Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 153 posts

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#71

Post by indigo_rex »

Spooky23 wrote: post #27
bko wrote: post #6

> In the U.S. and Canada, teachers are often underpaid—and many have quit the profession because they couldn't make a decent living Is there a source for this? I often hear similar notions lamenting the demise of US education spending but from what I can tell, the US spends more than most other countries per student. And spending has been growing in practically every respect > This graph shows that average education…

I always hear that lament, then I talk to my friends who are teachers. Most are in my age group (late 30s) and are making $70-85k, with summers and another month of vacation and good pension/healthcare. The only lousy benefit is that maternity leave sucks. They all are incredibly frustrated with the increasing meddling and red tape attached to federal and state funding. Half the job is paperwork nonsense, which wasn'…

If the National Education Association is accurate, your friends make more than most.

http://www.teacherportal.com/teacher-salaries-by-state/

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#73

Post by yummyfajitas »

altcognito wrote: post #23
yummyfajitas wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely ignoring what the 25 countries do that rank higher when it comes to education. You mean have lots of Asian and white students but not so many black ones? Unfortunately it would be kind of racist to do that. Trump is hoping to come up with a plan that helps all Americans, rather than simply excluding the underperforming ones from the stats. https://web.archive.org/web/20150525165748/http://super-econ... (Ar…

It is fair to have doubts that charter schools will be regulated enough and held accountable by a guy who was largely elected on "getting rid of all that red tape". http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2014/06/22/mi... When we turn children and education into a commodity, the problem is not going to get better. The system will be turned into a cost center for the country, and we'll get what we deserve per t…

Our last "deregulate all the things" president imposed strong regulation on education. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act This regulation was moderately successful, particularly for non-Asian minorities:

https://www.nber.org/papers/w15531 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/19345747.2013.878... https://www.nber.org/papers/w20511 https://www.nber.org/papers/w16745 https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/no-child-left-behind-wo...

Our last "regulate all the things" president deregulated education. Unsurprisingly, the sellers of education contributed a lot to his campaign and voted for him.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/obama-signs-n...

It's pretty clear that over the past 16 years, campaign rhetoric doesn't really reflect what will actually happen.

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#74

Post by Goronmon »

cmdrfred wrote: post #65
jschwartzi wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More like 12-hour days while school is in session.

Not where I went to school, half an hour after the kids left the vast majority of teachers were gone.

I mean, a lot of comes down to the individual teachers. The good ones, who care about their students, will spend extra time running student groups (drama clubs, etc) and participate in teacher groups. Add in grading and planning on top of that and you can easily be working 12 hour days, easily.

But you can still have plenty of teachers that don't care about making the extra effort.

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#75

Post by ashark »

the-dude wrote: post #29
humanrebar wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He had extra expenses due to having a special needs son. His wife was pregnant and presumably not working at the time. Also, they probably had too nice of a house if they had those other financial pressures. Their biggest financial problem was probably their impulse to overspend on big ticket items "because my family is worth it". If I recall correctly, his wife pressures Walter to go to an oncologist that wasn't on…

He was already at the carwash before his cancer was diagnosed. From an American perspective your points may seem reasonable. I think in The Netherlands there is no teacher to be found having a second job in the service sector just for the money.

Weekend and especially Summer jobs are really common for teachers here (US), when they're not too busy working toward masters and PhDs.

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#76

Post by ashark »

cmdrfred wrote: post #65
jschwartzi wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More like 12-hour days while school is in session.

Not where I went to school, half an hour after the kids left the vast majority of teachers were gone.

They do hours and hours of planning and grading at home. Often their poor spouses end up helping.

Source: am one of said poor spouses.

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#77

Post by CocaKoala »

cmdrfred wrote: post #65
jschwartzi wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More like 12-hour days while school is in session.

Not where I went to school, half an hour after the kids left the vast majority of teachers were gone.

Are you sure they weren't taking the tests and homework that they received that day home to be graded, after which they can prepare the lesson plan for the next day and write the next homework and test?

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#78

Post by scott00 »

Headline is wildly misleading. The company that is the subject of the article pays $21/hour, which works out to $42,000 a year, probably without benefits. The 25th percentile for a US high school teacher is $45,520, plus significant benefits. Median pay is $57,200.

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#79

Post by haliax »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #18
ceejay wrote: post #12

First, in the US I think we need to convince a substantial chunk of the population that it's not religion that will solve our problems, but better education.

Probably you should start by providing evidence of this. Most of the evidence I've seen suggests we are far past the point of diminishing returns on education, and we should have less education rather than more.

Would you be willing to cite some of this evidence? That's a conclusion I'd be interested to see...

Re: If the U.S. Won't Pay Its Teachers, China Will

#80

Post by ticviking »

Spooky23 wrote: post #27
bko wrote: post #6

> In the U.S. and Canada, teachers are often underpaid—and many have quit the profession because they couldn't make a decent living Is there a source for this? I often hear similar notions lamenting the demise of US education spending but from what I can tell, the US spends more than most other countries per student. And spending has been growing in practically every respect > This graph shows that average education…

I always hear that lament, then I talk to my friends who are teachers. Most are in my age group (late 30s) and are making $70-85k, with summers and another month of vacation and good pension/healthcare. The only lousy benefit is that maternity leave sucks. They all are incredibly frustrated with the increasing meddling and red tape attached to federal and state funding. Half the job is paperwork nonsense, which wasn'…

I'm in one of the worst states, but that is essentially the very top of most salary scales. To get there you have to put up with some of the most intrusive management of any profession for 15 years.
Post reply on HN