Boohoo, The Poor, Impoverished LA Teachers
From UnionWatch, Ed Ring reports about the looming LA school teachers' strike:
LAUSD teachers are threatening to strike because they only make - using real world equivalents - $97,041 in direct pay, plus $21,045 in employer paid benefits. The average full-time LAUSD teacher earns total compensation worth $118,086 per year. Throw onto direct pay the 5% offer from the district, worth another $4,852 per year, and you have a total average teacher compensation proposed to go up to $122,938 per year.
Excuse me, but in the real world, making $122K is cause for celebration, not angry protests.
via @reasonpolicy
Something seems really off. What is meant by "real world equivalents" - U.S. Dollars are U.S. Dollars - is this monopoly money or money that can only be spent at the company store or something?
21k for benefits for someone getting 97k seems really low for the private sector let alone a government employee. Maybe I am not understanding what is meant.
The Former Banker at March 3, 2015 10:06 PM
Where are you getting your numbers?
According to salary.com LA teachers average 58k in base pay, not 97k, coming to about 82k with benefits... still a good salary, hardly what you're talking about. 75.6k base pay is the 95 percentile, which means only 5% of the teachers earn that much or more.
Still good pay but hardly what you're talking about. Source?
NicoleK at March 4, 2015 12:22 AM
Amazing how many news articles cover this topic, but don't specify the salaries involved.
According to this:
http://edsource.org/2011/duncans-vision-of-150000-teacher-salaries-nowhere-in-sight/311/311#.VPcINeFCzpI
starting salary of teachers in LA is $45,637 in 2011.
Snoopy at March 4, 2015 5:29 AM
Just as significant, how much does the administration's wages go up when the teacher's wages increase? Nothing quite like 'management' encouraging people to strike so 'management' can get a raise.
Ben at March 4, 2015 5:30 AM
Read the article, everybody disputing the pay. They averaged in subs and part-timers for those lower figures. This removes those people from the equation.
Amy Alkon at March 4, 2015 5:33 AM
Most of the teachers I know are terribly bad at both math, and accounting.
The union told them they are underpaid, and that is their only basis for that belief.
When CALPERS comes crashing down, there is going to be a lot of weeping and wailing.
California is rapidly running out of OPM.
Isab at March 4, 2015 5:55 AM
Articles like this would be more powerful if they stopped playing around with the numbers. If I ask someone how much they make, they quote their annual salary, not their salary plus benefits:
In reality, teachers who worked full-time during 2013 for the LA Unified School District made direct pay that averaged $72,781, and they collected employer paid benefits averaging $17,012, meaning their total pay and benefits package was $89,793. And they collected this in return for working between 163 and 180 days per year (ref. UTLA/LAUSD Labor Agreement, page 30).
Benefits, paid directly to the employee or provided as add-ons, matter, of course; its just that these sorts of articles try to drum up outrage by making it sound like teachers are pulling in $118,000 for 9 months work rather than the still generous but less eye-popping $73,000.
The "real-world equivalent" data manipulation is particularly egregious. We all know teachers have the summer off; there is no need to gin up the bottom line. But then, most people probably don't read the actual article so why not tart up the bottom line?
Astra at March 4, 2015 5:56 AM
Misleading is calculating in subs and part-timers, which is what the other sites do. And benefits are part of compensation. I don't get benefits from my freelance writing work. I pay them out of my salary (my unaffordable health "insurance," etc.).
From the site:
Amy Alkon at March 4, 2015 6:12 AM
Amy, I quoted the average salary for full-time employees. Sheesh.
Benefits are a form of compensation, as I also said. How we quote that compensation is the issue. It is unnecessarily misleading to imply that these people have a pay stub that notes a $118,000 salary when they are actually making $73,000 by factoring in benefits in an unusual manner and then making "real-time" adjustments of fantasy money.
Is $73,000 plus a comfortable (by not, apparently, gold-plated) benefits package too little? too much? just right? THAT is the operative question.
Astra at March 4, 2015 6:32 AM
~73,000 average pay sounds much more believable than the ~112,000 figure that was originally being waved around.
This whole normalization based upon time off to generate a "real world equivalents" is quite a distortion.
We do not to this sort of calculation for any other profession.
We do not for example normalize actor or professional athlete compensation in this manner to bump up their "real world equivalent" salary. If someone makes 10 million on a movie shoot that takes up 3 months we don't suddenly report their yearly salary as 40 million dollars in "real world equivalent" money.
If the average teacher salary in LA is ~73,000 dollars, then let's have the discussion in those terms instead of creating a fantasy that the average teacher brings home a 6 figure income.
Artemis at March 4, 2015 6:43 AM
"...a comfortable (by not, apparently, gold-plated) benefits package..."
If their benefits are in fact worth $21K per year, that's more than my benefits. Doing some quick-n-dirty math, my benefits are in the $12-16K range per year.
Cousin Dave at March 4, 2015 6:56 AM
"We do not for example normalize actor or professional athlete compensation in this manner to bump up their "real world equivalent" salary. If someone makes 10 million on a movie shoot that takes up 3 months we don't suddenly report their yearly salary as 40 million dollars in "real world equivalent" money."
The two aren't comparable. I don't really care what anyone makes, who is not being paid out of the public treasury.
You need to include benefits when talking about teacher salaries, because benefits are a big part of compensation, and also they are being provided at tax payer expense.
Isab at March 4, 2015 7:09 AM
Isab Says:
"The two aren't comparable. I don't really care what anyone makes, who is not being paid out of the public treasury."
If salary out of the public treasure is not comparable to salary out of the private sector... when why are we comparing them?
That is part of this entire discussion, correct?
Comparing the salary of teachers against people in the private sector?
You cannot choose to compare the two and then suggest that an equivalent analysis of private sector jobs is in some sense out of bounds.
Artemis at March 4, 2015 7:25 AM
Just to put something on the table for people to chew on.
The reason this entire "real world equivalent" calculation is so suspect is that we could use it to suggest that part time workers who are just scraping by are actually earning more than full time salaried workers.
If for example we were to consider a hypothetical entrepreneur who owned a landscaping business that charged $40 an hour for their services... but only managed to drum up 20 hours of work per week, it would be dishonest to calculate their yearly salary as ~$83,000 because that is what they would have earned if they were working a normal 40 hour work week.
That person earns ~$42,000... to suggest otherwise based upon mathematical tricks is fundamentally dishonest.
Artemis at March 4, 2015 7:34 AM
Artemis, Teachers unions, and other public employees started claiming a long time ago, that their salaries *ought* to be equivalent to private sector employees, and then started ignoring their grossly larger and more comprehensive benefits packages, earlier retirements, and shorter hours, to make themselves *appear* to be underpaid.
A DODs teacher with an elementary Ed degree makes more money, (on average) and has more vacation, and other benefits than my husband, a supervisory DOD engineer with over thirty years of service, a professional engineers license and a Masters degree.
(So does the sexual assault awareness coordinator) due to a different, but still crazy federal salary system.
A public school teacher or any other public employee in California will be entitled to a pension roughly three and a half times what my husband's federal pension will be, and they can claim it twelve or more years earlier.
How is that for a direct comparison?
My husband doesn't kid himself that he can make double the money as either a contract engineer or a private sector employee, where the opposite is true of teachers. They are paid far less in private schools.
And yes, Artemis, I know you are a teacher. I was on to that a year ago.
Isab at March 4, 2015 8:03 AM
If their benefits are in fact worth $21K per year, that's more than my benefits. Doing some quick-n-dirty math, my benefits are in the $12-16K range per year.
From the article:
...and they collected employer paid benefits averaging $17,012....
The division is $10K health and other benefits and $6K to pension. There is another $4k per employee going into the pension fund, though that sounds like it may not end up in the employees' pocket due to unfunded liabilities in CalSTRS.
That sounded like a normal ballpark to me based on how we calculate fringe benefits in our grant budgets (at ~30% of the base wages). A lot of it depends on how the value of a medical benefit is calculated. Does your $10-16K include direct benefit to you or average cost to run the fund? If you had a preemie or were hit by a bus, the direct return to you would be higher but the average per employee would be the same.
Astra at March 4, 2015 8:08 AM
My last employer sent out a memo to all employees showing them their total compensation compared to industry averages, including benefits, vacation days, etc. in an effort to forestall dissatisfaction about salaries. The company was lower-than-average on salaries but very generous with non-salary benefits.
As for comparing private sector and public sector compensation - when you aren't contributing to fund your benefits, it's fair to include them (for both parties) for comparative purposes.
My employer matches my contribution to my retirement account - matches, not funds a pension plan to which I do not have to contribute any salary. I give up part of my salary to get an employer match.
In addition, I have monthly withholding to pay for medical, dental, life, etc. Granted, the employer again matches what I put in, but I'm still taking away from my overall salary to pay for these things. Many (not all) civil servants are not funding these things.
And if I use more than my allotted personal days, I don't get paid (my salary drops). Getting more than the average number of days to use for personal uses while still getting paid comparably is fair game for comparison of total compensation purposes.
Hence, my $112,000 per year is effectively less than the $112,000 per year of someone not contributing (or contributing significantly less) to his/her retirement, insurance, medical, dental, etc.
Thus, it's fair to do a real world equivalent calculation for full-time employees when comparing compensation packages.
And since my taxes are helping to fund their compensation, I also have a right to review it and comment on it.
Conan the Grammarian at March 4, 2015 8:26 AM
Artemis is quite defensive when it comes to criticism of teachers, but I believe denied being a teacher a few dozen threads ago.
Not that you can trust someone who obsessively conceals any and all information about themselves, including gender, (I'm going with female due to the Artemis-Diana nickname and the schoolgirl romanticism of the Orion name used earlier).
==============================
LAUSD teachers are not threatening to strike because they are not being compensated comparably to Kobe Bryant or Denzel Washingon.
They're comparing their pay to that of more mundane professions and saying their pay comes up short.
And no, we don't bump up the salaries of big name actors or professional athletes to "real world equivalents" for two reasons:
Conan the Grammarian at March 4, 2015 8:44 AM
As for comparing private sector and public sector compensation - when you aren't contributing to fund your benefits, it's fair to include them (for both parties) for comparative purposes.
Oh, I absolutely agree that benefits have to be included for the discussion to be meaningful. I just didn't like the misleading way in which they were being presented.
Astra at March 4, 2015 8:48 AM
"Artemis is quite defensive when it comes to criticism of teachers, but I believe denied being a teacher a few dozen threads ago."
I must have missed that thread.
If Artemis isn't actually currently a teacher, she certainly always toes the teacher Union party line leading me to believe that there is a close connection to the education field, perhaps as either an program administrator, school administrator or staff, or even a Union representative.
I would bet money she has been through a teacher education program.
Been through that crap myself, and I recognize the *eduspeak*
Isab at March 4, 2015 8:58 AM
As with all things Artemis (rhymes with artifice), it was less an outright denial than an evasion of Crid and Ppen's attempts to put some parameters around her crazy.
So, teacher may still be in the running.
Conan the Grammarian at March 4, 2015 9:12 AM
We do not for example normalize actor or professional athlete compensation in this manner to bump up their "real world equivalent" salary. If someone makes 10 million on a movie shoot that takes up 3 months we don't suddenly report their yearly salary as 40 million dollars in "real world equivalent" money.
Not actors as that is a pay per contract type work.
But we do compare other salaried positions when they have things such as expense accounts
lujlp at March 4, 2015 9:31 AM
Nope, it was outright denial.
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2014/06/10/wow_--_californ.html
Excerpt:
Conan: Based on the posts Artemis has made in this and other threads about teachers and education, I'm guessing Artemis is associated with the educational industry, possibly as a teacher. The strident and knee-jerk nature of her reaction to any criticism of teachers in these threads strikes me as defensive.
Artemis: Not that you'll believe me, but I am not, nor have I ever worked in the educational industry.
Conan the Grammarian at March 4, 2015 9:44 AM
Artemis: Not that you'll believe me, but I am not, nor have I ever worked in the educational industry.
Posted by: Conan the Grammarian at March 4, 2015 9:44 AM
Assuming this can be believed, a parent or another close relative, possibly more than one, is in academia and or a unionized teaching position.
It sounds like a quibble to me. I could truthfully say I have never worked in the "defense industry" because I have never been employed by one of those firms that build or design weapons systems, and government doesn't qualify as part of the defense industry.
This is what happens when you make exclusionary statements. Without defining your terms, it conveys absolutely no information.
Isab at March 4, 2015 11:14 AM
"A lot of it depends on how the value of a medical benefit is calculated. Does your $10-16K include direct benefit to you or average cost to run the fund? "
Maybe their medical coverage is different. I don't look at medical expenses per se as being employer-funded, because the employer isn't paying them; what the employer is doing is contributing to the cost of insurance. Based on the difference between what I pay and what I estimate the free-market value of the policy would be in group coverage (which admittedly is tricky since there are few fully self-paying groups), I estimate the value of that benefit at around $4K per year.
Cousin Dave at March 4, 2015 1:07 PM
I'll throw in one other thing regarding public-sector pensions. In nearly every state now, public employee pension funds are being kept alive by infusions of cash from the general fund. These constitute a benefit, indirectly, to the public employee. I don't see this being included in anyone's calculations.
Cousin Dave at March 4, 2015 1:09 PM
One more, since I'm on a roll: I think the key question to ask is: what would be the free-market value of teacher jobs? I maintain that, based on the applicants-to-job-openings ratio, elementary school teachers are rather vastly overpaid (particularly the teachers in the lower grade levels), but high school teachers might be underpaid.
Cousin Dave at March 4, 2015 1:13 PM
Artemis struck me as a college type. Professor, adjunct-professor, yada yada. The love of credentiation and PHDs in particular. The long posts look like someone filling up space due to minimum word limits. And I doubt Arty would count that as 'education industry'. Especially with the non-standard word definitions he likes to use.
Ben at March 4, 2015 1:43 PM
Professor? I don't know. According to Artemis, she/he lives a life of danger:
Artemis: The reality Crid is that I have spent the better part of my adult life working in environments that could kill me if I was not properly trained, if I was not adept at performing proper risk assessment, and was not able to keep a cool head under dangerous circumstances.
"There's a man who leads a life of danger
To everyone he meets he stays a stranger"
Conan the Grammarian at March 4, 2015 2:39 PM
My local neighborhood's elementary school has a sign out front that says "Bulling is uncool" or similar.
When, oh when, will we hold accountable the farmers that allow their bulls to escape and commit said acts of bulling.
I don't know what's worse, that the people running a school put that up (it's a billboard sign made with cut out letters by hand) or that none of the 100s of parents there every day have noticed and said anything.
I need to get a picture before they take it down.
Miguelitosd at March 4, 2015 3:56 PM
"Artemis: The reality Crid is that I have spent the better part of my adult life working in environments that could kill me if I was not properly trained, if I was not adept at performing proper risk assessment, and was not able to keep a cool head under dangerous circumstances."
A lab. Gotta be. Maybe with bio hazards. That is the only kind of work environment someone like Artemis could possibly function in.
Crid was closer to right than I was,
Isab at March 4, 2015 4:02 PM
Yeah, we even have a "My total rewards" page at work now. Shows breakdowns of salary, bonus, benefits. Also show gains in stock value if applicable.
Companies are starting to try to make it clear to people that the cost is a LOT more than just salary. Especially when you factor in the stuff like the 1/2 of FICA and all that.
Miguelitosd at March 4, 2015 4:49 PM
I'm with Isab on this one Conan. That is Artemis speak for standard chem lab. There is a big jug of HCL on the shelf. After many years of training Artemis has learned don't drink it.
Ben at March 4, 2015 5:33 PM
I'm glad they are doing that Miguelitosd. It is a major talking point about how middle and lower percentile wages have not kept up with productivity while the upper 10% has. And this is true. But once you include benefits, mainly health insurance, everything lines back up. People are taking more and more of their income in the form of benefits. They need to account for that when comparing jobs.
Ben at March 4, 2015 5:37 PM
Artemis: Not that you'll believe me, but I am not, nor have I ever worked in the educational industry.
Posted by: Conan the Grammarian at March 4, 2015 9:44 AM
Hmm a teachers union organizer wouldn't technically work in the educational industry. Dangerous? well just ask Jimmy Hoffa.
As to how to truly compare salaries, an hourly wage would be the most direct measure. Since it truly is how much you are paid for how much you actually do.
it would be applicable to part time, full time and overtime. Of course just asking how many hours in a day a teacher works will get wildly inflated numbers.
Joe J at March 4, 2015 7:10 PM
I am about to quit my "cushy" teaching job. I have great benefits and lots of vacation time, but the hours and stress are killing me. Everything is studied and examined, which sounds great but I spend more time preparing to teach than teaching. Then there is the paperwork. Aarg. I work from 7-7 and often later plus about 10 hours on the weekend.
Next week I have three individual education plans due which may be up to 100 pages each. They take on average 10 hours each. That is in addition to teaching, meetings, preparation, reading and answering email, grading, and professional development not to mention that we are supposed to develop relationships with our students by attending school events and being great examples by reading and exercising. In a couple of days a will realize that I have wasted too much time and will spend a few days skipping meals and working til midnight. I would happily trade 40 hour weeks for fewer weeks of vacation.
Jen at March 4, 2015 7:39 PM
I am about to quit my "cushy" teaching job. I have great benefits and lots of vacation time, but the hours and stress are killing me. Everything is studied and examined, which sounds great but I spend more time preparing to teach than teaching. Then there is the paperwork. Aarg. I work from 7-7 and often later plus about 10 hours on the weekend.
Next week I have three individual education plans due which may be up to 100 pages each. They take on average 10 hours each. That is in addition to teaching, meetings, preparation, reading and answering email, grading, and professional development not to mention that we are supposed to develop relationships with our students by attending school events and being great examples by reading and exercising. In a couple of days a will realize that I have wasted too much time and will spend a few days skipping meals and working til midnight. I would happily trade 40 hour weeks for fewer weeks of vacation.
Posted by: Jen at March 4, 2015 7:39 PM
Jen, you have no idea how many hours a supervisory engineer, an associate attorney or a physician doing his residencey puts in, do you?
I don't mean to be trite here but if you are reinventing the wheel and doing a hundred pages of unique paperwork per IEP, you are doing something very wrong.
The time you put in doesn't impress me, if it takes you ten hours to do something, it would take me three hours to do, because I have better organizational skills, you don't deserve more money or a pat on the back for all your *hard work*.
American public school teachers are one of the most coddled groups in the history of the world.
Isab at March 4, 2015 8:23 PM
And there is the rub Jen. You have to be a truly exceptional teacher to do anything with the administrative overhead put on teachers. For those who really want to do a good job and teach children it is toxic management but for those who just want a paycheck and don't care about kids it can be a decent job. I sympathize with your plight and I can't blame you if you chose a more rewarding career elsewhere.
And while we are talking about teacher pay few people talk about classroom cost. Most classrooms represent a couple hundred thousand dollars in spent taxes. The teacher's pay is usually less than 50% of the cost for a classroom. Often under 25% even.
Ben at March 4, 2015 8:25 PM
I don't think he's taken the name after the goddess. Artemis is also an obscure RPG game. It's called Artemis: Spacebridge Simulator. Also there are male anime characters called Artemis. Then there is that sci-fi series called Artemis Fowl where the main characters(Artemis) alter ego is Orion.
Plus I think he is too paranoid to use something as obvious as a female goddess.
Ppen at March 5, 2015 2:55 AM
Oh and he's told me people fly him out for interviews.
Ppen at March 5, 2015 2:59 AM
An engineer may put in a ton of hours. But you really can't teach in three hours. We are required to be a school in the classroom from 7:30-4:15 supervising or teaching. We have a 25 minute lunch and 45 minutes prep time.
Our paperwork is mostly cut and paste. Yes, it's a "no-brainer" but very detailed. The software is not efficient. Rather than entering the beginning and ending dates for a set of goals once, they must be entered 40 times. We must look up information that is in 10 different places with security that requires different passwords. We may have to enter our passwords 4 times to access each piece of information. Our lesson plas must change as they change the teaching requirements approximately every three years. They may also change what we are teaching and how we teach it to go along with the latest research so we can't just develop a great plan and stick with it.
We are no longer permitted to grade or do paperwork while children are working. We must be on our feet all day working with students. I have a pedometer on my phone and often exceed 10,000 steps.
Even the best engineer can't do that in 3 hours.
Btw, I think that the way the our workload is set up interferes with cognition. We are constantly given new tasks to MAKE us better. For me, it takes away the down time that I need to organize, reflect, explore, and become inspired - the things that would truly make us better and enhance cognition.
Yes, I feel like an idiot now. Intellectual tasks often seem above me which is ironic since in high school I had a 149 IQ and I graduated summa cum laude from college.
I thought that I could bring a different perspective to teaching because I have enjoying the creative mind rather than thought-killing steps, but it is really all too much for me.
I guess go engineers, but don't tell me that you could do my job in 3 hours.
Jen at March 5, 2015 4:13 AM
Also there are male anime characters called Artemis.
My WoW female night elf was named Artanis. I had some guy message me in game once to ask why I was using a male name for a female character. (I guess there is some toon named Artanis in Starcraft.) I told him it was from The Silmarillion and was one of Galadrial's other names.
I was proud for out-nerding him but he probably just thought, who is the old fart?
Artemis is definitely STEM higher ed. I could probably write a similar disclaimer about my job: for a while, astronomy was listed as one of the more dangerous professions because a UA prof was killed by a telescope dome crushing him within a doorway. Our field is small enough that that skewed the stats. And I think about that poor Yale undergrad who died in the machine shop when her hair was caught in a lathe.--Definitely an area where training is extremely important.
What were we talking about again?
Astra at March 5, 2015 5:58 AM
The Artemis Fowl naming scenario fits Arty's personality somewhat better way than the goddess one. Good to know.
Conan the Grammarian at March 5, 2015 6:24 AM
I thought that I could bring a different perspective to teaching because I have enjoying the creative mind rather than thought-killing steps, but it is really all too much for me.
I have many friends who taught in high school and only lasted a few years. Why put up with the stultifying bureaucracy when you could be making double the salary in industry? (STEM fields.) The exception are ultra high end private schools. I know some astronomy PhDs now teaching in those environments and loving it because they can satisfy a passion for teaching without the BS. It doesn't bode well for public education, but that is increasingly FUBAR from bottom to top.
Astra at March 5, 2015 6:40 AM
Isab,
I invite you to try public school teaching. It is full of pointless and destructive micromanagement. That is why charter schools are so important. They escape from the web of counterproductive federal mandates. Teaching is not that hard to do. But teaching in a US public school is.
Of course none of this is an argument for raising teacher pay.
Ben at March 5, 2015 7:27 AM
If the Teachers Union was striking about cutting down on unnecessary paperwork or to streamline administrative processes, that would be one thing but instead its striking for more $ and smaller classes (aka more teachers and more paperwork)
Joe J at March 5, 2015 7:29 AM
Isab,
I invite you to try public school teaching. It is full of pointless and destructive micromanagement. That is why charter schools are so important. They escape from the web of counterproductive federal mandates. Teaching is not that hard to do. But teaching in a US public school is.
Of course none of this is an argument for raising teacher pay.
Posted by: Ben at March 5, 2015 7:27 AM
I've done it before. It is low tier rote work for people not skilled enough to make it in private industry.
There are a few bright stars, and Asta is correct, top tier private schools are getting good teachers who love to teach. but the majority of teachers being hired today are cookie cutter low level drones who have the lowest SAT scores of any major graduating from college.
They then march the children lockstep through an approved curriculum that is mostly out of their control.
My mother is a retired teacher, administrator, and former president of the local school board.
She was a very accomplished lady. One of the few with a real college degree when she started teaching in 1947.
Ben, I know how the education system works, not only have I taught, but I wrote papers on state and local education funding in law school.
And if you knew how school districts ran, you wouldn't make imbecilic statements like a *teachers salary is less than fifty percent of the total costs of the classroom*
Of course it is, because a school system, is expensive ...buildings, maintenence, buses, lunch rooms, janitors, cooks, bus drivers, bus mechanics, heat, lights, a bloated administration and oodles and oodles of federal and state paperwork, for hundreds of different programs.
Like the rest of government, it is a bureaucracy out of control, that has been largely exploited by the teachers unions.
Isab at March 5, 2015 8:03 AM
"I feel like an idiot now. Intellectual tasks often seem above me which is ironic since in high school I had a 149 IQ and I graduated summa cum laude from college."
Jen, I have been fortunate to work with many people in my life. Some of them very bright, and others not so bright.
Organizing paperwork is a learned skill. It doesn't matter how smart you are if you can't organize a task to produce an outcome in a reasonable amount of time.
As Crid and others on this board have stated, I Q is over rated because while it is a necessary condition of doing some kinds of high level work, it can be sabotaged by so many other factors like mental illness, Aspbergers, ADHD, and pure unadulterated laziness (which I suffer from).
In the grand scheme of things, a high IQ doesn't make you a superior person, nor does it make you a good task organizer.
You are complaining Jen, we know that, because that... is...what....you... do.
The subject changes, from your husband, to his interior decorating skills, to his shopping habits, and now to your job, which apparently is just.....too......hard, you poor old thing.
Isab at March 5, 2015 8:24 AM
I don't see what is imbecilic about my statement. If we are talking about school costs why only talk about one small part. When you look at TV production costs all of the overhead has to be considered as well as the raw material and the guy assembling the TV. Why should schools get a pass? Do greek columns on a building help kids learn more? I doubt it, but they sure do cost more. The same with all that paperwork you mention. I've never seen the numbers broken out but I suspect schools would have more money if the forwent federal funding and fired all of the useless paper pushers.
Ben at March 5, 2015 10:18 AM
Ben, you are comparing apples and oranges again.
Last time I checked the local TV shop was not a government entity extracting tax payer dollars to build their shop, and fund their overhead.
Isab at March 5, 2015 11:14 AM
Ah, they get a pass on using basic accounting because they are the government. That sure explains the federal budget.
Ben at March 5, 2015 12:44 PM
"I have great benefits and lots of vacation time, but the hours and stress are killing me. Everything is studied and examined, which sounds great but I spend more time preparing to teach than teaching. Then there is the paperwork."
I get that. Seriously. I have a relative who was a schoolteacher, before she realized that the serious money and lighter work load is in administration.
Your problem is that you are burdened with those icky things we refer to as "conscience" and "prniciples" and "morals". You put a lot of effort into your job because you would not be able to sleep at night if you didn't. Good for you. And I mean that; I'm not being sarcastic.
The issue is: If you were to wake up one day and decide that you were casting off all of those limitations, you could totally slack off and you would still keep your job. You would not have to do any of that stuff you're doing now. Just show up, wing it for six hours, and go home and party. Or heck, depending on the school district, you might not even need to show up at all. You could intentionally be so bad that you'd get assigned to a rubber room, and then you could spend the rest of your career surfing the Net and getting paid for it.
You are a consciencious employee. Some of your co-workers are not. The combination of test scores and anecdotal evidence suggests that there are a lot more of them than there are of you. Why, in your view, is it OK that they get paid the same as you do?
Cousin Dave at March 5, 2015 12:57 PM
I think that's partly due to how we view teachers as workers and employees - not as managers of a classroom or learning process, but as implementers of specific tests, programs, and chunks of instructional material.
Also due to the teachers unions resisting technology.
The teachers unions insist on smaller classrooms. And, yes, fewer students allows one teacher to spend more time on instructing and mentoring each student - as long as they're all willing to learn at roughly the same pace.
But one teacher could handle more students learning at their individual paces with technology.
Imagine a bank of computer terminals with a large body of students watching videos, using interactive learning modules, and participating in chat rooms on specific subjects. A group of teachers (number depending upon need) monitor the activity (online and offline) while being available to answer students' questions individually with no interruption of the other students' progress.
Genius Johnny could move quickly through Algebra and on to Calculus while Slower Johnny gets extra lesson modules on his problem areas and extra attention from one or more teachers (instead of sullenly sitting in the back of a single teacher's classroom, afraid to look stupid, and accepting his F or being sent to "special ed").
Regular study group discussions (kinda like the Oxford University model) could help stimulate students' interest and provide real world applications for what students have learned.
Students not interested in academic subjects would meet the minimum requirements and study vocational subjects (at the school or at the local community college in a joint program).
Of course, you'd need savvy teachers for that scenario, not the glorified babysitters being turned out by today's teachers colleges, 99% of whom are being rated "satisfactory" according to a 2009 New Teacher Project study.
A study of college students several years ago found that education majors were the least likely of all students to read a book not assigned for a class or to read for their own fun or education.
Conan the Grammarian at March 5, 2015 3:17 PM
Bite your tongue Conan! Where are all the administrator and rules pushers in this little fantasy of yours? Who will generate the new buzz words? Who will drink all the coffee?!? Think of poor Pedro with his mule in South America!
Ben at March 5, 2015 4:21 PM
Cousin Dave your comment reminded me of how my English teacher lost all our coursework not just for his year but all our previous years for every student in all his different classes. It was great. He came in and felt like a stupid shit and next year was promptly....transferred to teach the freshmen.
Ppen at March 5, 2015 9:24 PM
Isab Says:
"A DODs teacher with an elementary Ed degree makes more money, (on average) and has more vacation, and other benefits than my husband, a supervisory DOD engineer with over thirty years of service, a professional engineers license and a Masters degree."
I have said it before and I will say it again.
In general, those who feel teachers are overpaid come from the group of individuals who believe they are more qualified than teachers... but do not feel they are compensated better.
If your husband is paid less than the average teacher and have 30 years of experience as an engineer, it is distinctly possible that your husband isn't as qualified and/or accomplished as you believe he *ought* to be recognized to be.
If someone is working as an engineer with a masters degree in a supervisory position with 30 years of experience and is earning less than ~$70K... that doesn't suggest that they are at the top tier of their profession.
"A public school teacher or any other public employee in California will be entitled to a pension roughly three and a half times what my husband's federal pension will be, and they can claim it twelve or more years earlier."
Again... your argument hinges upon a comparison to your husband.
Who cares?
Why does your answer to what a teacher should earn somehow seem to be that as long as they earned less than your husband it would be okay?
"And yes, Artemis, I know you are a teacher. I was on to that a year ago."
No... actually I am not a teacher, I just have respect for that they do for a living.
I am just someone who earns enough not to be threatened by the fact that the average teacher gets paid ~$70K.
My starting salary was more than double that figure... also, I am an engineer just like your husband... so why is it that I received compensation more than double what he makes after 30 years of experience when I first walked through the door?
Isn't there even the most remote possibility that your husband missed the boat financially and you now have sour grapes with regards to teachers who you feel are beneath him yet earn more than he does?
Artemis at March 6, 2015 4:44 AM
Wow... you guys really crack me up.
First I am a teacher... then I am not a teacher... then I am a professor... then I am not a professor... then I work in a lab (this by someone who mere moments earlier declared with certainty that I was a teacher)... then debate about my chosen blogging name.
Who the fuck cares about any of this?
This has absolutely nothing to do with teacher compensation, nor any of the substantive arguments made.
Goodness gracious, am I really that mysterious and interesting that the discussion needs to focus upon this stupidity.
Look, it is really not that difficult.
So let's get a few things straight:
1 - I am not, nor have I ever been a teacher (outside of standard teaching requirements required to earn my degree... and this is generally true for all people who earn advanced degrees, so this isn't in any way unique to me)
2 - All people who earn advanced degrees in the sciences based upon experimental work are exposed to serious dangers due to the very nature of their work. These can be from radiation (and this isn't necessarily what you think, not all radiation is from radioactive materials, x-ray sources for example present a hazard, high voltage, caustic chemicals, carcinogenic chemicals, cryogens, pressurized gases, etc...) Learning how to properly assess risk and handle dangerous situations is part of what you gain a great deal of experience in.
3 - I work in the private sector, where I continue to be exposed to various well managed hazards. At this stage in my career the dangers are less hands on than they were when I was first starting out.
My best guess is that they only reason this is mysterious or strange to any of you is that understanding how science and engineering gets done in the private sector is so far outside of your every day experience that many of you have no context or understanding.
So instead you just make shit up to fill in the substantial gaps in your knowledge.
You have a mold that you desperately want to fit me into for some reason, and that mold has to be something that allows you to dismiss my arguments without consideration.
Why not try a different tactic and just deal with the content of the arguments.
The person putting forth the claim doesn't matter.
The more I read though I suspect this has a great deal to do with projection on your parts.
Many of you seem to be motivated by personal reasons why you feel teachers are overpaid (Isab... I am looking at you who keeps bringing up your husbands salary as if that were in any way relevant)... as a result you project the same kind of irrational motivations onto me.
Sorry, but I am actually a disinterested party when it comes to this topic. I am also not threatened by the prospect of teachers on average earning ~$70K.
Artemis at March 6, 2015 5:04 AM
Astra Says:
"Artemis is definitely STEM higher ed. I could probably write a similar disclaimer about my job: for a while, astronomy was listed as one of the more dangerous professions because a UA prof was killed by a telescope dome crushing him within a doorway. Our field is small enough that that skewed the stats. And I think about that poor Yale undergrad who died in the machine shop when her hair was caught in a lathe.--Definitely an area where training is extremely important.
What were we talking about again?"
As you have verified, nothing I have said is in any way strange or out of the ordinary when taking into account what someone with an experimental background in STEM fields at the PhD level has to become comfortable with.
Just to provide you with a bit of background, this entire discussion about handling dangerous situations was not inserted into a conversation by me out of nowhere.
Instead what occurred was we were embroiled in a discussion regarding a hazardous situation on a plane and I disagreed with how it was handled... at which point the less rational members of this forum jumped on me declaring that I must have lived a life of complete comfort pushing pencils around a desk, never exposed to a danger in my entire life.
The hilarious part of that discussion for me was they were having this debate from the comfort of their office jobs or couch cushions as I was heading off for another day of work surrounded by high voltage lines and chemical vats filled with substances that could kill me if even small quantities got onto an exposed region of my skin.
The take away point is that many people on this forum have no interest in discussing topics based upon the merits of the arguments.
When they are outgunned from a logical perspective they start to pick apart who and what you are to try to ignore your points instead of dealing with them.
You have already noticed this here when you said "What were we talking about again?"
And I will emphasize that my comments were entirely on topic before everyone blew a fuse and started to try to pick apart what I ate for breakfast last Thursday.
Artemis at March 6, 2015 5:20 AM
Yessss Artemissss, let the hate flow. Continue your path on the dark side. sssss.
Ben at March 6, 2015 5:39 AM
Ben Says:
"I'm with Isab on this one Conan. That is Artemis speak for standard chem lab. There is a big jug of HCL on the shelf. After many years of training Artemis has learned don't drink it."
Ben, you desperately want to make my statements out to be weasel words when I have used very plain and straightforward language to explain my self.
The term "Artemis speak" should mean "accurate and honest" in this regard because that is all I have been.
On the other hand, you want there to be something more beneath the surface so you try and insert hidden meaning where there is none.
Let's discuss HCL for a moment, shall we?
When I talk about being trained to handle hazardous situations, I don't mean understanding that you don't drink from chemical bottles.
What I mean is that I know how to answer the following questions without having to look it up somewhere:
1 - What is the proper way to store HCL?... what classes of chemicals is it safe to store with, and what chemicals must it be segregated from to prevent things like explosions or noxious fumes assuming the bottles degrade or leak?
2 - What is the proper PPE (this is a standard acronym for personal protective equipment) to use when handling HCL?
3 - How should HCL waste be disposed of? What material is acceptable for the waste container, what other chemicals are compatible to mix in that waste vessel, how should the waste be labeled so as not to present unnecessary dangers to the staff that disposes of the chemical waste?
And that is just for one chemical... I have to know this for every chemical I have ever worked with. I have to know this for every pressurized gas I have ever worked with. I have to know this for the safe transport of cryogenic materials (including both liquid nitrogen and liquid helium... I have worked with both in the past)... did you know these present suffocation hazards in confined spaces during transport for example?
And this isn't to mention safety procedures involved when working on a beam line at one of the national lab facilities.
There are a million little details that I am familiar with because it is what I have become an expert in.
There are no weasel words about it.
I have made an effort here not to talk too much about my experience or what I do because I strongly believe it isn't relevant, but instead what happens is it leaves open room for the imaginations of the people here to run rampant... then suddenly I am an elementary school teacher whose knowledge of handling hazards is limited to understanding that you don't drink chemicals off a shelf in a lab.
Artemis at March 6, 2015 5:49 AM
Yessss Artemissss, let the hate flow. Continue your path on the dark side. sssss.
Posted by: Ben at March 6, 2015 5:39 AM
I'm so glad I just skipped to the end of the thread. Thanks for the recap Ben.
Michelle at March 6, 2015 6:36 AM
Ben Says:
"Yessss Artemissss, let the hate flow. Continue your path on the dark side. sssss."
Here is a quick reality check for you Ben.
I left this conversation yesterday at:
"Artemis at March 4, 2015 7:34 AM"
My comment was completely on topic and only discussed teacher salaries.
You and others proceeded to debate whether or not I was a teacher, whether or not I was a scientist, what the origin of my chosen moniker was, and other unrelated details all the way until this post by Astra:
"Astra at March 5, 2015 5:58 AM"
That is a full 24 hours of debate about superfluous details about my life that have nothing whatsoever to do with the conversation at hand... and I wasn't here to add to the conversation during that 24 hour period so you can't exactly suggest that I was driving that conversation.
And yet you declare that somehow I am "letting the hate flow"?
As usual, this blog is the mirror universe.
Artemis at March 6, 2015 7:09 AM
If you are still there Ppen, what type of coursework are you referring to? Do you mean lesson plans and worksheets? Or grades and actual work you filled in?
I don't think I've ever had a teacher maintain any of my grade records or specific completed work. Grades were kept by the administration and no work was officially kept.
Ben at March 6, 2015 9:35 AM
You and others proceeded to debate whether or not I was a teacher, whether or not I was a scientist, what the origin of my chosen moniker was, and other unrelated details all the way until this post by Astra:
Yeah, I was going to take the high road and eschew Artemis-speculation but it seemed so obvious to me that you had experience with STEM post-graduate work. I guess you just attended (but it sounds from your other posts like you picked up more understanding of the professorial culture than the many grad students do).
Astra at March 6, 2015 10:02 AM
Artemis,
If you would care to make a valid point instead of personal attacks and calls to your own authority it would be a breath of fresh air.
As for your 'dangerous' work environment, you make it sound like you work for BP. I've got some thorium in the garage. And there is plenty of cesium, uranium, or potassium at the office if needed. It is not that hard to avoid lethal doses. Honestly, between the high voltages, the radiation, and the chemicals the greatest risk to my life is Ernie using the overhead crane. He is a good electrical tech but he is just not safe with that crane.
Though seriously, if you work for BP you downplayed the danger. Please update your resume and find a different employer. I know we all need to work to pay the bills, but you can't spend money when you are dead.
Ben at March 6, 2015 11:01 AM
Ben,
It was something implemented by the State of California. I'm under 30 btw. They saved certain projects of ours to be judged by the state throughout our 4 years. We would be assigned numbers instead of names and random teachers would judge them, usually it was essays. I don't remember the why or the purpose except that at the time they were fooling around and implementing all kinds of expirental things for everyone. I escaped the state mandatory testing to graduate by one year. There was some big controversy that grades didn't matter because students didn't actually learn shit so the state wanted to know exactly what kids knew by testing them via multiple avenues. Long story short things became worse off than before.
Ppen at March 6, 2015 11:28 AM
Thanks for the update Ppen. I don't think anyone else does that. I've attended a number of schools in a number of states and I had never hear of a teacher keeping old assignments.
I do know of a teacher in Oklahoma who gifts his hair to his best student at the end of the semester. He doesn't cut his hair all semester long and then buzzes it and gifts it to the highest scoring student in a ziplock bag. It is quite a race to the bottom he started all on his own.
Ben at March 6, 2015 1:29 PM
When they keep your work, they call it keeping portfolios. They still talk about it, especially in gifted education. I guess that I have finally been around enough to see several ideas come and go.
I like individualized education but it seems that the trend for now is group work and teaching students to communicate effectively. Administration wants us to stop every 10 minutes or so to have student share ideas for two minutes and then continue to explore the subject matter. They say that students no longer know how to work as a team.
Jen at March 6, 2015 3:23 PM
When they keep your work, they call it keeping portfolios. They still talk about it, especially in gifted education. I guess that I have finally been around enough to see several ideas come and go.
I like individualized education but it seems that the trend for now is group work and teaching students to communicate effectively. Administration wants us to stop every 10 minutes or so to have student share ideas for two minutes and then continue to explore the subject matter. They say that students no longer know how to work as a team.
Jen at March 6, 2015 3:23 PM
"I like individualized education but it seems that the trend for now is group work and teaching students to communicate effectively. Administration wants us to stop every 10 minutes or so to have student share ideas for two minutes and then continue to explore the subject matter. They say that students no longer know how to work as a team."
Team work is overrated. In fact, when learning basic skills it is superfluous.
Might I suggest that the current public Ed administration puts the focus on *team work* because it is a nice buzz word that fits into their current paradigm of of trying to pretend that the public school can deliver effective instruction by having 12 year olds discuss concepts which they can't even begin to understand except on the most superficial level?
Conan is entirely correct. The current public school model is going the way of the buggy whip, and all the teacher Union screeching is only going to slow it down a little.
Isab at March 7, 2015 2:39 PM
@Artemis
It is nice to know you see no reason for a P.E with a masters degree who is a federal employee, to make more money than an elementary Ed major who works half the hours.
I'm sure you won't be the lest bit upset when the company you work for decides in the interest of fairness, to pay the part time janitor more than they pay you.
Isab at March 7, 2015 2:46 PM
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