensation, Steve. Nobody ever uses all of their fringe benefits, and it's deceptive to equate them as "salary".
So, in your example above, the teacher of the year for the entire state - a 19 year veteran of his field - actually made about $73,000 in an "annualized" salary (which isn't actually a good comparison either). That sounds very reasonable to me. He should probably be making more, as you said. If I was ever recognized as the "best of the year" for my field (in private industry), I'd be making 5 times that amount in compensation.
Anyways, this thread is really awful. I thought we would be talking about Austin area schools and the impact of these budget cuts. All I see here is people raving against immigrants, Democrats, minorities, unions, and a little bit of civil war flashback. Worthless...
Fringe benefits are not the same thing as salary...
For those of us who are self employed, yes they come right off the top of gross salary. I pay for health insurance (individual rates), life insurance, dental (no insurance), retirement investments. Those are all actual expenses that self-employed and/or W2 employees without those benefits must either cover out of pocket or do without. So I disagree that the fringe benefits don't have cash value.
The black kids in Wisconsin produce the lowest test scores in the nation. Over half are deemed "academically unfit". And yes, there are examples on the other end of the spectrum. But dead last with the group that needs it the most.
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I'm not going to reveal which district I work for, but, I would make $1900 more if I had 10 years of experience rather than my 3 years of experience. Most in the corporate world would not consider that a very good deal.
That's not what the published salary scales and job postings indicate for AISD. Where are you getting the $1,900 figure?
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Comparing teacher pay with average pay in a state is also unfair. Teachers are required to have a college degree to teach. A better comparison would be to compare teacher pay with other positions that require a bachelors degree.
I agree with that point. But I think Teachers will still fair well in a comparison.
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Unions aren't the problem. Finland has some of the best schools in the world and 90% are unionized.
Finland has an extremely homogeneous student population. The curriculum is very focused and standardized, and doesn't have to accommodate for the same socioeconomic, cultural and racial differences found in U.S. student populations. The Unions there have nothing to do with the outcome, it's the student demographic.
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I wish we could get "rid of the bad kids," but in reality that's not anything we as teachers can do anything about. It would also be politically difficult as well. It's not going to happen.
I understand. I attended high school in the 1970s in a small conservative farm town in Nevada. We were strictly disciplined (swatted with a wood paddle with holes drilled through), girls did not dress provocatively, boys were taken to the gym to box (literally) if we got into scuffles. There was none of the behavioral nonsense we hear of today (kids smack talking teachers, teachers afraid of kids, teachers powerless to expel bad students). That's just another part of the problem. Political correctness and unwillingness to hold kids to a high standard of conduct.
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We don't have an educational problem in America as much as we have cultural problems. Get rid of the cultural problems (not easy to do) and you get rid of the educational problems. The rot is pretty deep right now.
I think we agree with each other on that. But I think there are several "cultures" to blame. I do think the Union Culture is part of the cultural problem, as is the Parent Culture that says Little Johnny does no wrong and thus can't be punished, the political system, the Culture of Instant Gratification that our kids have been exposed to (consumer debt economy).
I think we agree with each other on that. But I think there are several "cultures" to blame. I do think the Union Culture is part of the cultural problem, as is the Parent Culture that says Little Johnny does no wrong and thus can't be punished, the political system, the Culture of Instant Gratification that our kids have been exposed to (consumer debt economy).
That's an awful oversimplification of teacher compensation - or any compensation, Steve. Nobody ever uses all of their fringe benefits, and it's deceptive to equate them as "salary".
So, in your example above, the teacher of the year for the entire state - a 19 year veteran of his field - actually made about $73,000 in an "annualized" salary (which isn't actually a good comparison either). That sounds very reasonable to me. He should probably be making more, as you said. If I was ever recognized as the "best of the year" for my field (in private industry), I'd be making 5 times that amount in compensation.
Anyways, this thread is really awful. I thought we would be talking about Austin area schools and the impact of these budget cuts. All I see here is people raving against immigrants, Democrats, minorities, unions, and a little bit of civil war flashback. Worthless...
Yep, you make entirely valid points. I stopped trying to have a civil conversation with most here. It's like everyone has tunnel vision and can't think about more than one idea (taxes). People on here are so stubborn they can't even consider other people's viewpoints or engage in discussion. It's like Fox News has so totally brainwashed them that all they can shout are talking points spouted to them, instead of thinking for themselves. It's really sorry.
If I could talk to just one conservative that actually valued education, that would totally surprise me. It's the reason I switched from the Republican party to the Democrat party a long time ago and am never switching back. If you value your children and things like education, there is no other choice. My only hope is that enough people moving from CA and the Northeast may finally start to sway things enough left here that at least we can start to have dialogue here and start to address our children's needs. Until then, our state will continue to rank near last with attitudes like what I've seen here. People must value education to improve it. Even the things I've read about football and how it "helps" players improve their education is so far out there that it makes me cringe. And to think that Austin calls itself liberal with people with views like that.
I was responding to the previous commenter's insinuation that teaching was a sweetheart deal. I was not saying it should be a sweetheart deal.
I agree with you that people who make less money often pay even more ridiculous amounts for their health insurance. All of the more reason to have a single payer system so the people that can least afford the burden of out-of-pocket medical expenses aren't hurt the most by the current system.
What you appear to be proposing is "Socialized Medicine" which is basically all the current Obamacare is about. Socialized medicine only works, just like anything else, if it is operated fairly and evenly across the board. However it rarely is!
Who exactly are we supposed to complain to? You obviously don't know how the educational system works and are oblivious to the politics of everything. Anyone who complains about the lack of respect shown might not be fired, but they will not have their contract renewed when it expires every two years. There is no tenure.
It is your system and you should know what your own chain of management is so please don't ask anyone else how you should handle your problems! You have just made a typical "Sheeple" response! You are being trampled on but would rather accept that then file a complaint in your proper channels? If you are too afraid to stand up for your own dignity and rights then maybe you should be crapped on?
You are living in a fantasy land with regard to teachers of years past. Of course we don't do it for the money, as I've already pointed out why. What's funny is that during the "good ol' days" that you long for, teachers were not under constant attack from our politicians, and, they were more likely to be unionized with good benefits. That being said, money is an issue because nobody is going to do what we do for free. So of course, it is kind of about money. I have a mortgage payment to make and I have to feed myself just like everyone else. By the way, it's not like we didn't have to pay a lot in tuition to get this job.
OMG another teacher that is talking from both sides of their face! On one hand you spout out that you don't do it for the money and on the other side of your face you say it is about the money! Which one is it? As for teachers of yesteryear, unions, and benefits their situation was no different than now.
You complain about your high health insurance and yet your costs are really no worse than many other people out there. You complain about having to pay tuition to get your job but so did many, many other people. You complain about many, many things and try to make it sound like "Woe Is Me, I have to pay and endure so much more than any other profession!". You're suppose to be an educated person and be teaching children but from your crying here it is hard to understand how you survived any time length in your profession??
If you make the teaching profession more undesirable through your budget cuts: cutting pay, cutting teachers and thus getting larger class sizes, not giving teachers the authority on grades and discipline (which we are increasingly having taken away from us), then all you're going to get our worse teachers (who else would take that job) with poorer performing students.
We already have poorer performing students! There is still larger drop-out rates than most people expect! As another poster had pointed out (either this or another post) that throwing more money at a situation does not necessarily make it better! Someone else had pointed out that Texas was way low in the rankings compared to most other States. SO WHAT HAPPENED TO ALL OF THAT MONEY THAT WAS ALREADY THROWN AT THE SCHOOL SYSTEMS TO SUPPOSEDLY MAKE THEM BETTER??
I think we agree with each other on that. But I think there are several "cultures" to blame. I do think the Union Culture is part of the cultural problem, as is the Parent Culture that says Little Johnny does no wrong and thus can't be punished, the political system, the Culture of Instant Gratification that our kids have been exposed to (consumer debt economy).
Steve
If you want to blame a "Culture" why don't you blame this: the "Anti Tax Culture" that doesn't want to pay taxes for services that have been proved essential for a top rated state, i.e. education.
Or blame this culture: the "Football Culture" that values football more than education.
Here are some excerpts from an article taking to task some of the Wisconsin teachers who chose to put themselves in the public eye by speaking out to the press during the protest.
If we annualized the above compensations based on the fact that these amounts are earned by working the equivalent of 3/4 the full year most of us work (9 months instead of 12), we're looking at some pretty high compensation numbers for a job that provides a pension-style retirement and near air-tight insulation, once tenured, from being fired if you're lousy.
I'll use the first person in the example: Lechleiter-Luke makes $54,928 in base salary and $32,213 in “fringe benefits,” which include health insurance, life insurance and retirement pay.
54,928 + 32,213 = $87,141. Then divide by .75 to get $116,188 for a gal who says "I will need to find part-time work again".
This salary analysis also doesn't factor in the imputed income derived from the generous Fall, Christmas and Spring vacations plus all the other federal holidays, on top of the entire summer off.
In Texas, I can't find as detailed a breakdown as provided in the article, but this teacher-oriented site, which rates best states in which to work as a teacher based on Salary/Cost of Living, does list some stats:
Texas:
7th out of 50 in "comfort score" (how far the salary goes based on cost of living)
20th of of 50 in 10-year salary increase.
17th out of 50 in average salary
35th of of 50 in starting salary
Texas spends 36% of education expenses on Teachers. Like I said before, cutting some of the red tape would allow us to keep more teachers and pay them even better. I actually think they should be paid better but I also think they don't have it as bad as they sometimes want us to think, such as the Wisconsin teachers.
But losing a job is no fun, no matter what, no matter the profession. I feel for anyone getting laid off. Our method of paying for education is broken, as is the way kids are taught and measured. Get the unions out, cut the red tape, get rid of bad kids, bad or burned out teachers, and the numbers would look different.
Steve
All of them excellent points but I have highlighted some. Possibly teachers need to be paid more but as you once pointed out in another post the information is not all made available so the people who pay their salaries can view it and make opinions based on it.
As it stands now the appearance is money was being thrown at a broken system in hopes to fix it. That apparently has not happened and the next step of significant budget cutting is now underway. What we have going on now are "Public Servants" (yes you are paid by the public) that are trying to make the rally cry "But your future is in jeopardy!" but who are themselves holding back on information here that might well sway the opinions of others to their cause. Instead the people who are being taxed into oblivion to support the broken system are being expected to shoulder even more of a burden without so much as a good reason why.
If you want to blame a "Culture" why don't you blame this: the "Anti Tax Culture" that doesn't want to pay taxes for services that have been proved essential for a top rated state, i.e. education.
Or blame this culture: the "Football Culture" that values football more than education.
Interesting about blaming the "football culture", which I'm sure is a factor in the terrible academics of the Westlake and Lake Travis school districts.
Have you attended very many AISD games in recent years? I'd venture to say that the Capital City's overall "football culture" has had much less impact there now than it did 30-40 years ago.
And how is a massive, expensive increase in a bloated paper-shuffling bureacracy that we have seen building up in that same time period somehow proven to be "essential" for a top-rated education?
Why are the major urban school districts in most large blue state metro areas in such poor condition? They've had massive amounts of money thrown at them. DC, Kansas City, Chicago, etc...
Maybe it has more to do with the "people culture" and demographics than it does about taxes and conservatism.
Fringe benefits are not the same thing as salary. For instance, I don't get get to collect on my own life insurance policy.
Yes that is correct, but are you paying money out of your own pocket for it?? If so then how much of that premium is being subsidized by the school budgeted funds? Also if employer supplied (paid for) life insurance is not a benefit then why does the IRS consider it an "Imputed Income"?
Health insurance is something I don't benefit from unless I use it.
Yes you do benefit from it in the fact that you are covered in the event something does happen. By the way some employer health insurance contributions are also considered as "Imputed Income" by the IRS.
If my employer is paying $400 for my health insurance a month, it's not the same as me getting $400/month, or however much it costs.
What?? You are supposed to be an educated person aren't you? If you do not have to take $400 a month out of your salary (whether the employer gives you extra for it or not) then your employer paying for it is no different than whether they hand you the money or not!! Do you recall the term "Imputed Income"??
If you pull out money from your pension, you get assessed a penalty on that, even if, in the case of Texas, you've already been taxed on that income.
And the point with that? Anyone that pulls money out of a pension (whether it is a pension or 401K) before the retirement term of the pension is penalized. This is not unique to teachers or educators. Many people have had to cash out their 401K in this current recession (depression ??) just in order to survive and pay their bills after being let go from jobs.
That being said, holding teachers accountable for performance on standardized tests is beyond stupid.
Wow! We can actually agree on something (not that it matters much to you). I said that for years but I don't have any influence in the education syste. That has to be taken on from inside to change it. It is very unfortunate that in the educational system, as well as any other business, the "Bean Counters" have taken control!
Unfortunately, one of the best predictors of academic performance is socioeconomic status, and of the best predictors of socioeconomic status is race. If you hold teachers accountable for performance on tests, all but the most desperate of teachers will avoid inner city districts. Plus, the tests are a joke anyway, especially here in Texas. Testing companies like Pearson are making a killing by buying off legislators at all levels to make sure standardized tests never go away.
The rest of us posters who have been speaking of the various ills, and problems, with this as well as other budgetary problems are being called racists. That in spite of the fact we are not and only present information and facts. Here however we have a case where nobody so far on this post has pointed out a potentially racist remark??
I'm not going to reveal which district I work for, but, I would make $1900 more if I had 10 years of experience rather than my 3 years of experience. Most in the corporate world would not consider that a very good deal.
Ahhh, now it comes out!! In a previous post you stated teaching was not about the money. Then in that same paragraph stated it was about the money. Are you one of those new college grads that looked all around you at the education field with stars (dollar signs) in your eyes? Who thought "Hey this is a great career. I can work 9 - 10 months out of the year, take all these holidays off, work 9 - 5 Mon. - Fri., and then when I get tenure they can't fire me!"?? Are you now seeing the reality and that no job is safe, teaching is not what you thought it would be, and are now regretting it?
Comparing teacher pay with average pay in a state is also unfair.
Why? Are teachers in a whole other class of people? Are they better than RE Agents, Engineers, car mechanics, etc., etc., etc.?
Teachers are required to have a college degree to teach.
And?? Engineers are required to have a college degree and 5 years experience before they can even obtain a Professional Engineer license. Many RE Agencies require their Agents to have college degrees (or at least select those over those that don't), Social Workers who work for governmental agencies are mostly required to have degrees and are many times paid well less than teachers, Many companies are even now requiring college degrees for positions that never required them and still don't.
A better comparison would be to compare teacher pay with other positions that require a bachelors degree.
Unions aren't the problem. Finland has some of the best schools in the world and 90% are unionized.
We are not in Finland! Finland's culture is different from ours. Some unions are useful and some unions are useless!
I wish we could get "rid of the bad kids," but in reality that's not anything we as teachers can do anything about. It would also be politically difficult as well. It's not going to happen.
It is not going to happen because you don't want it to happen! Yes you as an individual teacher can not get up and just suspend bad little Johnny from school. However instead of spending all of this time fretting and worrying about your job over the last "THREE" years maybe you should have spent some of that liberal time off working with other teachers to help improve the system to make handling these problems easier?
We don't have an educational problem in America as much as we have cultural problems. Get rid of the cultural problems (not easy to do) and you get rid of the educational problems. The rot is pretty deep right now.
Now you are blaming waste and mismanagement on "culture problems"?
Well, I can only offer my personal judgment/perception of "Union Culture". I readily accept and agree that others will have a completely different take.
But for me, it's ...
Self-preservation and self-benefit over outcome. Entitlement. The notion that a job and a certain amount of pay is a "right" that must be protected at all cost, in any circumstance. Us vs. Them. "You owe me". "That's not my Job". It's the culture that undeniably killed GM (before government had to rescue it). Wisconsin Teachers demonstrated it perfectly last week with their tantrums. Their "talking point" arguments are intellectually dishonest, and serve the Union, not the kids.
My general impression is that a Union seeks first to serve the interests of its members. Maybe that's what it's supposed to do in some, if not most instances, but education is different. These are our kids. The education should come first. At present, Teacher Unions fight efforts to try new ways by exerting political influence to elect people who represent Union Interests, not those of children. Teachers Unions unflinchingly fight to keep the status quo and/or simply fight for more money (for classrooms and/or pay), which hasn't solved the problem, and won't solve the problem. The entire model, as it functions in Education, is ineffective and broken, in my opinion.
Many people don't even have jobs or live in fear of losing the jobs they do have. Record numbers have been unemployed for over a year. State Budgets are broke. Who else, in this economy, at this time in history, but a bunch of crybaby Union members would call in (fake) sick to demonstrate and complain about having to do their share in tough times when they have a better compensation/benefits/retirement deal than most employed persons will ever see?
That's how I perceive "Union Culture". Whether my perception is 100% accurate or not can be debated, but it's the perception I hold, and I know others feel the same. Therefore, it limits by ability to get 100% behind teachers in general, though I want to be 100% behind them and I think we all should. But they have to want what's best for my kids, not themselves or their Union. And they have to be willing to accept the same realities the rest of us live with.
Union Culture is completely opposite of how most of us live and operate in the world, and the mindsets we have. Especially those us self-employed business owners, and people who toil in low/no benefit jobs. My attitude is that nobody owes me anything. Life isn't fair, I deal with it. I teach my kids the same. There are no guarantees, but my opportunities are boundless. I can do or become anything. I am personally accountable for my life, my successes, my failures - everything. If I need help, I ask. If I can help others, I do. I am part of a society and a community, but I do not belong to a "collective". I will think for myself and make my own decisions, not have a Union tell me when and where to show up, what to say and who to vote for.
Finally, I feel like I'm ending up sounding like I'm against teachers. I'm not. I would be happy if every AISD teacher could remain employed in a long and joyful career as a highly compensated educator. I'd just like to see that happen within a different framework and mindset than Unions (and our funding and political system) currently allow.
Steve
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