Posted on 06/01/2018 9:59:37 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
An honest teacher-pay debate requires careful attention to the facts.
This spring’s teacher walkouts have spurred renewed attention to the question of teacher pay. The topic is a serious one, warranting the extensive reportage it’s received. At times, however, the media’s progressive sympathies, the allure of hard-luck tales, and concerted PR by teachers’ unions have yielded some questionable coverage. A recent case has been the spate of stories suggesting that teachers routinely reach into their own pockets to spend extraordinary sums on classroom materials.
“There is no other job I know of where the workers subsidize what should be a cost borne by an employer as a necessary ingredient of the job,” American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten has thundered. Numerous recent stories have echoed her sentiment, repeatedly stating that the average teacher spends nearly $500 a year, unreimbursed, on school supplies. “The average teacher spends $479 a year on classroom supplies, national data show,” read a typical headline in Education Week. The Washington Post reported the same finding, in a story headlined “Teachers shelling out nearly $500 a year on school supplies, report finds.” A Time story explained, “Nearly all public school teachers report digging into their pockets to pay for school supplies, spending nearly $480 a year.”
Such claims make for attention-grabbing headlines. But, as with some of the other assertions made in the teacher-pay debate, they can be misleading. It’s less that the coverage is “wrong” than that it’s credulous and sometimes deceptive. So, let’s take a moment to clear things up.
The data in question are drawn from the 2015–16 National Teacher and Principal Survey, a nationally representative study of teachers and principals in public schools, conducted by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). Using the survey results, NCES calculated average teacher spending for the 94 percent of teachers who said that they spent money out of pocket — excluding the 6 percent of teachers who did not report such spending, though the coverage frequently skips past that qualifier. (Including those other teachers lowers the average by about $30 a head.)
In reporting the “average” figure, news outlets have made the odd choice to focus on mean spending rather than the more typical median figure. There’s a reason most such data are reported in terms of medians (e.g., “median household income”). The median, after all, is the figure midway between the top and bottom of a distribution, meaning it represents the middle of the pack. A mean, on the other hand, can be dramatically moved by a few outliers. Including Warren Buffet or Bill Gates in a sample of average household income would make the typical household look much wealthier than it really is; similarly, a small number of teachers claiming big outlays can move the mean a lot. Indeed, NCES says that just one in five teachers reported spending more than $500, and the median teacher reported spending $297 — or about 60 percent of the widely quoted $479 figure.
Even these qualifications elide the real concern, however, which is the trouble with placing too much weight on a self-reported figure like this one. Journalists have generally ignored the problem inherent in asking respondents about how much they claim to do a good or noble thing. Self-reporting in such cases is highly susceptible to what social scientists term “social-desirability bias”: the tendency of respondents to say things that cast them (consciously or subconsciously) in a more favorable light. Studies show, for instance, that respondents substantially overestimate the number of days per week that they exercise, claim to watch the news three times as much as they actually do, and dramatically over-report their weekly worship-service attendance.
Now, let’s be clear. We are not suggesting that teachers are lying about their spending. But we are suggesting that, when teachers filled out the survey, precious few probably took the time to comb through twelve months’ worth of receipts and credit-card statements. Most of them probably guesstimated, and it’s safe to assume that their guesstimates tended to be on the high side.
We have no desire to diminish the real sacrifices many educators make, much less to deny that some teachers do indeed dig deep into their own pockets on behalf of their students. Spending even $100 or $200 per year out of pocket, especially for a teacher making $45,000 per year, is a big deal, and we don’t mean to suggest otherwise. But serious conversations about teacher pay should be informed by accurate data and careful analysis. Public deliberations about how much teachers should be paid, and whether raises ought to be funded by new taxes or cuts to other programs, are best served by reporting that meets that standard.
— Frederick M. Hess is the director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. R.J Martin is a research assistant at AEI.
I wonder if a teacher purchasing school supplies can claim a tax deduction?
I’m from Long Island. Public school teachers there are paid WELL into 6 figures, for 7 hour days, 10 months a year. plus pensions and benefits most private sector people (who pay the taxes to pay for this) can only dream of. A power couple on LI is a teacher and a cop pulling down $300K combined.
I wouldn’t be surprised if my kids teacher spent a decent amount of money out of pocket but she spends on things like Sesame Street educational posters, a class pet, stuff like that. We were responsible for notebooks, pencils, glue etc. the class parent collect donations for all the parties and special events.
When all is said and done I spent some out of pocket money and I took the deductions. My class was a vocational electronics class and at times it was easier to make a direct purchase for some items rather than get a purchase order processed through the wicked witch of finance at our school.
It was my choice. I broke even.
Yes, I spent several hundred unreimbursed dollars of my own money every single year for classroom supplies, mostly to design engaging hands-on science activities. My personal collection of “props” was superior in many ways to the science department’s own stuff.
I’ve known teachers who’ve spent more... good teachers are forced to do this so liberal ‘elites’ running these education factories have more money for pet projects...
Bad teachers (and there are many of those too) don’t even earn the salaries they’re paid.
“Georgia, public school teachers not only get well paid (last I heard they start at $50,000) but, get a Great Benefit package, including a pension plan that if you work hard, will leave you set for life at retirement.”
The neighbor behind us was married to a military guy and she wasn’t working, although she was a school teacher with a degree. Her husband was going to retire at 20 and they were moving back and she was going back to work in the school system where the money was much better than it was in Virginia.
> Not necessarily “supplies”, but student related expenses, I believe it. Supplies, food, student personal expenses, fees, etc. <
You’re right. I’ve taught for decades in urban public schools. In our district at least, the schools no longer cover optional student expenses. So when a student doesn’t have the money for a field trip, we teachers pitch in. When a student doesn’t have the money for a team jacket, we teachers pitch in.
That being said, $500 a year seems a bit high to me. But then again, my experience was all in the high schools. I know that elementary teachers are always buying extra supplies out of their own pockets.
And it’s really not some big outrage. It’s just part of the job.
” (last I heard they start at $50,000) “
How about T1 = $32,217 ...
My wife’s a teacher, and I’d say close to $500
My wife retired a couple of years ago and yes, she certainly spent at least $500 per yr. on supplies.
She’s an Elementary teACHER
Don’t like your Job, quit and get a new Job.
Better yet, start your own Business so you can hire People who will complain about working for you.
$175 dollars a day. For the 184 days a year they do work. Hard to see how anyone could live on that... only $29/hr.
I wonder how many school teachers are on food stamps?
I taught for 30 years in a wealthy school district, so I never had to spend out of pocket. There was always a well stocked supply room. But the poorer counties in my state are not as lucky. It really does come down to tax revenue.
I was a sub teacher for 13 years. You wouldn’t believe the brand new still in the package supplies teachers would toss in the dumpsters at the end of the year. I didn’t have to buy new school supplies for our kids because I’d shop in the dumpsters. I’d gather up armloads and pass them out to students who didn’t bring pencils and paper to school. Still have more than one shelf of supplies that will last my lifetime or longer.
I brought in a closet full of games and crafts for the life skills kids. A new teacher came in one year and I didn’t get over there fast enough to save any of my personal things.
Some schools require STUDENTS to bring in enough school supplies for everyone, forcing the parents to subsidize the classroom.
Back in the day, kids didn’t need a prize box.
I look at it this way:
Most of the monies paid by the taxpayers goes to teacher retirements.
Teachers who need to buy things for the class room because all the tax monies have been spent on them and their work are sort of contributing towards to their retirement.
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