Do teachers "really" have it that bad???

[mr ed]

What I want to know is who is getting rich off the school supplies?
Stores - walmart , target, reasors, etc take up donations of supplies.
Churches, civic org. etc take up collections.
Radio and tv stations take up collections etc. etc.
Where does it all go???
Kotv has Giles coats for kids "Free clothes" yale cleaners cleans them before they are handed out.
But they show up for school with no coat.
Somebody must be getting a warehouse full of this stuff and selling it.

What really gets me is the kids can't even show up with a 5 cent pencil and a 88 cent pack of notebook paper.
But they are wearing a $100 pair of sneakers.

I always buy extra for my kids to take and share and I'm getting a little tired of it.

 

[Jeff405]

From another post off-topic dicussing teacher salaries:



Working 9 months out of the year, their salaries would translate to market levels if you add in the other 3 months they would be earning in another job that was 12 months per year. Maybe I "just don't get it" but every time there is extra money it seems to go to the teachers and the perk of having the summer off is overlooked. My aunt & uncle are retired teachers (one was a principle by the time he retired) and they lived better than I do looking back...they had a lake place in their early 30's, bass boats, 4wd, nicer house than I lived in by the time they were late 30's and that was with 2 kids...Now in retirement they live a dream at 2 separate lake homes...I do remember my uncle used to trade and do odd jobs for extra money sometimes in the summer when he'd go up to the lake place to fix it up and stuff, but that couldn't account for the majority of how they were able to live...all the other teachers I knew were females, married to a men who made more than them so they also lived well...is it really that economically bad for tenured teachers who are in their 30's & 40's & 50's these days?

Again, I'm not being cold but considering the other state employees haven't had a raise in like 10yrs or more and they work 12 months, I just hear about how bad teachers have it like I constantly hear about global warming...if all the noise is for the single, 22yo punks right outta college whining about not making a lot of money then they should have picked another field...if a married teacher who is say 40 is making 25k or something, well then of course I'd think they needed a good raise. I think my uncle was making close to 100k or so by himself when he retired from teaching more than 10yrs ago (maybe even closer to 15yrs)...add in the aunt's salary and of course the 9months thing and the pension plan that pays out every montht he rest of their lives and I'd say they didn't get such a bad deal/life...educate me if I am off-base.

Are they from Stigler?

 

[chadh2o]

Please keep the discussion civil and on point. Teacher pay increase.

Why have I not heard anything about what the school systems can do within? I have worked at companies that have had issues with funding and when certain items were wanted or necessary, we all took part in the discussion on how to become more efficient.
As far as I know, within my school discrict, no attempts have been made to bring the teachers into the loop for making the distict more efficient.

Their are 520 public school districts. 77 counties/6.75 districts per county. Most have more than less. 520 school superintendents and staff, 520 curriculum advisors and staff, 520 IT directors and staff, 520 bus systems. You get the drift.
Why not drop down to 100? Set a minimum for the number of students in a district. The smaller schools can pool with other nearby small schools.
I grew up outside Chickasha and attended Friend school for elementary and middle. 8th grade graduating class was 17 (students, not my age at the time). We had/have our own buses, superintendent (who is also the "middle school" principal), an elementary principle (because it was a separate building), coaches and athletic director (usually one of the teacher/principal/superintendent, but none the less paid for the position). Why was Friend indepentent? Amber/Pocasset had to merge in the 70's due to finances. Middleburg, Norge, Alex, Dibble all independent school districts with less than 1000 kids in each district, most with less than 500 kids. My daughter's recent graduating class had over 600 in one grade at one of two high schools. Our high school is larger than all of the above mentioned districts combined.
We, Oklahomans, are not your usual individual because most of us are individuals not a group. This is why the district consolidation has not happened. Those that live in the sticks want the small school in the sticks. I have no problem with that, but being a part of a larger system would streamline, but the small power brokers would loose their grip.

Here is a little to what I am talking about

http://m.news9.com/story.aspx?story=34278629&catId=112032

Some Oklahoma School Superintendents' Salaries Rise As School Week Shortens

Posted: Jan 17, 2017 12:28PM CSTDana Hertneky, News 9

Schools in crisis are doing anything they can to save money including going to four day school weeks, but News 9 has learned many of the superintendents in those very same districts are getting big raises.

The small district of Atoka has less than a 1,000 students, but according to the Oklahoma Department of Education, in just one year, the salary for the superintendent went up $40,000.

In Glencoe, the superintendent's base salary went up $10,000, his total compensation nearly $17,000.

In Crescent, the superintendent there went from making $101,000 in 2014 to $118,000 a year later.

“This is not a frugal use of money,” said state Sen. Rob Standridge, R-Norman. “I’m a manager, I’m an owner, I would never give myself those types of raises where I couldn’t give my employees those types of raises.”

Michael McClaren is the president of the Oklahoma Association of School Administrators. He’s also the superintendent of Claremore schools and the school's financial officer and HR person. He said in small districts, that's often the case, especially when times get tough.

“Some of those communities are small enough they might have combined administrative services between a superintendent and a principal. So a local board may have made a decision to put a stipend to that,” he said.

For example, when News 9 called the Jennings superintendent in Pawnee who received a $10,000 raise, he told us his base salary remained the same but he took on some extra jobs.

But that's why Standridge said the state needs a full audit.

“We need to know the full picture of where every penny is going,” Standridge said.

McClaren, however, argues those decisions should be left up to the local school boards.

“The board knows the best, they’re the closest one to the actual issues of the community,” McClaren said.




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[Lakenut]

Ok....i'll take the bait. Teachers pay is ok for only doing 9 months of work. They really don't deserve more. Lets say they are really smart with their money too. They live well below their income level and save for the future.

Does this mean they never get a raise? What do they do when every year their property taxes go up? And their home insurance goes up? And other costs of living go up? Every year. Let's say living costs go up 2-3% a year. How long does it take until they can no longer support their modest life style?

 

[cooljeff]

Educate me...I don't really know their salaries and I have admitted that. I watched family who were teachers enjoy their summers for years...maybe sometimes the aunt tutored or taught summer school...but if I am wrong that they get a summer break then educate me please.

I'm a Special Education teacher in Moore schools and I can tell you that it has less to do with teacher salary and more to do with general funding. We buy most all of the supplies needed for each school site ourselves with some help from PTA and fundraising. Most sites operate in less than $1000 a year general operation fund. That means all supplies, copy machine paper, copy toner, office and school supplies come from that. Keep in mind that there are 39 teachers in my elementary school alone. Also teachers pay might seem great for the 9 months it looks like we work, but I can assure you if I could book for all my hours lesson planning, grading, conferencing with parents, staying after to tutor and staying late to get compliance paperwork done they would have to double my pay because I would make less than minimum wage.

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[YukonGlocker]

Let's convert an average teacher's salary to hourly pay. Here's the math:

• Let's assume this teacher's salary is $35,000 per year.
• There are 42 weeks during a normal school-year (e.g., Aug 8 to May 26 for this year), we'll subtract 2 non-working weeks out for holidays, leaving 40 paid weeks during the school-year. We'll estimate 65 hours per week (including 1.5x overtime pay for every hour over 40 hours) for those 40 weeks.
• Let's assume this teacher spends $10 per week, for those 40 weeks, out-of-pocket on necessary classroom materials--effectively reducing salary to $34,600.
• Let's assume this teacher also takes 2 non-working weeks during the summer, leaving 8 paid weeks during the summer. We'll estimate 10 hours per week for those 8 weeks. This yields 80 hours of summer work, which is a very conservative estimate. That is, if this teacher works more than 80 hours during the summer, the hourly pay is actually *less* than what's stated next.
• This teacher makes $10.8806 per hour.
• If this teacher moves to Texas for a $10,000 salary increase, s/he makes $14.0252 per hour for the same work.
• The BBQ is much better in Texas, so you now you know why teachers are leaving Oklahoma in droves!

 

[JD8]

I'm a Special Education teacher in Moore schools and I can tell you that it has less to do with teacher salary and more to do with general funding. We buy most all of the supplies needed for each school site ourselves with some help from PTA and fundraising. Most sites operate in less than $1000 a year general operation fund. That means all supplies, copy machine paper, copy toner, office and school supplies come from that. Keep in mind that there are 39 teachers in my elementary school alone. Also teachers pay might seem great for the 9 months it looks like we work, but I can assure you if I could book for all my hours lesson planning, grading, conferencing with parents, staying after to tutor and staying late to get compliance paperwork done they would have to double my pay because I would make less than minimum wage.

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"You only work 9 months out of the year..... so you obviously get paid too much..... you really should get another job to fund what you need..... you knew what you were getting into when you took the job!!"

 

[cooljeff]

"You only work 9 months out of the year..... so you obviously get paid too much..... you really should get another job to fund what you need..... you knew what you were getting into when you took the job!!"

Lol. Good thing my wife supports me so I can play with kids all day.

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[Sanford]

Sort of indirectly related but wondering how much the state spends on Teacher Aide (or Assistant Teacher) salaries and are those expenses absolutely necessary? Also wondering what the average student to teacher ratios these days? I was just looking at some old pictures of when I was in school, in the third grade it was 22:1, the fifth was 25:1, and seventh was 30:1.

 

[FrankNmac]

Do teachers receive paid medical insurance and retirement in addition to their salaries?