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Every person that I know that signs a contract with an employer, expects that employer to hold up their end of the deal. In my district, there is a substantial raise in the contract when a teacher acquires a masters degree. It is not unusual to spend over $10,000 to get their masters. Our district tried to renege on that.
Teachers expect that the contract they sign will be honored by other party. If we are going to piece-meal what parts of the contract we follow, then I could easily make my job much easier.
For the non-unionized world, we keep track of what changes with our work year after year (no one does the same work year after year, not just teachers) and then you present the differences to your boss and make a case as to why you deserve more money. More money should never be automatic. If you can't prove you deserve it, you shouldn't get more money.
I've had private sector jobs (teaching is my second career) where there were raises every six months on a schedule. Nonunion. Sometimes there was cursory evaluation that went with it, but not always.
One of my sons is a computer programmer who works for a company that provides regular raises on a schedule.
My other son is becoming an engineer. He's already networked and scoped out what's available. You can bet that he will go to work in good paying job with a company that offers regularly scheduled raises.
They are not that uncommon in the private sector especially with math/science backgrounds.
No, there are only a finite number of people who are willing to teach, regardless of education and certification requirements. If the pool of willing people shrinks significantly, then pay will rise.
The pool of people willing to teach (or at least try teaching) is much much more larger than the number of teaching jobs. Just imagine how big that pool would be if the qualification were dropped to a high school diploma. A state legislature has the ability to drop the qualification bar that low if they so choose.
Nearly all of these would be non-issues if teachers were not forced to unionize. She is honestly complaining about 'only receiving one automatic raise'? Why should anyone ever get an automatic raise? You should get a raise if you prove you are doing more than you were when you were hired. No one ever deserves a raise for doing the exact same work.
North Carolina is a non-union state. Teachers are legally barred from joining a union there. Public sector workers do not get cost of living adjustments or merit raises. What most people call raises for the public sector would just be COLAs for the private sector and not count as raises. What most people call raises in the private sector are merit raises and do not exist in the public sector. What most people call a "raise" in the public sector is not something that exists in the private sector and the two are not in any way comparable.
Basically, a public sector employer never earns more at a position than the day they are hired. From then on, they only get across the board increases the lag behind inflation and the real value of their wages decline for the rest of their career. Since there are no merit raises, they can never exceed what they earned when they were hired.
The only way to get a "raise" in the public sector is to get a promotion. Teachers have the advantage of having seniority based promotions built into their contracts in the form of steps and degree tiers; but most school districts have frozen or even eliminated both steps and degree tiers (including the entire state of North Carolina). For those districts, a teacher will never earn more in real value than they did on their first day of work.
The husband's letter echos a lot of what drove me from teaching HS science after more than 20 years. With NCLB and now, Common Core, the amount of stifling, counterproductive, micromanaging administrivia has become more than I'm willing to put up with. I retired in June and have absolutely no regrets about turning my back on education. It's done and I'm so relieved to be away from it. I loved teaching for the first 15 years or so. The past 7 - 8 have become progressively worse each year and the trend downward will continue into the foreseeable future.
Those of you out there who are sticking it out, I wish you all the best.
The pool of people willing to teach (or at least try teaching) is much much 1)more larger than the number of teaching jobs. Just imagine how big that pool would be if the qualification were dropped to a high school diploma. 2A state legislature has the ability to drop the qualification bar that low if they so choose.
1)This is what would happen if qualification is dropped to high school diploma.
2) Not if they want their school accredited and if they want their graduates to proceed to college.
I've had private sector jobs (teaching is my second career) where there were raises every six months on a schedule. Nonunion. Sometimes there was cursory evaluation that went with it, but not always.
One of my sons is a computer programmer who works for a company that provides regular raises on a schedule.
My other son is becoming an engineer. He's already networked and scoped out what's available. You can bet that he will go to work in good paying job with a company that offers regularly scheduled raises.
They are not that uncommon in the private sector especially with math/science backgrounds.
Those kind of raises are extremely rare. I would not want to work for any company with scheduled raises. Why would I want to work in a place where people who don't pull their weight still get raises? That does nothing but incentivize laziness.
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Originally Posted by marigolds6
North Carolina is a non-union state. Teachers are legally barred from joining a union there. Public sector workers do not get cost of living adjustments or merit raises. What most people call raises for the public sector would just be COLAs for the private sector and not count as raises. What most people call raises in the private sector are merit raises and do not exist in the public sector. What most people call a "raise" in the public sector is not something that exists in the private sector and the two are not in any way comparable.
Basically, a public sector employer never earns more at a position than the day they are hired. From then on, they only get across the board increases the lag behind inflation and the real value of their wages decline for the rest of their career. Since there are no merit raises, they can never exceed what they earned when they were hired.
The only way to get a "raise" in the public sector is to get a promotion. Teachers have the advantage of having seniority based promotions built into their contracts in the form of steps and degree tiers; but most school districts have frozen or even eliminated both steps and degree tiers (including the entire state of North Carolina). For those districts, a teacher will never earn more in real value than they did on their first day of work.
And again, teachers work significantly less in terms of hours per week as well as days per year than most other professions, so lower pay is to be expected. Teachers unions spent over $70 million on political lobbying efforts last year alone. The effects of teachers unions reaches teachers in all public schools, not just ones who are unionized themselves.
In my district, there is a substantial raise in the contract when a teacher acquires a masters degree. It is not unusual to spend over $10,000 to get their masters.
I did not get a raise after getting my masters of mechanical engineering (automatic raise). I don't see why teachers get automatic raises for additional education.
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My other son is becoming an engineer. He's already networked and scoped out what's available. You can bet that he will go to work in good paying job with a company that offers regularly scheduled raises.
What prevents the company from lowering the bar and hiring non-engineers to do the work that your son is doing for half the money? There isn't anything except that non-engineers wouldn't be qualified to do the work, so the company chooses to pay market rate for engineers because that is who they want. The reason engineers get paid more is because the number of qualified people who want to do engineering work is smaller than the pool of positions, and therefore the pay is higher.
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What most people call raises for the public sector would just be COLAs for the private sector and not count as raises. What most people call raises in the private sector are merit raises and do not exist in the public sector.
Cost of living adjustments are a term coined by unions, and do not exist in non-union jobs in the private sector. They're just called "raises" and are paid based on what the employer believes is required to keep the employee from jumping ship and moving to another company.
Last edited by twoincomes; 10-24-2013 at 02:56 PM..
He talks about how his wife hasn't received promised pay increases. I would like to ask which private sector employers promise a certain raise each year (they don't unless you are unionized)
He complains about senior management (school board & legislature). In most companies, employees complain terribly about the bad decisions senior management is making. This is not limited to teaching.
As far as his other points, I think he is pretty accurate. I would add a big pet peeve of mine - teachers being forced to teach kids that don't want to be there and parents who don't prepare their kids for school, or expect the school to work miracles.
Good case in point is the thread about the 4 year old who wants to bring a dog to class, and expects the teacher (and school nurse) to care for the dog in addition to teaching the class. Poor teacher. But, happens all over.
Final comment about teacher pay. Teachers get paid based on supply (number of people willing to work as teachers) and demand (number of school districts trying to hire teachers). The reason they don't get paid as much as other professions is that the supply of teachers is great and demand is low, so the pay is low. It's not based on public's perception of what they do or the administration's or legisature's opinion. If suddenly half the number of teachers stopped teaching, pay would increase significantly.
I so agree with you here. People underestimate the difficulties involved in teaching the unwilling who don't want to be there, didn't get enough sleep last night, didn't eat breakfast and had no one to help them with their homework.
Wake up and smell the coffee. This is what it is like in the real world outside of the teacher's union. We, who are outside of a teacher's union, are sometimes happy, but not too often, but at least we can have autonomy to solve a problem.
I confess, it is a surprise to me that you still have some of the same problems as those who haven't been in the cloistered atmosphere of a union.
Some of us, of a certain age, were raised in the ethos that if we were pure of heart, and diligent, we would live the American Dream. We did not know that this is not so until recently.
Your fault, and our fault, is only being born too early.
What does you wife think is the solution? It seems to me it must be in the formation of more private schools and vouchers.
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