By these criteria, American education is a failed profession. There is no widely agreed-upon knowledge base, training is brief or nonexistent, the criteria for passing licensing exams are much lower than in other fields, and there is little continuous professional guidance. It is not surprising, then, that researchers find wide variation in teaching skills across classrooms; in the absence of a system devoted to developing consistent expertise, we have teachers essentially winging it as they go along, with predictably uneven results.Teaching requires a professional model, like we have in medicine, law, engineering, accounting, architecture and many other fields. In these professions, consistency of quality is created less by holding individual practitioners accountable and more by building a body of knowledge, carefully training people in that knowledge, requiring them to show expertise before they become licensed, and then using their professions’ standards to guide their work.
This is one of the most true things I've ever read about American education. But frankly, you can't force a primary school teacher to show expertise in anything, to get a doctorate, stay in school for seven extra years ... and then pay them just ten grand over the poverty line.
But even if what you say is true, prestige can be substituted in -- there's no prestige in teaching anymore, and there certainly should be.Bunch of people with doctorates work for less than what public school teachers make.
I don't really know if I can believe that. The average (<5 years of experience) teacher's salary can't be more than about 40k.
Well I can tell you that I have a PhD in biophysics. I make a little more than my sister, who has 5 years teaching experience, but not nearly as much as my mom who has 35 years. The starting salary (nih regulated) for a postdoc is $38,000. when you consider that teachers only work 9 months, their effective salary is 33 percent higher than their nominal wage. You can not believe that if you want to, but it's a matter of public record.
Yes the salary ceiling is higher. A scientist can make maybe $120,000 if they get a couple grants and have luck on their side. A teacher with a master's and a lot of experience in MI makes maybe $70,000. So it's comparable if you consider the time off a teacher gets. I work in neuroscience. Mainly I study stroke recovery, and brain repair mechanisms.
Neuroscience is a really interesting field! Cool. At the risk of pointlessly comparing your profession to a teacher's in aspects beyond salary, it has to be more fulfilling than teaching 8th graders. And the ceiling's higher. But I had no idea that starting salaries in a research science were that low.
Yeah. Do what you love and love what you do sums it up. I love what I do and have the occassional gripes. I can definitely empathize with neuroscience researchers. Funding has been easily as scarce as it has been lately in teaching. My school district has the same per pupil funding allowance as it did when I began teaching 15 years ago. Hopefully things will turn around with funding for science and teaching sometime soon. Teacher salaries aren't too terrible. Especially relative to the last economic downturn. There's some extra security in teaching comparatively speaking. I happen to know a few very talented neuroscience researchers too. Good people. One of those neuroscientists I know is very talented, as you'd expect a neuroscience researcher to be. He helped create this "hubski" online thing that's been cultivating and expanding a virtual venue for thoughtful sharing of information and viewpoints. The ideas driving it have integrity and universal appeal. You should check it out.
Agreed. As an 8th grade math teacher, I am continually pressed for time during the school day. I teach six class periods, three different curriculum, with four minute passing times in between each hour and a 21 minute lunch period. I have a 56 minute planning period at the end of the day and average about 1.5 to 2 hours a day extra outside of that. It is rare that I walk in feeling over-prepared. I do hold hope that our profession, now that we can unpack and review student learning data, will begin to be viewed on par with medicine, law, engineering and other well-established professional models. My school district has moved to an hour early dismissal for all students on Thursdays in order for all discipline teams within the building to meet. There, we look at assessments that will guide our future instruction. I appreciate the respect that is being given to the time necessary for educators to meet and collaborate. Seems like a small step in the right direction. More of this is necessary. Plus a few extra dollars in our paychecks won't hurt either.
I saw a cool poem on this theme recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxsOVK4syxU. Sorta related.