To think teachers are quite well paid?

[Newyearnewnameforme]

Not intended goadily but my salary is more than most of my graduate friends.

Obviously, it isn’t Rockefeller standards but AIBU to think it’s actually OK?

Your OP title is very misleading, which is why you sound goady.

You made it sound like the average teacher is on nearly £50k, which we all damn well know is untrue.

I think you need to edit the title

So what’s stopping her from applying to other schools Tilda?

It’s more of a rhetorical question but I do think a lot of people and most of them are female end up stuck in schools where they aren’t well treated or well paid because there’s this lack of confidence and fear of moving on. That’s what I am getting at.

YABU as most aren't. A 47k salary is unusual & top end for HOD too.

The title is misleading.

Of course your salary is excellent compared to the London average of £26k. On MN anyone earning over £30k is classed as well off. However whether it is well paid for a teacher I don’t know but I would imagine you are well paid.

The average classroom based teacher salary does not stand up against other similarly qualified graduate roles in my experience.

Not everyone can be head of department, senior management, etc.

When I started teaching my starting salary was comparable to my friends who were also leaving university and starting graduate professional jobs.

Within three years all had exceeded my salary, most by a large amount.

Even those who didn't go on to become management at their chosen roles all ended up earning far more than I did. There was no way, even if I'd become a headteacher, for me to earn the kind of money they were earning, not as a teacher.

And many of them, though not all, were doing less hours and had less stress too!

Then that is what you should have put as your opening post and with a different heading...

What did you mean then OP?

Your title should have said, 'teachers in management roles are paid quite well'

I don't think £47k is that well paid when you compare it to other graduate manegerial roles.

Divide your salary (net or gross)by 39 weeks (as the holidays aren't paid))

Then work out how many hours you work each week and divide your weekly pay by number of hours. You will be surprised by how low your hourly rate is!

Have to disagree OP. All the schools I’ve work in every deputy/head has been female, confident and well paid.

All that being said Newyear it still doesn’t mean that the average teacher earns a great wage. Some do, some don’t which means the average is somewhere in between, or it wouldn’t be average. You cannot say all teachers earn a good wage simply because you personally do. Personal anecdote is not data and all that. Teachers generally earn a living wage, and good on them for it. Most earn it. Some other jobs earn more, some less. What is really your point?

So what’s stopping her from applying to other schools Tilda?

Well considering all primary schools in my LEA are in a similar financial situation, I’d have to move and switch from primary to secondary. Fairly big changes to get the extra money you earn. I wasn’t on that by a long way as Deputy Head. I’m not complaining about my salary but to say everyone can achieve what you earn just by switching schools is disingenuous.

In primary schools, a lot of schools are getting rid of TLRs completely and saying UPS covers additional responsibilities, having executive heads and then senior teachers who are not paid on leadership scale. So no, there are definitely not opportunities anymore for everyone to achieve this. Schools do not have the money to pay for teachers earning that kind of salary.

Depends, really. I'd be interested to know the following before being able to reply.

1. What subject do you teach? Is it a shortage subject? What exams are you teaching to? (Yes, that preposition at the end is deliberate.)
2. How large are your class sizes?
3. Where do you live? Somewhere in the north or midlands with a low cost of living, or somewhere south and east of Manchester?
4. Is it overseas/tax free?
5. Are you in a "naice" school in a wealthy, leafy suburb, in an area with hidden rural poverty, or in a tough inner city somewhere? Is it a state, private, church or "other" school?
6. Are you on the Leadership scale?
7. How many hours do you teach?
8. How old are you?
9. What does your other half do?

10. "not intended goadily". Is it English you're teaching? 11. Have you ever done any other job in your life, or did you go straight into teaching from university? 12. What classroom support do you have?

Then I'll be happy to make an informed response. (Trained teacher here who decided it was not for me, thanks. Lots of friends in th same situation. One has just decided to retrain as a lorry driver as the situation at their school deteriorated so badly. And they were in a "naice' school with over 20 years of experience but were starting to get a little too expensive for the SMT. Besides which they never were very good at playing the corporate management meetings game.

I'm northern-inner city born but at a time when it was possible, just, to get a degree without having to sell your soul for it.

£41000
Classroon teacher Surrey.

Tbf I was asked about my salary and answered, but if I was just a classroom teacher (and for the extremely easily shocked, ‘just’ means ‘without any additional responsibilities’) I’d be on £40,000 which isn’t bad to be fair.

Because I'm 57, on UPS3...are you living under an education rock OP? Have you looked at the job websites in the last year? There are no jobs at that level advertised...ever! In fact, the very vast majority state 'up to MPS3' or 'Suitable for NQTs' ((which is code for 'we are going to employ an NQT so don't bother applying).

Do you read the education papers/forums? Older/experienced/dare I say 'expensive' teachers are being forced out (which is basically what happened in my school, only we kept our jobs at a lower pay grade 🤷‍♀️) because budgets are being slashed!

It's soul destroying. I look every single day...I'm registered on every job site and with so many agencies I've lost count...there's nothing.

You are very patronising to suggest that I might not have though to do this myself 😂

Wife is a teacher and her pay is shit. I earn significantly more in my job and don’t work nearly as hard. Given the amount of time she spends working in the evening her hourly rate must be pretty low. Plus we spend on resources for the classroom which the school should pay for but are too cheap. One example being green pens. Students have to respond to teachers remarks in their books in green pen. So many students don’t have green pens (this could be legitimately because their parents have very little money). When the books are reviewed if the responses aren’t there or are not in green pen my wife gets in trouble. The school refuse to buy green pens for students so my wife buys green pens to lend to students.

Your thread title was that teachers have a good salary.

What you actually meant was teachers who are high up on the leadership pay scale have a good salary.

The average class teacher is not earning £47k as I'm sure you are aware.

They are better paid than many academics and far less likely to be on short-term casual contracts decades after graduating.

But then again, they have to deal with parents....

siring1

Is that secondary? Do you have no additional responsibilities?

I'm on ups3, ie top of the payscale for a classroom teacher, and I'm on just over £40,000. I don't think I'll be going for promotion, possibly ever, I like being in the classroom and don't like paperwork, so promotion doesn't seem like it would suit me.

I think I'm relatively well paid, especially compared to friends from school or uni, who are all at least degree educated and most earn between £20,000-£30,000. Most of us did stem degrees too, so I would have expected them to earn more, but they've struggled to find well paid jobs.

I'm not convinced less experienced teachers are well paid though, I know I struggled as a new teacher although part of that was being a single parent at the time as well. I know that if I'd been in a more expensive area then I would have really, really struggled. I'm not sure what I'd have done then.

So you’re ups3 plus a tlr as HoD? And you think your salary is representative of the entire profession?

Primary and secondary pay scale is the same.

I think the pay is decent. Especially outside of the south east. A lot of solicitors are paid less than teachers, and have worse benefits and less holiday and less job security. Loads of quite difficult and stressful jobs pay a lot less. Why compare with City salaries?

@Newyearnewnameforme - you may not have had the ‘brains or talent ‘ to work in the city but most teachers in my school have both. It’s a choice isn’t it about what you want in life. Pretty much everyone I work with could be earning lots more elsewhere but love teaching. I earn the same as you and am a classroom teacher. If I’d chosen to go for promotion and stayed in Lindin I’d be on a lot more but have chosen to stick with what I enjoy. People on MN seem to think you need enormous salaries to survive.