Over the years the need for strong educators and higher levels of education has increased but somehow teachers’ salaries have been declining. As mentioned in my most recent post, the yearly pay of educators in many states has declined significantly and is generally in poor shape, yet with larger and larger populations and the push for better educations teachers need to be more frequent in number and better trained than ever before. As such, teachers have gotten fed up. They are doing jobs that are worthy of pay far greater than what they currently earn and have begun to speak up in order to demand a higher pay.

I recognized this dilemma only recently when I had my own experience, as I considered becoming a teacher. For a short month last semester I debated changing my major from an engineering degree to that of Spanish education. My mom, a teacher in a nearby pennsylvania school district encouraged whatever I decided but seemed uneasy about my decision, like most parents would be. But after a week or two when I was mulling over the decision she worked up the courage to tell me directly what she was thinking about my possible decision. She had talked to her fellow teachers, who I had in high school and they were all so upset that I would think about becoming a teacher. They begged her to talk to me, saying their hours and workloads were heavy, their pay lower than ever and the public education system a mess to work within. They would not recommend being a teacher to anyone they said. How sad is that?! If our own public teachers wouldn’t advise anyone to become a teacher how will the future generations be educated?

This issue is upsetting and worrisome for our future in the United States. And this issue began to truly manifest itself in 2018 as many teachers around the country took to the streets or walked out of classrooms in order to fight for better union rights and higher pay.

The movement began in West Virginia in Febuary of 2018 with a walk out that shut down schools throughout the state, in all 55 counties. Over 20,000 public educators left their classrooms demanding a 5% pay raise for all public employees with the educational field. Technically all labor strikes are illegal in West Virginia, so although it was not coined a strike, the teachers refused to work, 9 school days were cancelled, until they accomplished their goal (The 2018 Wave of Teacher Strikes, Stan Karp). This was a huge success for these teachers and a necessary win as West Virginia teachers have seen their salaries fall by more than 11 percent since 2009 and nationally, teachers’ salaries are down by roughly 5%. More students, less teachers, less funding, this equation just doesn’t add up.

WV may have been the first state to model a teacher ‘strike’ but it’s success spurred on others throughout the country. Walk outs, marches, protests have been held in Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma, and Kentucky, most of which have also been successful to some extent.

There was discussion for a period of time about how the protests seemed to be only in primarily republically leaning ‘red’ states or ‘purple’ ones but with California predicting teacher protests that correlation does not seem to affect the cause of these strikes as directly as analysts originally thought. Yet still the stance that politicians take on this issue is revealing and makes them nervous as election dates near, none want to be seen as “anit-teacher.” There are more and more rumours as we dive deeper into 2019 about strikes in Illinois, Washington, and even Texas. Texas is especially surprising as there are strict laws about teacher strikes and the stripping of benefits that would result from them, yet despite that threat teachers still seem motivated to strike for their salaries and resources. Washington teachers rejected a ‘mere’ 6.9% pay rise and seem convicted to keep fighting.

Most teachers claim that they are truly protesting for their students. They want them to have the best educations possible and hate to leave their classes for a period of time, knowing the wholes in curriculum that it creates, but in the long run they believe it will be for the greater good. Teachers across the nation are being forced to represent to their civic classes the true act of democratic participation, as they stand up for their own political beliefs and use their voices to fight for what they think is fair. Statistics show that the majority of the nation is on their side but it’s still need to be seen where this funding to pay teachers more will come from and how politicians and legislators will respond to the issue as time progresses. Hopefully educators will remain in classrooms long enough to teach but short enough to make a change.

Last week I shed light on the differing perspectives that exist towards higher education within the U.S. today, this week I hope to shift focus to our institutes of secondary education, and specifically teachers’ salary. This issue has been highlighted recently by the strikes that have been held around the nation over the past year by teachers who refuse to continue to take pay cuts or simply work for such low amounts, I’d like to dive deeper into these strikes in the coming week but for now simply look at the statistics behind these debated salaries, how they have changed over the years and how they compare between states.

The Washington Post released a telling article in March of 2018, written by Valerie Strauss, entitled, “How much (or how little) do teachers earn – state by state.”  In her article, Strauss pulls from raw statistics over the last 40, nearly 50, some years to educate readers about the evolution, or in some sense, the lack there of, of teachers’ salaries. The average teacher’s salary in the United States as of 2017 was $45,701. Surprisingly low in many people’s eyes, or even worse, not surprisingly. Many people are aware of the hard tasks that teachers have to educate the youth of the nation, and most are also aware and seem to believe that teachers are not paid enough for the work they do. According to Chalkbeat, an online educational news platform, 68% of the population agrees that teachers should be paid more, but how does this compare to the actual changes over the recent years? In fact many state’s have decreased their teachers’ salaries over the past 18 years, in reference to the charts below the far right column is shocking in the case of states such as Arizona or Colorado where the salaries have decreased by more than 10% since 2000. The difference in pay between states is also staggering when looking at the second right-most column, where you can notice that a teacher in the state of New York could earn nearly 80 thousand a year compared to the mere 42 thousand of that in South Dakota, nearly half!

A Forbes article by Niall McCarthy entitled “Where U.S. Pay is Highest and Lowest,” shows slightly differing data as in the info-graphic below. And he too highlights the grand disparities between salaries of different states.

These disparities among states and the generally low salary of teachers creates a public opinion that it is all well and good to be a teacher but that you will be underpaid and over-worked. Many public school teachers today would remind students of this before suggesting a higher educational degree in education. This public opinion and understanding than leads to a slowly decreasing amount of full time school teachers. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, there were roughly 3.6 million full time primary and secondary teachers working in 2017 which was 1% less than in 2006. The current student to teacher ratio within the country is 16:1, and yet that statistic will vary from state to state and school district to school district. Individuals are not incentivized to become teachers if the pay is low and the work is extremely difficult in comparison, and the possible effect this could have in the future is very negative, as teachers are an essential part in educating those who will fill all other professions and aspects of our government and daily life.

There is the commonly heard phrase, “If you can’t do, teach!” To which teachers would most likely laugh off or embrace jokingly, but there is an aspect of dysfunction in that phrase that we can’t seem to truly embrace and value in our society. We must recognize that not only can teachers “do” but they can then explain, educate, inform, aid, elevate those around them. Teachers are the individuals who have devoted themselves to serving others and creating those who will change the world. Seemingly only 68% of the nation can see this, and without a greater awareness and appreciation of teachers and what they do, there will likely be fewer and fewer of them, or possibly just more on strike.

I look forward to next week as we look to analyze the different teacher’s movements around the world and how individual teachers are speaking up in order to fight for better pay and resources, funding and support, to better educate young people.

 

As students attending a university and pursuing our secondary education, we have a unique perspective of the academic climate that currently exists. Many would say that their college experience thus far has been largely positive, although there are also those who would quickly offer many critiques. This diversity in opinions is present in other societal circles as well, even among researchers and reporters as they attempt to understand the current condition of higher education in the United States. There are those who would say that the level and access of education are declining while others would say that academia in the U.S. is at an all-time high standard. Throughout this post I hope to accurately align two of these opposing views and insert my own commentary as a current college student attending a public university.

 

Steven Brint, a sociology professor and author, evaluates that “American universities have never been stronger” in his article “Is this High Education’s Golden Age?” which was published in The Chronicle. He claims that despite people’s pessimism towards high education today, universities and graduate and research programs are doing exceedingly well in today’s modern sociopolitical and economic climate. According to Brint, many believe that universities have “forsaken their social and cultural responsibilities,” as they have been marketized, but he retorts that nonetheless, universities are educating more students at a higher level than ever before. Brint shares statistics such as the fact that research expenditures grew by more than 10 times between 1980 and 2010 and that Federal funding was at $30 billion in 2017. Apparently graduate degrees have become more common and overall attendance of universities is up, and this increase of education benefits the students greatly, as college educated individuals are expected to earn more than $1 million more than high school educated citizens. Brint writes, “as the telecommunications industry anticipates the day when every person owns a smartphone, so, too, does higher education anticipate the day when every qualified person will hold a degree, credential, or certificate.” This is a bold statement to say the least, and seems to combat the idea that universities are failing to educate their students, but perhaps it eludes to the real issue that many other authors and sociologists point out. Perhaps this debate about institution’s golden ages is suffering from a rhetorical issue of differing arguments. As Brint argues about the statistics and the financial success of universities as more citizens are graduating every year, many other writers don’t deny these facts but argue that Brint and others are overlooking a greater issue beneath simply the raw statistics.

 

Anne-Marie Slaughter is one such writer, political scientist, lawyer and foundation president, declares that those statistics may be true but she moves back to a universities “social and cultural responsibilities.” In her article, “The Broken Promise of Higher Education,” published in The Atlantic, she declares the statistic that ONLY 59% of college students graduate within six years! This means that most now a days don’t even graduate within 4 years, the typical college degree length. Slaughter shares that is is du to lack of finances or poor academic preparation or simply factors of life preventing students from completing their degree. Those who do not graduate face higher rates of unemployment and debt from the years of university they did pay for before dropping out. Slaughter proposes that as a society we must ask who is responsible for this “abysmal national graduation rate?” 58% of people believe that universities are responsible for their student’s success and yet we are still faced with the current graduation rate which reflects very poorly on our universities, even if Brint’s statistics are true that there are more students graduating now than in the past. Slaughter goes on to share that this graduation rate reflects itself in national opinions, the economy, and political viewpoints. Her article ends by her saying, “[people] are proudly watching their friends and family members receive their degree- but for those who don’t graduate, their debt loads and dashed hopes paint a much darker picture of American high education.”

 

And there seems to be the issue of the argument, Brint’s side seems to only be focusing on the “golden age” whereas that of Slaughter seems to be focused on the “darker picture.” In order to get an accurate image of the current climate surrounding higher education in the U.S. the stance needs to be more wholistic and recognize that the true image is a mix of both, more gray than golden or dark.

 

Yes, more students are graduating and that should be something to celebrate and continue encouraging that. The marketizing of universities has not been completely negative as the diversity of schools has grown and they are more incentivized to better themselves. But it is also true that the “abysmal graduation rate” must be addressed. As a student I can claim responsibility for us all, we need to take responsibility in general for our educations, but the whole weight does not rest on us alone. Our universities must come along side of us and lift us up, offering resources and help to students who financially or academically or physically require it. I can see this aid here at Penn State in the form of scholarships and tutoring centers and organizations like “Best Buddies.” Yet there seems to always be more to be done, so rather than fixing our eyes on and analyzing the idea of a golden age, we must spur on progress in the hopes of actually reaching it.

To get in touch with Penn State and work to make the University better, contact a hotline or email a dean and have yourself and your ideas heard!

https://www.psu.edu/hotlines

https://ed.psu.edu/internal/deans-office

Thank you so much for visiting my site! My name is Tori Lenze and I am a second semester student at the Pennsylvania State University. I am currently pursuing a degree in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in Spanish.

I hope you enjoy reading my posts and how I approach different civic issues that face our modern society, feel free to leave comments, concerns, suggestions, questions and/or feedback, I’d love to hear what you think!

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