Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021 • Hacker News Board

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#431

Post by rkk3 » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 2:53 AM UTC

bombcar wrote: post #248

rkk3 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't necessarily know what is marketing and what they are buying, and the few truly top schools are selective. Private school teachers are also paid less & have worse benefits. It would be great if the private system had it all figured out but they don't.

The low pay does somewhat select for teachers who want to teach - as those who don’t can get more money elsewhere. The main advantage private schools have is they an expel problem students and let the public schools try to handle them.

> The low pay does somewhat select for teachers who want to teach - as those who don’t can get more money elsewhere.

It ends up selecting for people who are more transient and have less experience, who haven't gotten the better Public school job yet.

> The main advantage private schools have is they an expel problem students and let the public schools try to handle them.

They theoretically have more control over expulsions, but whether or not they use it really depends on the school.

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#432

Post by swinnipeg » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 2:55 AM UTC

kickout wrote: post #418

throwcanada324 wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not in Canada. Teachers are well paid in Canada, and in many Canadian mid sized cities a teacher with 10 years experience will make more than a software developer with similar years experience. Additionally they have a strong pension, and incredible job stability. e.g. A teacher in Saskatoon would make about $92K with 10 years experience with a defined benefit pension, and 2 months off in the summer. It is tougher fo…

Is that a location thing? Like, do places like Saskatoon have problems attracting people (weather)?

Nope. Teachers salaries would be similar to that across Canada. Software dev salaries would be very close, with some exceptions. Winnipeg/Calgary/Edmonton are all very similar to Saskatoon.

There would be some higher paying opportunities in Van/Tor/Mtl. But an $200K individual contributor software dev is a truly a Unicorn in Canada.

Lots of reasons, but the biggest is that simply don't have the ultra profitable FAANGs that drive up salaries.

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#433

Post by laurencerowe » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 2:55 AM UTC

Mehdi2277 wrote: post #413

giantg2 wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but most of the civics classes are a joke compared to the citizenship test. The used to have shop or home economics as required classes. I do agree that it is up to the student to maintain proficiency. I just feel like many of the tests and classes are ridiculously easy, like to the point of being geared to passing people rather than teaching. But I do also acknowledge that I forget about stuff I don't use, lik…

Have you taken the citizenship test? I am an immigrant and my dad had to take it. I was a bit under age requirement but did look over it. One example it doesn't even ask for the 3 branches of government, just name a single one. A lot of the questions are nice like that and will let you give a partial answer. You can see questions here, https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/questions... The test is longer…

> The test is longer than many classroom tests but also only needs a 60% to pass.

The test itself isn't even very long - 10 of the 100 possible questions.

I hope school civics classes are more than just rote memorization in the US...

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#434

Post by toast0 » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 2:58 AM UTC

jliptzin wrote: post #416

mattkrause wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The analysis is harder than that. I would imagine education degrees are not particularly versatile: they’re meant to train you to become a teacher, more or less. Given that, it is not particularly surprising that teaching is one of the better-paying options once you commit to that pathway. However, there are plenty of other, career tracks: potential teachers might become accountants or engineers instead. Zooming in a…

I would say it’s the opposite. Vacation time has more incremental value the longer it goes on. Even a 2 week vacation I’d have trouble fully unwinding from. An entire summer, you can truly have some quality time to yourself to recharge, focus on a hobby, travel a lot, etc. I would say those summers off are easily worth $100k.

Too bad it's vacation time when everyone else is having vacation, so everything is crowded.

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#435

Post by hypnoscripto » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 2:59 AM UTC

kickout wrote: post #414

thomastjeffery wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You could double teacher pay and it wouldn't make a lick of difference. I sincerely doubt that. Having a teacher who isn't struggling financially would be a huge improvement.

OP is correct. double your salary at your job, but have to take verbal abuse and berated from your 'boss' and see how that paycheck affects your life

If your salary is high enough that you can save some money then you aren’t required to put up with bullshit in order to keep eating food.

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#436

Post by tptacek » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 3:00 AM UTC

gpapilion wrote: post #396

tptacek wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are they grossly underpaid? I don't think that's necessarily true. I think it's true in rural areas, but Chicago Public School teachers are paid above-average, and suburban Chicago teachers make as much as Chicago-area software developers do. And that's without taking into account defined-benefit pension plans and huge amounts of vacation time. I think the meme about teachers being underpaid is mostly unuseful in con…

There are several subtleties when comparing teacher’s pay. First it’s 10 months not twelve so you need to adjust for that. Second the pay also usually includes retirement benefits that can pay you 100% off your salary after 30 years. This is hard to compare to private industry since 401ks have replaced pensions. This is probably worth 2-5m when mature, and is accounted for in their pay. I think this is the biggest is…

The 10 month thing gets brought up in these discussions, but I'm looking at annual comp numbers, so the fact that it's 10 months makes the deal more attractive, not less.

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#437

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 3:01 AM UTC

barry-cotter wrote: post #317

glitchc wrote: post #291

In North America, teachers are grossly underpaid and their ability to discipline poor performance has been entirely eviscerated. It’s not just SF, look at what’s happening in Vancouver: https://nationalpost.com/opinion/rex-murphy-cutting-honours-... The problem is the administration: The board that sets the standards and the parents and politicians who sit on those boards. The solution is this: Ban anyone without a m…

https://www.heritage.org/education/report/assessing-the-comp... > Workers who switch from non-teaching jobs to teaching jobs receive a wage increase of roughly 9 percent. Teachers who change to non-teaching jobs, on the other hand, see their wages decrease by roughly 3 percent. This is the opposite of what one would expect if teachers were underpaid. https://www.heritage.org/education/report/critical-issues-as... > O…

[deleted]

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#438

Post by askvictor » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 3:02 AM UTC

Pxtl wrote: post #430

glitchc wrote: post #291

In North America, teachers are grossly underpaid and their ability to discipline poor performance has been entirely eviscerated. It’s not just SF, look at what’s happening in Vancouver: https://nationalpost.com/opinion/rex-murphy-cutting-honours-... The problem is the administration: The board that sets the standards and the parents and politicians who sit on those boards. The solution is this: Ban anyone without a m…

Just get rid of school boards altogether. Here in Canada we only have 5 ballot questions across our 3 elections: Federal representative Provincial representative Municipal representative Mayor School board trustee. The PM? Head of the party with the most seats. Same with provincial premiere. Judges, crown attorneys, controllers, senators, the governor general, etc? Those are all appointed by our elected representativ…

In Australia the only elections regarding school are for the parent representatives on school council, which is local to an individual school, and sets some amount of strategic direction, but overall, doesn't do a lot. Curriculum & testing decisions are made by politicians and bureaucrats at the state or federal level. We also don't elect judges, DAs, etc. We just elect politicians; they are ultimately responsible for making sure their respective public servants are doing the will of the people. You could argue the US system is more democratic, and yet most such systems in the US seem to be broken (from an outside perspective), while here they are not (there are certainly problems mind you).

Any perspective how these things work in countries that have a well-regarded, high performing education system, like Finland (apart from having well-trained, highly regarded, and highly trained teachers with a large degree of autonomy)?

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#439

Post by dragonwriter » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 3:02 AM UTC

barry-cotter wrote: post #317

glitchc wrote: post #291

In North America, teachers are grossly underpaid and their ability to discipline poor performance has been entirely eviscerated. It’s not just SF, look at what’s happening in Vancouver: https://nationalpost.com/opinion/rex-murphy-cutting-honours-... The problem is the administration: The board that sets the standards and the parents and politicians who sit on those boards. The solution is this: Ban anyone without a m…

https://www.heritage.org/education/report/assessing-the-comp... > Workers who switch from non-teaching jobs to teaching jobs receive a wage increase of roughly 9 percent. Teachers who change to non-teaching jobs, on the other hand, see their wages decrease by roughly 3 percent. This is the opposite of what one would expect if teachers were underpaid. https://www.heritage.org/education/report/critical-issues-as... > O…

> Workers who switch from non-teaching jobs to teaching jobs receive a wage increase of roughly 9 percent. Teachers who change to non-teaching jobs, on the other hand, see their wages decrease by roughly 3 percent. This is the opposite of what one would expect if teachers were underpaid.

Its exactly what I'd expect if tecahers were underpaid but most switches from other jobs into teaching were from jobs taken as a student pre-qualification for entry-level teaching jobs and most switches out were post-retirement-from teaching “have something productive to do” jobs.

Re: Life as a public school teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021

#440

Post by rcpt » Sun, Jun 20, 2021, 3:06 AM UTC

makeitdouble wrote: post #362

barry-cotter wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.heritage.org/education/report/assessing-the-comp... > Workers who switch from non-teaching jobs to teaching jobs receive a wage increase of roughly 9 percent. Teachers who change to non-teaching jobs, on the other hand, see their wages decrease by roughly 3 percent. This is the opposite of what one would expect if teachers were underpaid. https://www.heritage.org/education/report/critical-issues-as... > O…

From the same report, the bullet point above your first quote: > The wage gap between teachers and non-teachers disappears when both groups are matched on an objective measure of cognitive ability rather than on years of education. That “objective measure” is based on human capital model of wages, and it seems to me pretty biased to apply to such a specialized profession. Being wonderful at making a group of 6 years…

heritage really isn't going to be a good source on this kind of thing fwiw