2966 The Education Myths
"Few people are aware that our education spending per pupil has been growing steadily for 50 years. At the end of World War II, public schools in the United States spent a total of $1,214 per student in inflation-adjusted 2002 dollars. By the middle of the 1950s that figure had roughly doubled to $2,345. By 1972 it had almost doubled again, reaching $4,479. And since then, it has doubled a third time, climbing to $8,745 in 2002." The American Enterprise.If spending more money on education worked, why don't we see better results? Instead, we just get asked for more money. Sometimes they don't even pretend they need it, like Danbury in Ottawa County, OH. That's where we have our summer home. They've just raised our taxes by 30%--but most of us don't live there and don't send any children to their schools. They must have gold plated computers--two for each child.
"Economist Eric Hanushek of Stanford University examined every solid study on spending and outcomes--a total of 163 research papers--and concluded that extra resources are more likely to be squandered than to have a productive effect."
Feeling sorry for poorly paid teacher? Don't.
"Data from the U.S. Department of Labor show that in 2002, elementary school teachers averaged $30.75 per hour and high school teachers made $31.01. That is about the same as other professionals like architects, economists, biologists, civil engineers, chemists, physicists and astronomers, and computer systems analysts and scientists. Even demanding, education-intensive professions like electrical and electronic engineering, dentistry, and nuclear engineering didn't make much more than teachers per hour worked."
Read the whole article for more myths about class size, school choice, insurmountable social problems and the effectiveness of certification.
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2 comments:
Looking at the hourly pay for teaching is a bit misleading as it only covers the time they spend teaching class. A friend of mine who teaches college physics courses gets paid for the nine and a half hours a week he spends giving lectures and teaching lab classes.
But he doesn't get paid for the other work his job entails, such as...
•Office hours (time when he's available for students to drop in and discuss problems they are having in class -typically 8 hours a week).
•Time spent preparing his lectures, reviewing the textbook material and finding additional sources of information to present in class
•Assigning homework
•Writing up quizzes, tests and final exams
•Re-writing and administering tests for students who missed the exam but had a quasi-exceptable excuse.
•Grading (homework and exams) and calculating semester grades.
•Attending faculty meetings (usually two full 8 hour days and several 3-4 hr meetings each semester).
You really need to look at what teachers make weekly or monthly to get a more accurate picture. And of course, you need to deduct the supplies and visual aids they purchase for the classroom but do not get compensated for.
Of course, the above quotes are not my own research, but I think the author is correct that many professions spend time off the clock preparing and upgrading their skills. The credit hours assigned to college teachers take into account all the things you cite. Which is why you don't want to have too many new classes because of the preparation time. Since 90% of my career was in the halls of ivy, I know that few university profs work as hard as public school teachers in terms of hours, and they are paid better. But, they went to school longer.
At least at the university level, the health and vacation and sick leave benefits are terrific; they get sabbaticals, all school holidays off, extra pay for helping with student organizations, low cost parking, and time to pursue research, which may or may not benefit their careers.
The author's point is that many of the things we hear about teaching today are myths, based on what teaching was 30-40 years ago. Otherwise, why would teachers be in unions? They are not underpaid or overworked.
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