AIBU to think teachers are not paid that well in England and Wales

[ImaynotliketheEducationSecretary]

If salaries in England are so "good" why then are salaries in Scotland £9K higher?

If salaries are so good, why then apart from the NE and Scotland (who are on far better salaries) are teachers, 4-5 years post qualified, paid less than the average salary? If salaries are so good, why could so few teachers even think about buying a house? By the way, I by no means think teachers in Scotland are overpaid. I think they probably are paid far, far more fairly than E or W)

Do we really think so little of education that that is what teachers are paid? People who need degrees and post-grad qualifications to teach their subject? Who need passion and empathy to care about their students? Who do not just do 9-3 in the classroom - but, many, many hours outside the classroom too?

Read below and if you really think teachers salaries are so good, would you, on reading the below, encourage a friend/DC/sibling to join this well-paid profession?

Figures all from end of 2022:
M4 is what you could be earning c4-5 years after qualifying.

Scotland
Teachers Salary - Starting £30,081 & M4 £42,915
House Price average £191,492
6.3 x starting salary
4.5 x M4 salary

Average salary in Scotland in 2022 was £33K
Actually, you maybe OK being a teacher.

Wales
Teachers Salary - Starting £28,866 M4 £33,5877
House Price average £220,326
7.6 x starting salary
6.5 x M4 salary

Average salary in Wales in 2022 was £34K
You maybe OK to be a teacher - but only if you live in a cheaper part of Wales.

England
Teachers Salary - Starting £28,000 & M4 £33,850 ((M4 rising to £39,655 with inner London weighting)
House Price average £313,073 England (North East 162K, SE £402K London £542K)
On average, houses are 11 x starting salary and 9 x M4 salary
Ha ha ha ha if you are in London (13.5 x M4 salary) or South East (12 x M4)
NE teachers are possibly OK a few years later at 4.8 x M4 salary

Average salary in England in 2022 was £33K
North East £29.5K
SE £34.5K
London £42K

Don't be a teacher unless you are in the NE/somewhere cheap to live. How the fuck any London school recruits and retains staff is beyond me.

And, BTW, I am not a teacher. I just went down this rabbit hole as DD was talking of becoming a teacher post-degree....and having gone down said rabbit hole I am not sure I would recommend an extra 9K+ debt to do so. I don't really want her to move to Scotland (we are on the SW).

Currently on top of my subject I’m teaching an A-level I only have an A-level in myself and a subject I do t even have a GCSE in. This isn’t unheard of in secondary but I don’t get any extra pay for the extra work it is taking me. Tbh, I don’t question the extra work but this is why it’s hard to go for extra responsibility when time is taken up just trying to fulfil my day to day teaching. If I don’t then I won’t pass my appraisal.

Sure, but it doesn't add anything to the conversation. We all know that some areas have more expensive housing than others. But minimum wage is the same all over the country, public sector jobs are paid the same, even in the private sector many wages don't reflect regional house price variations. So just discussing it in the context of teachers' pay isn't adding anything. It's a separate conversation altogether.

I dont understand the focus on teachers.
Lots of other roles earn the same or less and are just as valuable.

Nothing is stopping people in those roles from starting threads about them. This is a parenting website. Parents tend to have strong views about schools. Most of them would probably prefer their dc not to be 'taught' by a succession of cover supervisors due to a lack of qualified teachers.

Teachers starting salary, £28,000. Doctor starting salary £29,000. Accountant in big firm £50,000. Aldi graduate manager £42,000 + car. Big bank in London £60,000 (some medics are taking this instead of the pants conditions in NHS)
Really think things have gone a bit wrong with our values.

@Fairislefandango

They can.

But this op is making out like teachers are the only ones facing this issue

It's OK to point out that's not the case.

@mumsneedwine even the big4 don't pay their starting salaries at £50k for accountants... more like £21k!

@greenlabeljar 2 of my DDs friends, graduating this year, are both starting on £50,000 🤷‍♀️. In London so probably worth £2.50 else's where 😊.

The point is why are teachers in Scotland and somewhat Wales valued at more than England?

But not having to pay out an additional 9K in uni fees.....

Exactly. And paid, 4 years in, 9k more than the average salary. But in England...national salary (unless you are in London...fucked...)

And, until I started down this rabbit hole, I had no idea there was any difference!

And still makes my head explode (sorry Scotland). Teacher in Scotland paid more than teacher in London......

@greenlabeljar DD tells me that the minimum graduate salary any of her friends has been offered for accountancy is £34,000. And that's in Leeds.
But hey, let's start our doctors on £29,000 (for a 48 - usually actually 72 - hour week). And our teachers on £28,000. Huge incentive for young people to enter those (slightly important) professions !!!

@ImaynotliketheEducationSecretary yup. I'd earn £9,000 more in Scotland. It's not just the salaries that are underfunded, it's the students too.

Well, England will keep voting tory.

What do you expect?

You'd have less students loans as well........

A starting salary of 28K sounds pretty good actually, well above the minimum wage. Remember that teachers get a lot more holiday than someone in most other jobs, 13 weeks a year or so. If you work it out as seven hours worked per day, five days a week (35hr/week) for 39 weeks, a teacher's hourly rate is 28000/39/5/7= £20.51 per hour. So a teacher starts at more than double the national living wage.

ahem obviously I forgot the minimum wage has gone up so it's actually just under double now, sorry.

er Dot - do you know any teachers that only work 35 hours a week?

I think when you do an hourly rate of hours actually worked, even taking into account the holidays, its pretty poor.

@mumsneedwine sorry but your dd is incorrect. Perhaps that's her anecdotal experience and it's possible but I know those salaries are not correct average starting salaries for many many firms including the top4.

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/sep/18/25-of-teachers-in-england-work-more-than-60-hours-a-week-study

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-49728831

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/teacher-workload-cut-by-five-hours-a-week-over-past-three-years#:~:text=In%20the%20second%20Teacher%20Workload,4.9%20hours%20compared%20to%202016.

So gov figures of 49.5 as an average (many work way more.)

If you take 39 weeks plus 4 weeks stat. holiday thats 43 weeks

28000/43/49.5 is £13.15 which is quite a different number.

And to be honest new teachers usually work a lot of hours just to keep afloat so it is likely to be less...

This might tip English teachers over the edge but according to this in Scotland (full time) teachers work around 46 hours a week term time

https://www.tes.com/magazine/archive/what-teacher-workload-scotland

There is a national shortage of around 40,000 teachers and rising at the moment! Any other suggestions to recruit and retain other than pay? (And conditions).

I am happy as a teacher with my pay and overall benefits package. But in some schools teachers will do the same jobs as me for much less, thanks to abandoning parity. The next step for teachers needs to be bare minimum and hope that all of us won’t be put on capability. Teach all day, mark the bare minimum in the paid time you have. No extras, no goodwill, no extra revision classes, no phone calls, emails to parents out of work hours, no trips, no concerts, shows, no extracurricular sport!?

This will only affect the kids, the govt still won’t care.

Teachers have never been paid in line with doctors!

Oh.

Maybe not.

That article says its similar for English teachers

Researchers found that teachers in England work 47 hours a week on average during term time, including marking, lesson planning

My son was looking for graduate jobs last year, and saw many graduate trainee accountancy jobs at far less than £34k. The only ones anywhere near that salary were the Big 4 firms, and they'd only recruit the top of the tree, so say top 5% of graduate applicants. The vast majority of graduate trainee accountants are on less than average wage.