Teachers Finally, almost get what they deserve
Utah Teachers Finally Catch a Break
By Tracy Medley, 6-18-07
Utah teachers are finally getting a decent raise this year, but is it really enough? With local papers like the Deseret Morning News sporting fancy headlines like “some teachers will be getting more than a 10% hike,” some Utahns might get the false impression that the job of paying Utah teachers what their worth is done.
After all a 10% hike sounds great, doesn’t it? But, that isn’t the real or whole story. Teachers in that lofty sounding category will be taking home no more than $2500 extra dollars next fiscal year. Now, remember what your teacher taught you about percentages – yep – that means these teachers are only making a whopping $25,000 per year in the first place. Now, of course $27,500 per year is better, but – it’s hardly a salary the state should be bragging about.
In most cases though, teachers won’t even be receiving the full $2500 promised them – at least right away. The Legislative Auditor General discovered the budget for the raises was some $20 million short, leaving each school district to come up with their own disbursement plan in the meantime. Most Utah districts settled contracts, giving their teachers around $1930 each, while Weber and South Sanpete will be doling out the full amount to their teaching staff.
Some districts are throwing in an additional 3.5 percent cost-of-living increase for their teachers at their own expense, according to the D-News.
All of this is good news indeed, and hopefully a harbinger of even better things to come for Utah teachers. Don’t drop the ball, legislators!
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Comments
Are wages set by the State of Utah, or by individual school districts? Are teachers unionized in Utah? Is this raise across the board as the same percentage rise for all teachers in all pay stages and steps? Or is it just a representation of the raise for a first year teacher? What are total pay packages, with all retirement contributions, insurance contributions, sick pay and personal days? What are the mean and median pay packages for the State of Utah teachers? How many years on the job does the average teacher or administrator have? Is it a greying occupation, or a vocation of younger people? What is the average retirement age? How many working days in a contract year? How many hours in a contract day?
The teacher pay or raise story is always told from the perspective that it is too little, for a great sacrifice. If that is true, I want the writer to provide the details that would allow me to come to the same conclusion. That seldom happens. So, as I go to work every day this summer, and I see the retired teacher loading his golf clubs, (when he is not staying at his beach house), I am sort of suspect of this poverty wage whine. And, he is 10 years younger than I am.
When you could not afford to take a teaching job 40 years ago (working in a sawmill paid twice as much), teaching paid less per year than the amount retiring teachers will get for a monthly retirement benefit in 2007. The best first year teaching jobs in 1968 paid $3000-3600 a year. If those numbers hold true for the future, this year's beginning teachers will get half million dollar per year retirements at age 52.
But, for 40 years, we have heard how poorly teachers are paid. Show me the proof, not the company line from education unions.