Teachers have more to complain about than their pay. Sure, it would be nice to get paid more, but let’s face it, our nation can’t afford a substantial pay rise and we are not being completely ripped off. No teacher enters into the profession with the intention of making a sizeable income. We know that we will always be paid less than the ideal amount.
It is the conditions we face that we should be most concerned about. The obsession with changing curriculums every two years without any apparent reason, the increase in planning paperwork that robs us of time to devote to other aspects of our job and the crazy overregulation which has shifted the focus from quality education to lawsuit damage control.
Rita Panahi is right to point out that a teacher’s pay is no reason to strike:
Why, one wonders, do presumably intelligent people study for four years to enter a profession where they find the pay so unacceptable?
It’s akin to buying a house near an airport then complaining about aircraft noise.
If money is what motivates you then teaching is probably not the job for you.
Higher pay comes with greater scrutiny but teachers have fought hard against attempts to link their wages to their performance.
Under the current system, which the Australian Education Union desperately wants to retain, almost all teachers automatically move up the pay scale every year regardless of their ability, effort or suitability for the job.
This absurdity helps to explain a 2009 survey of teachers which found that nine out of 10 of them don’t believe their school would acknowledge improvements in the quality of their work, while seven out of 10 believed their consistently underperforming colleagues were in no danger of losing their jobs.
Actually, despite the persistent whingeing we’ve grown used to from teachers, they are hardly surviving on the breadline.
A first year teacher can expect to earn around $57,000, which is more than graduate paramedics, accountants and substantially more than nurses. This can rise to more than $90,000 at leading teacher level.
Not bad for a job with enviable hours and holidays of which most of us can only dream.
Tags: 2009 survey of teachers, A first year teacher wages, Australian Education Union, Federal School Education Minister Peter Garrett, Higher pay comes with greater scrutiny, teacher enviable hours and holidays, Teachers pay, Teachers Salary, Teachers Stress, Teachers strike, Teachers wgaes linked with performance, Teaching conditions
Topical Teaching 
May 17, 2013 at 6:01 am |
I read this and my first thought was, “This Rita Panahi couldn’t be a teacher.” I was right. No idea.
May 22, 2013 at 8:06 am |
She is a social commentator on radio and print.