LI Teacher's Salaries (New York, Albany, Merrick: sales, best school districts, sales tax)

[kdlugozi]

You are right that many jobs have take home work. The point I have been trying to make is that there has to be something between a teacher free for all and bottom line almighty dollar business approach to running school districts. There has to be a balance somewhere. Anyone who thinks that there is anything good about either extreme is sadly mistaken. Apparently because I do not agree with the extremists on either side means that I must be a teacher. LOL.

No, I am just someone who has witnessed medicare reform first hand. This reform was needed because, just like in education, there was a lot of greed and years of medicare fraud, lining the pockets of healthcare administrators. The government overhauled medicare and cut way down on reimbursement. The initial changes were way too extreme, as reimbursement went WAY down. Did this help the patients? No. The administrators continued to line their pockets with cash by cutting costs from workers salaries and benefits and quality of care went down the gutter. Less workers with higher caseloads. Less time spent with each patient. Now things are correcting themselves somewhat. Salaries are still down and turnover continues to be high but government mandates have ensured that administrators can't skimp on individual care anymore, forcing them to have to hire more workers. It is getting better, but still far from perfect. Without benefits and with lower salaries, there is high turnover still. Less people are going into the rehab field and there is a staff shortage. Rarely do people stay in a job more than 12-18 months anymore. And as soon as cheaper staff via a cheaper agency is found, you are replaced. And as soon as a worker is offered a better rate with another agency, they leave. No commitment/ loyalty on either side. The point is that the higher ups were the ones skimming funds but they were not the ones impacted by the reforms....the workers and the patients were.

Just like the greed in healthcare which sparked the medicare reform, there is greed in education sparking the need for education reform. A major overhaul will not be without its consequences though and if not carefully thought out, our kids will suffer. The key will be to find the balance.

[kmrlongisland]

Originally Posted by majortom1981

I do not know if it has been brought up. You can see all teachers, and civil service employee salaries at SeeThroughNY :: Home

Referenced at least a dozen times in any thread about civil servant compensation. There should be a law against discussing teacher compensation without having first proved you have read your local SD contracts on seethroughny.net. The ignorance out there is astounding.

[I_Love_LI_but]

Originally Posted by kmrlongisland

Point taken. What I am trying to express is the compensation protection that teachers enjoy is provided by legislative action only. We really don't know what the real cost is of a specific level of quality. We need to let some market dynamics creep in to provide a reality check.

Compare LI public school teacher salaries and benefits to LI private school teacher salaries and benefits. We have all kinds of private schools on LI from the elite to the religious. Another thing is, people PAY EXTRA to send their kids to privates above and beyond their property taxes because they consider the private school education way more valuable than the education available in public schools. Therefore you would think private school teachers are better compensated, right? Makes sense? NO, they are not. The private school compensation may even be too low in many cases. So the actual market value of teachers on LI lies between public and private school compensation IMO.

[I_Love_LI_but]

Originally Posted by IceandFire

What's with the complaining of teachers salaries on Long Island? $100K should be an average income on Long Island because the cost of living is among the highest in the country. I don't understand why people are complaining about teacher and administrator salaries when the average pharmaceutical CEO makes $2 million a year..with that money you can have more money for retirement than a teacher pension! I don't see why you're so mad about high taxes paying teacher salaries when your health insurance pays pharmaceutical CEOs million dollar salary.

Too bad we're only middle class taxpayers ... that's what makes up most of LI. If we were all pharma CEOs the property tax would be a drop in the bucket.

[I_Love_LI_but]

Originally Posted by IceandFire

"New York’s State mandates take your tax dollars out of your local community and limit the ability to provide local services.

90 cents of every county property tax dollar goes to Albany to fund State mandates.

Local taxpayers send $7.3 billion, in weekly installments, to help fund the State’s Medicaid program.

In 2012, counties and the City of New York will send more than $11.5 billion in local revenue to subsidize the State Treasury."

Source-
Enough is Enough Albany-NY Demands Mandate Relief. | "OUR COUNTIES ARE NOT YOUR PIGGY BANKS"

Additional sources-
Reforming Medicaid to Relieve Your Property Tax Burden | New York State Senate

http://www.lohud.com/article/2011100...nclick_check=1

I don't know where you're from, but on LI our SCHOOL TAXES are separate. We see exactly where they are going and it's not upstate or NYC, it's 80% towards pension, salary and benefits for LI teachers and administrators.

[OhBeeHave]

Originally Posted by kdlugozi

Of course teachers should pay into their own healthcare and retirement! And I know that in many districts they are already paying into their own healthcare. These things vary from district to district.

Ok, you want districts run like a business? I never said that all inexperienced teachers are bad. But the fact is that if there were no union and schools were run just like other businesses, there would be no incentives for pursuing higher education. Teachers could also leave mid-year for no reason with no contract to state otherwise. And what loyalty would there be to those who are good, experienced teachers? None. If schools were run like businesses, what incentive would there be to do a good job and stick around, knowing that once you get too experienced and expensive, you will just be replaced by a cheaper teacher anyway? Why even bother trying? Why even work hard if you know your experience will not mean higher pay or increased job security?

For the same reason that if you don't work hard, you will not receive higher pay and have a decreased chance of job security.

You guys seem very focused on the fact that teachers work 10 months out of every year. When do you think the grading is done, the copies are made, the lessons are planned, the continuing education credits are earned..during school hours? Think again.

If we were to go with 180 teaching days -- that is still a much smaller amount of time than the average person works. 365 days per year - weekends = 261 weekdays. 261 week days - 5 major holidays = 256 work days. 256 work days - vacation (2 weeks for argument's sake) 10 days = 246 days for the average Joe or Jane in an office. 246-180 = 66 days less that the teacher has worked. Our elementary school day is 6 hours & 15 minutes long; Jr high 6 hours & 40 minutes; HS 6 hours & 46 minutes long. Right off the bat, the school day is, on average, 1.5 hours shorter than the average 8 hour work day. Right there that's almost 4 more days a year that the teacher has free, so-to-speak. It's an additional 1.5 hours a day that could be committed to grading, copying, etc., doing things that weren't completed during the contractual prep period.

In my district (TVCSD) according to the contract:
" All elementary school teachers shall be scheduled for a 45-minute duty-free
lunch period every day unless impossible. In the event such a period cannot be
provided, the Professional Rights and Responsibilities Committee of the TVTA shall
receive upon request a written report of the reasons for each such instance.
Elementary teachers shall be scheduled for a 45 minute duty-free preparation
period daily."

As indicated above, the elementary day is 375 minutes long which includes the 45 min lunch and 45 minute daily 'duty-free prep period' 375-90= 4.75 instructional hours, which I can only assume must be the difficult part of a teacher's day if they have a class of troublemakers and chatterboxes.

Secondary Schools in my district:
"In addition to homeroom duty, secondary teachers shall be assigned to:
a. no more than 25 teaching period per week, or the equivalent in minutes or
modules which may include laboratory classes;
b. five preparation periods per week in which no duty will be assigned;
c. five duty free lunch periods;
d. five periods for supervision or supervised study hall;
e. five professional/service periods per week during which assignments shall
be determined by the building principal and shall include...(very long list)"

Each secondary school has a 9 period day = 45 periods a week. Right off the top the teacher has no more than 25 periods a week (or 5 periods a day) in his/her given subject.
20 periods a week (4 periods a day) break down into:
5 lunch periods a week (1 daily)
5 free prep periods a week (1 daily)
5 study hall or supervisory periods (1 daily)
5 professional development periods a week (1 daily)

Please note that 'Homeroom' consists of the last 3 minutes of 1st period.
Please note that 27 minutes a day are spent changing classrooms.
Adjusted JHS period time = 6 hours, 10 minutes.
Adjusted HS period time = 6 hours, 16 minutes.
Periods are approximately 42 minutes.

A secondary teacher has 3.5 hours a day of instructional time within their field and ~.75 of prep time. Depending on their study hall/supervisory assignment and nature of students it entails, they might be able to allocate part of that time to prep as well.
Let's say 210 mins instruction time + 126 mins prep, supervisory, & prof. develop = 336 mins/school day devoted teaching and their contractual obligations.

This sounds silly but: Can a district cut costs by eliminating teachers supervising study hall, and bringing in attendants -- like in the cafeteria -- which then frees up the teachers to do what they were trained to do -- teach?

Some prep work can be done by lesser paid secretarial staff or aides. Grading? Elementary teachers have students pass off their homework to other classmates where it is then reviewed as a lesson and the classmates place X marks next to the incorrect answers. Teacher gets back corrected papers which s/he needs only glance over before assigning a grade. I will concede that secondary teachers need more time to grade.

Teachers should pay into their own retirement and I believe the pension system will need to be phased out/decreased as things cannot go on the way they are, but to expect schools to be run like businesses with no regard for anything but the almighty dollar would be really short sighted.

A school is a business where the product is providing an education. While many do this well, there are variables which take the school from solely providing a quality product. Teachers can and do make a difference, but when the math is done, their actual working hours are very light compared to many who are in other fields. By no means do I feel they should be slighted in their pay -- they've received degrees and advanced degrees upon those, but at what point do we say draw the line when someone teaches 3.5 hours a day, 180 days a year, and is making $100K a year plus benefits?

If a school were run in a more business-like fashion, the time of a valuable asset would not be allocated to work which could be performed by someone with lesser training or skills. I want teachers to teach, not babysit study halls or hover over Xerox machines.

[sneakyvegan]

Originally Posted by Jdawg8181

And yes you can just say "be a teacher then" but that is not possible bc i dont like really like kids.

I'd love to get the same benefits and retirement options as a member of the FDNY but I don't want to have to risk my life going into burning buildings. You and I should talk.

[IceandFire]

Originally Posted by I_Love_LI_but

I don't know where you're from, but on LI our SCHOOL TAXES are separate. We see exactly where they are going and it's not upstate or NYC, it's 80% towards pension, salary and benefits for LI teachers and administrators.

Property taxes are a bigger issue than school taxes. At least most teachers and administrators aren't corrupt and educate our kids. Most of our property taxes go to unnecessary state social services and fat cat state government workers who make more money than Long Island teachers. But you still complain about teachers, it's like you all have a vendetta against them or something. The state government is the real reason why we have such high school and property taxes, why Long Island has no industry, why upstate New York has been in an economic depression for decades, why there is no diversified business in the state other than NYC. As for teacher pensions, the newer and lower tier of state government workers don't get pensions anymore and have to pay into their own 401K. So I'm sure that is going to change soon with new teachers being hired if it's already happening in the state government.

[BigMike50]

This thread was dead for over two years until a one post wonder dug it up from the grave

I think all this stuff has be said before and probably more than once,lol

I think I'll start a new thread on L.I. police salaries and pensions and see how that goes over.

Now that tree lady doesn't seem to bad.

[OhBeeHave]

Originally Posted by BigMike50

This thread was dead for over two years until a one post wonder dug it up from the grave

I think all this stuff has be said before and probably more than once,lol

I think I'll start a new thread on L.I. police salaries and pensions and see how that goes over.

Now that tree lady doesn't seem to bad.

Are you feeling left out? j/k

Seriously, though, this necromanced thread has been civil in its reincarnated form as opposed to one of the classic Cops v. Teacher threads.