Did Matt Damon `School` This Reporter?

Religio-Political Talk (RPT) ^ | 8-4-2011 | Papa Giorgio

[SeanG200]

Firstly, teachers ARE well paid:

$34.06 an Hour ~ That’s how much the average public school teachers makes. Is that “underpaid”?

Who, on average, is better paid–public school teachers or architects? How about teachers or economists? You might be surprised to learn that public school teachers are better paid than these and many other professionals. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, public school teachers earned $34.06 per hour in 2005, 36% more than the hourly wage of the average white-collar worker and 11% more than the average professional specialty or technical worker.

[....]

Mr. Damon is simply passing on talking points probably heard from “memes.” A second point is that tenure is a huge part of the problem. A teacher reaches tenure after just two years of doing what, working. This should be based on how well they perform and have a go at tenure after say, 5 years with a two-year interim to try again.This will weed out bad teachers or teachers that may be predators of younger persons. You see, is a teacher is tenured after only two-years, when it comes to light that they may have some indecent relationships with students it is almost impossibly to fire them and they get moved from district to district before they are finally canned. Having a longer period of tenurship often times allows some committee that would tenure teachers more insight into the teachers character.

[....]

High Paying State and Low Paying State Teacher pay, as mentioned earlier, varies a lot depending on which state you teach in. California ranks number 1 in teacher pay with an average pay of $63,640. South Dakota ranks number 50 in average teacher pay with an abysmal $35,378.

[SeanG200]

Professor, in another you mentioned your wife works in New Orleans, below is the teacher salary average in LA. Take note this does not reflect what a teacher CAN make. I have a close friend here (SoCal) that teaches at a local high school, he also does summer school and does a few online classes for other adult ed. online courses. He makes WELL OVER $100,000 a year. (Take note there is a graph at the link below as well.)

[QUOTE]
Louisiana teacher salaries have been steadily increasing over the period from 2007 to 2009. In 2007, the average teacher salary in Louisiana was $40,923.33. In 2008, Louisiana teacher salaries rose by 4.65 percent to $42,825. By 2009, teaching salaries in Louisiana rose to an average of $45,090, an increase of 5.29 percent.

Overall, the average teacher salary in Louisiana rose by 10.18 percent during the 2007 to 2009 period. This surpasses the national average growth of teacher salaries for the time period, which was 2.8 percent.

The rising average teaching salaries in Louisiana earned the state a similarly rising national ranking. In 2007, the teacher salaries in Louisiana reported earned the state a national rank of 42. In 2008, Louisiana earned the rank of 39th in the nation. 2009 teaching salaries in Louisiana garnered the state 36th place in the country, as seen in the Louisiana teacher salary schedule below:
[/QUOTE] -— http://www.teachersalaryinfo.com/average-teacher-salary-louisiana.html