Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
You are assuming a 40 hour work week? Teachers will laugh at that assumption. Do nurses get overtime? If teachers got paid overtime, or even got paid hourly, they would be happy. A new teacher is going to work 12 hour days and one day on the weekend, if they are going to do a decent job. More if they want to do a good job.
However the issue is only partly about starting pay. It is about pay increases. They do not go anywhere and they are inconsistent. The system results in essentially random pay each year. A teacher with 5 years experience might make $48,000 for a few years, after saving for five years, they think they at sufficiently stable they can buy a small house in Aurora. This will get them out from under the yoke of rents that goes up much faster than their salary. They buy a house. Suddenly their pay drops to 44,000 for a couple of years. Now they cannot afford their house unless they immediately leave and go to another district.
I do not know how nurses make a living in Denver, but I do know teachers struggle constantly to get by in Denver, particularly if they are not supported by a second income. They can go to another district or another state, but if they are committed to Denver for whatever reason, they do not have that option. However many of them do just go elsewhere after a while. Denver has a terrible retention rate. The terrible retention rate actually saves Denver money as it has fewer and fewer experienced teachers and therefore fewer and fewer teachers making higher pay levels.
If you step back and look at the facts with an open mind, you will see, yes, they are very seriously underpaid. And no, teachers do not strike all the time demanding more money. there has not been a teacher strike in Denver in 25 years. It takes a long time to reach this point. Further a strike is devastating to the teachers. Some of them will lose their home because of the strike. Some will completely deplete their savings and have to start over. Some will likely have to move to another district despite the resolution of the strike. Yes, they have to be completely desperate to go out on strike. That is why only about half of the teachers actually went on strike. Many of them simply cannot survive if they strike. Income during a strike is $0.
While pay is the primary driver of the strike, it is not only about pay. On top of low pay, the teachers are treated terribly. In addition, as mentioned, the system of determining bonuses is random and political. The evaluation system is demeaning, unfair and unreasonable. There is way too much administration and way too little support. Teachers are spread too thin.
Teachers know the pay is not great, but they expect to be able to make a living, support themselves without subsidies or food stamps. No one goes to college for five or six years to live on food stamps, or to spend their entire life living paycheck to paycheck and occasionally skipping meals or walking to work because they are out of money.
It is amusing to me that the central district has so many expendable administrators they can move something like 1200 or 1400 of them into the classrooms in order to keep the schools open. If that does not tell you Denver is misapplying its school funding, then nothing will.
Great summary. This is what people need to read and understand.
The chart for teaching salaries in DPS that I posted says it is based on 1496 hours/year. Any job can be translated into an hourly salary. Please quit saying teacher pay is like that of a barista. It simply isn't true! You're not sure where I got that number? I showed my work, like a good little student.
I mean non-student time is built into a teacher's work day. They have these things called "planning periods". Elementary kids go off to art class, music class, PE and the like and the teacher is still there. Teachers in my district get comp time for things like conferences. They get paid for coaching. They get extra pay when they work outside of school hours, for ex, if they are the orchestra director they get paid for the time they're directing an evening concert.
"Assisting with millage or bond election efforts so they can keep their jobs." Isn't that illegal to do on work time? I don't believe teachers are working "open house, concerts, science fair, invention convention etc." for free, either.
Nurses usually get paid for overtime. I gave the example of nurses sometimes being asked to clock out and then finish paperwork, etc. I thought it was rather obvious that they were not getting paid after they clocked out. Yes, they'll get paid for 50 hours if they work 50 hours, but as I said though it apparently did not go through, that is an unusual situation. The admin will usually do everything they can to avoid paying OT. When I worked in an office, the work week was 4 days because while you knew what time you started work in the AM, you never knew exactly when you were going to get done. Anyone who called in by 4:30 who needed a same day appointment was guaranteed an appt, meaning you were often there late. So some days you worked 8 hours, some days 10. In reality, you seldom got in 40 hours during a week, working full time. It was nice to have a day off during the week, but that was not a job for someone needing the $ badly. I don't know what kind of weekend and holiday pay is offered these days.
I never said I thought teaching was easy. I think I said previously that I have no problem with anyone trying to get more pay. I have a problem with people poor-mouthing it, claiming teachers are going on food stamps (that would be an extreme situation), walking to work because they can't afford to drive their car, skipping meals and the like because the pay is so low, and earning the wages of a barista.
ETA: When I worked for a health department, we got "paid" for overtime work in comp time, and it was sometimes difficult to take the comp time.
I do not think you are gong to be able to understand how teachers are paid. they are not paid for 1496 hours. they are paid for performing the job of teaching their assigned class, meeting all of their reporting requirements, meeting with parents, etc. It is not a set hours job. that is not how salaried positions work. you will not find a teacher who works just 1496 hours. Unless maybe they are a part time teacher. What you do not seem to grasp is teachers work closer to to 2000 hours but their pay does not change. They do not punch a clock like nurses do. They are on a salary to do a job. That job is not done in the classroom hours. That job is not done in 1496 hours. It requires a lot more. Babysitters who just show up for class and do not teach might be able to do the job in 1496 hours. Teachers cannot. there are some babysitters posing as teachers, but the majority teach.
Planning period (no s). The panning period is, as I said encroached, on for other purposes and it is already insufficient. What that means it the teachers do not actually get to do planning during most of their planning periods because they are required to do other things. Planning get done at home. teachers get paid for coaching as a separate item (it is not much and works out to about $3 an hour. they do not get paid for the other activities. They do have to do lots of other things that are not on school time. unlike other people, they do not go home and do their own thing. They go home and work some more. They do not get paid anything more for that work.
Teachers do not do extra work for free, it is part of the package. We are repeatedly running into a lack of understanding of what a salaried job is. They get paid a set amount for teaching and that includes all the requirements that go with it. So, if you want to figure an hourly rate, you have to include all of the hours. Teaching work does not end when the bell rings.
What the job is supposed to be according to the website and what the job is are two entirely different things. the schools are short of teachers and have too many kids. They have to draw the teachers they have into other duties the school is unable to fill. teachers work more hours as a result. Hence the strike. or at least a portion of the reason for the strike.
Baristas I know make $15 - 20 an hour. They get tips. They get time and a half for overtime. They also get raises. That is ballpark what a teacher makes, although a teacher may net out a bit less per hour, especially a new teacher. Teaching is a lot more work for newer teachers. Admittedly I only know three baristas, so maybe they are just exceptional. Would it make you feel better if I used cocktail waitresses for comparison instead, I think they do a bit better than Barristas.
Apparently they are making some progress. After 15 months of "negotiations" the district is finally starting to negotiate. Without the strike, they never would have negotiated at all.
I do not think you are gong to be able to understand how teachers are paid. they are not paid for 1496 hours. they are paid for performing the job of teaching their assigned class, meeting all of their reporting requirements, meeting with parents, etc. It is not a set hours job. that is not how salaried positions work. you will not find a teacher who works just 1496 hours. Unless maybe they are a part time teacher. What you do not seem to grasp is teachers work closer to to 2000 hours but their pay does not change. They do not punch a clock like nurses do. They are on a salary to do a job. That job is not done in the classroom hours. That job is not done in 1496 hours. It requires a lot more. Babysitters who just show up for class and do not teach might be able to do the job in 1496 hours. Teachers cannot. there are some babysitters posing as teachers, but the majority teach.
Planning period (no s). The panning period is, as I said encroached, on for other purposes and it is already insufficient. What that means it the teachers do not actually get to do planning during most of their planning periods because they are required to do other things. Planning get done at home. teachers get paid for coaching as a separate item (it is not much and works out to about $3 an hour. they do not get paid for the other activities. They do have to do lots of other things that are not on school time. unlike other people, they do not go home and do their own thing. They go home and work some more. They do not get paid anything more for that work.
Teachers do not do extra work for free, it is part of the package. We are repeatedly running into a lack of understanding of what a salaried job is. They get paid a set amount for teaching and that includes all the requirements that go with it. So, if you want to figure an hourly rate, you have to include all of the hours. Teaching work does not end when the bell rings.
What the job is supposed to be according to the website and what the job is are two entirely different things. the schools are short of teachers and have too many kids. They have to draw the teachers they have into other duties the school is unable to fill. teachers work more hours as a result. Hence the strike. or at least a portion of the reason for the strike.
Baristas I know make $15 - 20 an hour. They get tips. They get time and a half for overtime. They also get raises. That is ballpark what a teacher makes, although a teacher may net out a bit less per hour, especially a new teacher. Teaching is a lot more work for newer teachers. Admittedly I only know three baristas, so maybe they are just exceptional. Would it make you feel better if I used cocktail waitresses for comparison instead, I think they do a bit better than Barristas.
Apparently they are making some progress. After 15 months of "negotiations" the district is finally starting to negotiate. Without the strike, they never would have negotiated at all.
So what is a fair salary for a teacher? What should a starting salary be?
If you look across the country being a teacher is not exactly a position you can be the head of a household at. I don't know of a teacher that is the bread winner. But there are lots of jobs where the pay isn't that great either.
Why isn't there more transparency as to where the tax funds go to each school? How much is going to the students/teachers vs admin, buildings, tech etc....?
I'm fine with teachers getting paid more, I'm not fine with tax increases until I see where the $$ goes.
Also, willing to bet once this strike is settled, the increase in pay will pay a few bills, it wont be anything substantial., but the union will claim victory!
I'm having a hard time understanding this on a few different levels.
First, as it pertains to the teachers in Denver...they seem to be making about 50-60 grand a year for a job in which they only have to work 180 days a year. That's essentially part-time. From what I understand, their pensions at retirement are 80-90%, which is crazy. Like, there's a long term play there. And the ones talking about working "3 jobs"...well yeah, if I got 3 months off every summer, I'd probably go find a temp hustle for those months, and then drive Uber or do elance for a 3rd job during Spring Break, Winter Break, etc. My guess is, with the right hustle, these people could be pulling almost 6 figures.
Which leads me to my second conundrum, which is this belief that Denver is "expensive". I own rental property in the area, and frequently have to make my way to the front range for work, and one thing I'd never call it is "expensive". Gas is less than 2 bucks a gallon, the sales tax is, what, 5%? Income tax is similarly low. Properties are dirt cheap - I've got a 5500 square foot McMansion in Cherry Creek for less than 3/4 a million, and have 2 2 bedroom condos near the tech center that I paid less than 225 a piece for. Food costs are nothing. I recently got my property tax bills, and they were really mild (though germane to this topic, the larger SFH property taxes included something like $2,300 for the schools, which is awfully high - so clearly there's better funding). Interestingly, it costs more to insure the vehicle I keep in the area. Like, making 55 or 60 grand a year in Denver seems like it'd be solidly middle class to me. LA, where my primary residence is? THAT'S expensive. I understand the LA teachers striking. They're making 65-70 a year in a city where you're living hand to mouth in a shoebox at less than 125 unless you inherited property. They've got bigger safety concerns, have to contend with overloaded class sizes because of all the illegals, etc. I'm just not getting what "the struggle" is in Denver. ****, my larger Denver rental property would be a 6 or 7 million dollar home if you picked it up and put it on a comparably sized piece of land where I live.
Like, I don't doubt that Denver is expensive "compared to 10 or 15 years ago", which might give long-time locals the mistaken impression it's an expensive city, but y'all have no concept of what a real cost of living looks like. Hell, we've toyed with moving in to the SFH just because it would accelerate our retirements by years.
I do not think you are gong to be able to understand how teachers are paid. they are not paid for 1496 hours. they are paid for performing the job of teaching their assigned class, meeting all of their reporting requirements, meeting with parents, etc. It is not a set hours job. that is not how salaried positions work. you will not find a teacher who works just 1496 hours. Unless maybe they are a part time teacher. What you do not seem to grasp is teachers work closer to to 2000 hours but their pay does not change. They do not punch a clock like nurses do. They are on a salary to do a job. That job is not done in the classroom hours. That job is not done in 1496 hours. It requires a lot more. Babysitters who just show up for class and do not teach might be able to do the job in 1496 hours. Teachers cannot. there are some babysitters posing as teachers, but the majority teach.
Planning period (no s). The panning period is, as I said encroached, on for other purposes and it is already insufficient. What that means it the teachers do not actually get to do planning during most of their planning periods because they are required to do other things. Planning get done at home. teachers get paid for coaching as a separate item (it is not much and works out to about $3 an hour. they do not get paid for the other activities. They do have to do lots of other things that are not on school time. unlike other people, they do not go home and do their own thing. They go home and work some more. They do not get paid anything more for that work.
Teachers do not do extra work for free, it is part of the package. We are repeatedly running into a lack of understanding of what a salaried job is. They get paid a set amount for teaching and that includes all the requirements that go with it. So, if you want to figure an hourly rate, you have to include all of the hours. Teaching work does not end when the bell rings.
What the job is supposed to be according to the website and what the job is are two entirely different things. the schools are short of teachers and have too many kids. They have to draw the teachers they have into other duties the school is unable to fill. teachers work more hours as a result. Hence the strike. or at least a portion of the reason for the strike.
Baristas I know make $15 - 20 an hour. They get tips. They get time and a half for overtime. They also get raises. That is ballpark what a teacher makes, although a teacher may net out a bit less per hour, especially a new teacher. Teaching is a lot more work for newer teachers. Admittedly I only know three baristas, so maybe they are just exceptional. Would it make you feel better if I used cocktail waitresses for comparison instead, I think they do a bit better than Barristas.
Apparently they are making some progress. After 15 months of "negotiations" the district is finally starting to negotiate. Without the strike, they never would have negotiated at all.
Why don't you think I can understand it? Do you think I'm too stupid? I was in the professional workforce for 45 years. I've had jobs that were salaried. They also broke that down to hourly. If you had to take time off you didn't have (e.g. extra sick time) they could figure out to the penny how much to deduct from your check. A salary isn't a blank check so to speak to demand any number of hours out of an employee, nor is it a blank check for an employee to work as few hours as possible. You are are very incorrect that teachers don't get paid for extra duties other than coaching. Because I'm more familiar with Boulder Valley's website, I found their page: https://www.bvsd.org/HR/Documents/Ne...s__2018-19.pdf
Lookit this will ya! Intramural coaching, yearbook sponsor, director of musical, newspaper sponsor, choir director (50 hrs after school), marching band director (ditto), director of full length play (ditto), on and on. Now, I have to say I think people should get paid for the work they do. Just don't try to keep telling us the teachers are NOT getting paid for these activities. That's as much a fabrication as the skipping meals, food stamps, walking to work to save gas, etc. A band director, for the extra 50 hours, gets $2000, or $40/hr.
Please post verifiable information about baristas making $15-$20/hr plus tips, that is, a link! All I could find was Starbucks, for all their self-aggrandizement, paying minimum wage.
"More than half the district's teachers went on strike Monday after negotiations over pay broke down."
Negotiations did not break down, the District simply refused to negotiate at all for 15 months. They just kept repeating basically the same offer over and over and ignoring the teacher's concerns and issues.
Sounds like it might be a good deal. District finally wised up. Losing teachers at alarming rates is not good for the district or the kids. Continuity is important. I will see what the reaction is.
I hope the teachers were able to go back today. My daughter really wanted to be there for Valentines day. She thinks it is one of the best holidays for young kids because for them, it is a time to express pure love for everyone: friends, family, teachers. It has not yet become a love/lust thing, but a pure expression of love for everyone in their lives.
. . .Teachers in the state's largest district can return to classrooms on Thursday or take an unpaid day off. Early Childhood Education classes, which have been put on hold during the strike, will remain closed on Thursday. . .
W
Lookit this will ya! Intramural coaching, yearbook sponsor, director of musical, newspaper sponsor, choir director (50 hrs after school), marching band director (ditto), director of full length play (ditto), on and on. Now, I have to say I think people should get paid for the work they do. Just don't try to keep telling us the teachers are NOT getting paid for these activities. That's as much a fabrication as the skipping meals, food stamps, walking to work to save gas, etc. A band director, for the extra 50 hours, gets $2000, or $40/hr.
Please post verifiable information about baristas making $15-$20/hr plus tips, that is, a link! All I could find was Starbucks, for all their self-aggrandizement, paying minimum wage.
Those are all coaching jobs. Different name but yes coaching. Not the things that I listed where teachers must put in added hours and they are not paid more. Coaching jobs are paid more, because they are an additional job, not part of the teachers duties. Planning, filling out reports, meeting wiht parents, attending board meetings, all are part of the teacher's job. When someone says they are working three extra jobs they may be referring to coaching or coaching by other terms. It is an extra job, not part of their work. And again, like everything else a band director is not putting in just $50 hours. The number on the internet has no relevance to real world. the band director does it because they want to help the kids, not for the money. they can make considerably more at McCDonalds per hour than they can directing the band (unless they mean 50 hours per week which is way high or 50 hours per month which is about right). As you get more experience with the internet you will discover much of what you find on there has no relationship to the real world. Yes, even if it comes from a government source, or maybe especially if it comes from a government source. It is amusing to watch people cite internet statistics, numbers and publications in an effort to try to deny reality. newsflash - the internet is not gospel. It is not reality. It is an imaginary world where people pretend to be who they are not and where numbers, data, statistics are spun or wholly fabricated.
It is rare someone will get docked for a salaried job. if they do it is simply prorated for the number of normal work days. It does not account for the additional time they put in. It is not based on an actual hourly rate. that is because there is no hourly rate for salaried people. There is no overtime, there is no added compensation for the extra hours. If you can get the job done in less time than someone else, your salary works out to ore per hour. However in most jobs, most salaried people spend a lot more than 40 hours a week. In some jobs you might get docked some pay for missing a day beyond your allotment even if you still work 50 hours that week. Teaching is that way (so is my job, except they would not dock my pay, they just would not count the missed day as a missed day).
You can scream until you are blue int he face but you cannot change two facts. 1. Salaried workers are not paid hourly and there is no way to make an hourly comparison. 2. You do not know more than thousands of teachers in the Denver school district whether they are compensated sufficiently to make decent living and to feel like they have a future. there is a term for speaking with authority about something of which you have no actual knowledge. I will not repeat it, you can google it if you wish.
If you want to assert teacher are overpaid, or if you want to speak from a position of knowledge, go back to college for six years and try doing it for a year or two.
The teachers are happily back in school - at lest most if not all. I was not certain whether they would get the go ahead on time to get in today.
The deal is decent for them. It is a huge positive over what they were looking at and most importantly provides some certainty. Can you imagine working a job where you are told your income will go up and down dramatically every year and you will have no way of knowing how much you are going to make until the end of the year? Even salespeople on a c omission have a good idea how much they will make, just add up the commissions. For Denver teachers, it was random.
Everyone should be very happy they are back to work. And for those who were concerned, no, the school district cannot increase taxes. They do not have that power. Only your state legislature can raise taxes.
his was more about application of their budgeted funds. the will probably have to cut back on a few layers of excessive administration and reduce bonuses for working in at risk schools (which bonuses generally do not work anyway, just ask Detroit). This may result in the legislature moving more funds to education from other sources, or if they decide it is necessary, to increase taxes in some way. It is always puzzling and frustrating when you are in a state that has average or higher than average taxes, and yet they seem unable to take care of teachers, schools, roads, public safety etc. compared to other states with lower tax rates. Where is the money going?
best of luck to the students and teachers returning to school
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
