Are teachers really underpaid?

[Blarg]

I've been in four, and I haven't been in one that wasn't effed up yet.

It's hard to make changes, because there is a lengthy process to go through, and when you bring in a new union, they have a contract for a number of years with you. You can get new representatives on the floor, but that doesn't fix where the main corruption, incompetence, or laziness really is, which is in the management of the union itself much more than the employees and their floor stewards. Often those are really not much more than glorified whipping boys for the complaints of the employees that they can do nothing about.

Union management can be as insular and structually protected from accountability for their incompetence and misbehavior as is management. The employees are forced to pay their dues, but they are not guaranteed an ethical, hard-working, or competent union in return. The first thing they are guaranteed is a debt. The rest is a matter of crossing one's fingers that things will work out well.

Unfortunately, in the elaborate dance of labor relations, this can breed even more corruption and incompetence, as employees learn to expect, and demand, less and less from an incompetent and corrupt union. After a while, the employees can become so disspirited and hopeless that they don't even bother filing even the most well-justified complaints and either just quit their jobs, having derived no real benefit from the union after all the money they've put into it, or wind up staying and still not getting any benefit from having a union.

Not all unions are like this, but a great many are. And there are few employees who have the sophistication to extract what value they can out of a useless union. And I can see why there is so little incentive for those who could stand up to an abusive management to come forward; every steward our company ever had was relentlessly harassed by management, on a weekly and sometimes even daily basis for years. It made their jobs, already indifferent at best, into incredibly stressful daily miseries, and took a toll on their health that was noticeable both physically and mentally.

Being in a union is definitely no picnic. How many unions are like that, I don't know, but I was in four of them that were each like that. All our employees felt pretty badly about all our unions, and didn't trust them.

[ShakeZula06]

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Let me be the first to throw out the common response that no one is underpaid in a free market.

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Too bad this isn't a free market.

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I think that's the point

[davebwell]

one thing i've always wondered is just how much correlation there is between teacher quality and educational performance. A sociologist named Coleman found in the 70s that the single most important factors in educational performance (measured in test scores) were parental education and income. These factors were more important in predicting test scores than teacher characteristics like gender, race, education level, etc. District charecteristics like race composition, or techer pay, etc.

The high school I attended is somewhat indicative of this too. It had its share of both good and bad teachers and overall it was a fairly mediocre school in regards to test scores and college placements.

At my 10 year reunion, the thing that I noticed was that the people who grew up in white collar homes had jobs such as teacher, engineer, lawyer, etc. and the ones from blue collar homes were working as machinists, electricians, steel workers, etc. It was also obvious that the professionals weren't always smarter than the blue collar workers although they were more than likely better students.

More often they were better students because the influences around them provided motivation to be better students. If all you plan to do after graduation is manual labor, then what incentive is there to spend two more hours a night studying for an English literature test? Getting a "C" in English may hurt your chances of getting into (place the university of your choice here) but it has little effect on your chances of getting an apprenticeship with the Electricians Local or some other union.

That being said, I really don't know how much teachers influence educational results. My parents were both college educated. I have a PhD. My brother is an Electrical Engineer with an MBA. My best friend from childhood had the same teachers I did through Jr High and many of the same teachers through high school. We played on many of the same sports teams, etc. His mom was a secretary and his dad was a machinist. He never went to college and works with his dad now. I don't think I'm any more intelligent than he is but have no doubt that I have a greater base of knowledge than he does.

In the grand scheme of things, how much of this is attributable to teacher quality and how much is due to parental focus on education?

[numeri]

Blarg,

Thanks for the reply. It sounds to me like those unions were structured very differently than mine, which is why I didn't understand how difficult it would be to change.

Not all unions are the same, and not all teachers' unions are the same, but my guess is that most are smaller and thus can be easier to change.

Our union has a relatively small leadership - we elect 15 (I think) "senators" and one president from the faculty - each position lasts only two years, as I mentioned earlier. When contract negotiations come up, the negotiating committee is elected by the entire union body, not appointed. We have about ~500 members of our union - 125 full-time, and ~400 adjunct.

I think because our union is smaller, the leadership positions last only two years, and every union member has a vote for the important positions, we are held more accountable. If we talk about unions with thousands of members, change is much more difficult.

By the way, regardless of the size of the union, you make a good point about the pressures on the leader. Our presidents carry almost a normal teaching load in addition to their union ditues, and traditionally take a beating from the administration. It definitly takes a toll.

[numeri]

Dave,

You make excellent points. I would contend that there is a correlation between parent education/income and student success, but that the driving factor is parental involvement in the educational process. Typically, (but not always) parents who are more educated and make more money both realize the importance of an education and have the time to be involved.

To make an extreme and very prejudicial example, let's consider two families:

1. Two parent home where both parents have college degrees, father works full-time and mother works part-time and is home when the child gets home from school. These parents are very secure in their livelihood and have time to take the child to different events, help with homework, and provide a very stable home environment.

2. Single mother who dropped out of high school because of an early pregnancy. She completes her GED, but never is able to go further, because she doesn't have the time. She needs to work two jobs just to pay for rent, groceries, car payments, and school supplies (for her now two children). Of course, she doesn't have time to help her kids out at home - they stay with grandma after school until Mom gets home from her second job.

Of course, these are clear-cut examples - the world is full of shades of grey - but you get the idea. Of course the first will do better in school, regardless of the teachers.

On the other hand, all else being equal, don't you agree that a student will receive a better education from a better teacher?

[Frinkenstein]

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I spend about 60 hours a week in my office, but I also spend maybe 10-15 hours a week doing work-related activities at home, not to mention 1-2 nights a week where I have a business dinner or some other similar function. Yet if anyone asked me what my hours were, I would tell them about 60.

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There are exceptions, such as yourself, but your workload is not normal for most white collar jobs.

[Weatherhead03]

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I spend about 60 hours a week in my office, but I also spend maybe 10-15 hours a week doing work-related activities at home, not to mention 1-2 nights a week where I have a business dinner or some other similar function. Yet if anyone asked me what my hours were, I would tell them about 60.

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Why dont you tell them your actual hours? I've never understood why people would say X amount of hours when in actual fact they work a lot more hours than that.

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Only simple, blue collar-type jobs involve no extra work outside the actual place of work. Doctors, lawyers, accountants, athletes (reviewing tapes), business people, etc all have work to do away from the office. Bringing this up about teachers is pretty meaningless, since it is true for virtually all "professionals."

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Teachers are paid significantly less than these "professionals" that you have listed.

[captZEEbo]

I read most of this thread and I don't think anyone mentioned that teachers (at least at my high school) had to keep taking more and more college classes to keep their education up.

Also, to say that teachers are not stressed is ridiculous. There's a huge percentage of teachers that only last 1-2 years before they realize that teaching is too hard for them. Students stress out teachers so much. Students will do pranks and say really mean-spirited things to teachers who are trying to help those students.

[SackUp]

Most teachers in Southern CA are compensated very well for their work.

I cannot speak for other states as I'm not familar.

[PokerBob]

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Come on. Other professions take work home as well, and I don't want to hear that teachers have a back-breaking amount of work to do outside of the school building. They have plenty of time to grade papers and do class prep DURING school hours, including silent study halls, time in between classes, and while their students are taking tests.


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a.) the majority of professions that take work home with them make a hell of a lot more than teachers do.

b.) between classes? are you retarded? that's MAYBE 8 minutes, the majority of which is spent catching their breath and cleaning up the room.