Teachers - how much do you earn?

[coopekid]

So it's my 5th year of teaching, not in London or fringe, and I am on £27,260 and have been since Sep 19 (no across-the-board pay increase as announced last summer for me ) This - according to the NEU advisory pay points puts me somewhere between M1 and M2. Interested to hear what other Teachers are earning?

Some of these salaries might seem quite attractive, especially if you are not in the South East.

However, I know I am not cut out for teaching, and the stress/long hours would probably kill me. So best wishes to all teachers, you certainly earn your money!!

Primary teacher, Dublin. I'm 48 and on 71k ( euro ) . Promoted post and Masters etc. Leave work at 2.30 every day !!

I’ve been a teacher for 30 years and have been a head of a core subject in a secondary school. I’ve never got near 50k.

There’s something not right here. After thirty years you should be on UPS 3 (£41,604 in England, not London or fringe) and head of core subject would usually be TLR 1 at £8k plus, although many school put their core HODS on the leadership scale. That is pretty close to £50k.

This thread has made for interesting reading! I work in schools' payroll and was initially quite surprised at teacher pay, it seemed rather generous to me (I'm on buttons so most pay is good to me tbf!) especially considering all my teacher friends had told me it was poorly paid...! But when you take into account the workload and the current covid ballache... Hmmm. Maybe the only judges of whether teaching is worthwhile for the pay are people who've taught and who have also worked in another field entirely.
Seriously though OP, I would ask some questions about your pay. It's not what I would expect to see for a teacher in their 5th year of teaching who is progressing satisfactorily (believe me I process these things all day every day) x

@LaurieFairyCake

Dh is state secondary comp/London/Vice Principal (deputy head), 19 years teaching - £73k

Until he got over £50k he didn't earn more than minimum wage (as he did so many hours)

While I know teachers put in long hours, even at today's rate of 8.72/hr that would have been16 hours a day without a single day off, no weekend, no holiday, no Christmas day, for years. There is no way that's true.

5 years, outer London on 42,000.

57k in a London private school with a couple of additional responsibilities. Been teaching for 7 years.

OP, you need to ask your headteacher to justify why you have had no pay progression. Either the school is not happy with your performance (in which case they need to put you through capability) or they need to progress you. In your position I’d be updating my CV and actively looking elsewhere.

Crikey, I hadn’t thought about it much (had no interest in teaching personally - don’t think I’d have any aptitude for it) but assumed teachers earned more than the figures on here. That is a pretty low salary for absolutely ages. Feeling more grateful to my DC’s lovely teacher for continuing to put in a lot of effort for pants money.

The size of a school can also make a difference to tlrs and the leadership scale - my small secondary school only pays the top of tlr 2 for core hods.

@99victoria

The government changed the payscales last year. There used to be 11 points on the MPS and teachers climbed up (generally) at a rate of a point a year as long as they were performing well.

Now they've changed it to 6 points and you go up half a point a year so someone on M2 could be in their 5th year of teaching. Goodness knows why they changed it!

I’ve been teaching 12 years and there’s only ever been 6 points on the MPS, with the general rule that you move up once per year, and 3 points on the UPS that you move up once per 2 years.

I agree they are well paid tbh.

HOD in the NW. Been teaching over 20 years. 45, 578. I feel I am well paid as, I have a 10 minute commute, it is a fantastic school team and I feel very invested and loyal to school. The summer is a perk. Because of the closeness I am happy to work, support events, do extra in the other holidays. The pension is a real bonus.

Day to day thw jobis exhausting, relentless and luckily I have a very thick skin.

Inner London prep school, specialist teacher and head of department - £43000

@LadyfromtheBelleEpoque I can’t remember - 23k ish was my first year in teaching 7 years ago. I was on 42k after 4 years, now I’m on 50k and will go for another promotion soon.

What an interesting post. Teacher pay scales are surely available to all. It’s well known it’s not a profession where you’ll make your fortune, and the early days are a slog, however if you take on extra responsibilities and work up the pay scale you can do very well and let’s not get started on the generous pension especially for long timers ( all posted from a financial adviser that has direct info on many people’s salary’s and pension benefits ) on reflection I wouldn’t want the job (however dare I say it I would like the holidays..very contentious I know) but as someone who’s was taken a maximum of 2 weeks holiday for the last three years in my own business I’m a little envious! ) if currently a really tough profession to be in....very much under the spotlight.

Wow it's a lot better in Scotland! Automatically go up the pay scale with seniority and just under 42k at the top after 6 years. Feel like I'm really well paid, happy with it.

I start my PGCE this year so this is extremely insightful. Thanks all for sharing!

Need to look at whole package too.

How long is your commute? What are your petrol/public transport costs?
Do you get free parking?
Pension?
Lunches?
Tea/Coffee/refreshments?
Do you have childcare costs either during term time for wrap-around care or in school holidays?

Are you happy?

Lots of things other than salary can indicate if an employer sees your worth.

I also think the teachers are well-paid, especially once they’ve been doing it for a while: the only issue is the huge gap between NQTs and senior teachers for the same job.

The repeated claim that they don’t get paid for the holidays is nothing more than creative accounting: the pay they are quoted is the pay received, with no pro-rata. Compare teaching assistants, who are being asked to take on the teaching of reading everywhere, take classes to suit the school, get treated as general dogsbodies and domestic servants - and who are usually on about £10 an hour, for hours present in school only.

The continued insistence from teachers that ‘no one respects them enough anymore’ turns my stomach and makes me question whether these are really the kind of egoists we want in a classroom tbh.

@SheilaWilcox

Need to look at whole package too.

How long is your commute? What are your petrol/public transport costs?
Do you get free parking?
Pension?
Lunches?
Tea/Coffee/refreshments?
Do you have childcare costs either during term time for wrap-around care or in school holidays?

Are you happy?

Lots of things other than salary can indicate if an employer sees your worth.

5 minutes Yes Yes Free school dinner if we want Yes No Yes

After I graduated I worked as a TA for 2 years, so starting on an NQT salary really felt like a step up to me. I did an Arts degree and many of my peers from the time are in lower paid, less secure jobs with far less benefits than me 10 year on so I suppose it is all relative. Yes it comes with all the challenges and long hours as many have said, however I am very happy in my school and with my HT/ SLT support.

I am due to start MAT leave this year so am not looking to move schools and hoping to return part time at least initially.

Do teachers claim that they aren’t well paid? In my 11 years of teaching my experience is that teacher grievances almost always relate to conditions rather than pay. Since I’ve been teaching that’s been things like cover, ofsted, paperwork, excessively onerous policies on things like marking, unnecessarily restrictive diktats about how teachers should teach, constant scrutiny and low-trust management. I can’t remember the last time I heard a complaint from a teacher about pay unless they were in a school that was not sticking to the pay scales and was instead holding people back from pay progression on spurious grounds. Pay is not the issue in teaching.

About 40,000 fte TLR 25 years experience.