Posted on 05/12/2010 8:38:19 AM PDT by MichCapCon
New school fiscal data from 2008-2009 are available from the Michigan Department of Education, including average teacher salaries. The Michigan Education Association is claiming that school employees have made $1 billion worth of concessions over the last three years, but this latest report shows average teacher salaries continuing to grow.
The average teacher salary in 2008-2009 according to the MDE was $58,721, up 3 percent from the previous year. This figure is computed by dividing the total expenditures on basic instruction by the total full-time certified teachers. However, it also includes teachers in public charter schools, which has the effect of reducing the figure significantly. Only counting salaries of teachers in conventional schools (93 percent of all teachers) produces an average salary of $62,556.
Making this same adjustment for prior years creates a very different picture of what is happening to average teacher salaries in Michigan. The MDE’s reported average teacher salaries from 2000 to 2008 (including charter teachers) declines by 3.9 percent after adjusting for inflation. But charter school enrollment increased by 125 percent over that period, and teachers in these schools impacted the average salary at an increasing rate. Counting only unionized teachers in conventional districts finds that over this same period, average salaries increased by 1.9 percent after adjusting for inflation.
In one sense, it's quite remarkable that average teacher salaries have increased...
(Excerpt) Read more at michigancapitolconfidential.com ...
Great Days to be a government employee!
‘Average Teacher Salaries Continue to Rise’
Nice salaries to only be working 10 months out of the year.
Where is the incentive for the schools to turn out a better product?
I know that individual teachers want to help children. Many are very dedicated. But the overall school administrators, the US Dept of Education, the curriculum designers, and the textbook publishers, are not primarily interested in helping children. I would push the argument that it in these folks' interest that the children fail. There's good money in that.
Let's put this in perspective, shall we? Teachers are contracted to work less than 180 days a year.
A full 98 percent of Michigan schools don't even have 180 school days per year, falling behind other states.
Source
This does not include sick days, or vacation days that teachers get off in addition to the holidays, spring and fall breaks or the time between Christmas and New Years - not to mention the summer break.
So, if we do some basic math, we'll see that a teacher on average makes more than $326/day.
Now, let's look at Mr. Joe Public. 365 days a year, minus 104 for weekends, minus 10 holidays, minus 10 Vaction days give us us 241 days a year we are expected to be at work. 241 days per year multipled by $326/day give an AVERAGE income of $78,566/yr and that doesn't include the benefits that teachers enjoy (tenure, medical insurance, special retirement programs, ect).
Forgive me if I don't have a flood of tears pouring down my face.
I do not think they are saying that in Greece right now.
MI ping.
Yeah. And if only the teachers were actually at least AVERAGE!!!!
I wonder if this is an accurate way of figuring out average salaries.
I would not be surprised if average salaries are going up for public teachers across the country. As school districts have been cutting back they are laying of the younger (and cheaper) staff. That leaves behind older staff that are making more pay.
Two of my kids' former baby sitters finished their teaching degrees and got jobs for one year. Now they are both out of teaching because they were the first to get cut.
What are the salaries of bad teachers and good teachers doing? Inquiring minds want to know.
Teacher salaries rise, while private sector worker salaries are flat or decreasing. Not sure about everywhere else, but most Michigan folks are paying higher insurance deductibles and co-pays. If the private sector sacrifices, it’s only fair that the teachers do too. Private sector pays their salaries, after all.
If my boss gets less money, I certainly don’t expect to get more.
I wonder of the average SAT scores of those teachers has risen
This should say UNION teachers’ pay.
My salary has been frozen at 38K for a year.
Plus average Mr. Joe Public is up and at work at the same time as the teachers, maybe one hour later tops. And he’s still working at least two hours after Ms. Average Teacher has gone home for the day.
I never did understand why we trust the education of our children to people who know when they graduate from high school that teachers are “underpaid” , go to college to become teachers and then complain about being underpaid.
Really? Wow! Please tell me where this person works so I can apply! ;-)
Haven't seen a raise here in 5 years+...
Throw in the cost of benefits (in NJ where I live, Gov. Christie has been trying to reduce state expenses and the teachers union balked at having to pay as little as 2% for their healthcare which is commonly subsidized by about 50% or less in the private sector) and you get the real cost. Pensions are fat and start after a small number of years and some districts provide tenure (which means the teacher can stop working — or not be held accountable). Add it all up with the construction costs of new schools and capital expenditures, and education is extremely cost-inefficient.
Well, Northwest Indiana is not a bed of roses itself as we have the rotting liberal decay of Chicago influencing the region.
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