Teacher Pay

Teacher Pay

Originally published May 21, 2008 – 6:15 am by Brendan

When the folks at Global Scholar asked if anyone would like to be a blogger and not get paid I actually jumped at the chance. I’m one of those guys who has a book somewhere inside, but I can never seem to get it out. I figure it is because I can never seem to follow through with the first piece of advice any writer will tell you: sit down and write everyday. So here I am writing everyday.

I’m pretty new at this blogging stuff, or old if you think about it. (As a motorcycle enthusiast I was writing about my travels before I knew blog was a word) I do have two blogs as a sort of diary for my boys that I hope they will take over when they get old enough. The surprising thing to me was how many blogs are out there just on the state of education.

Today I looked at Educationwonk, Coach Brown, Scenes from the Battleground, And Three Standard Deviations to the Left, among others.

It was Three Standard Deviations to the Left, that caught my attention. If you remember early one I wrote an article where I mentioned that the quick and easy fix to education would be to raise teacher pay to about $60,000 and then wait a few years. I didn’t think I had a chance of actually being original in my thought, but I had never come across anyone who had even thought of the idea before.

Now of course he put a bit more thought into his plan (or hers). He went on to quote leaders in the field such as Sir Michael Barber (good and bad). He also shows some data on the amount of pay teachers receive in countries with the best rated school systems.

In the end though she sees improvement in education being made by one of two major changes being made. Either we increase pay (as in South Korea) to encourage the best and brightest college students to enter the teaching profession, or we somehow create an attitude of respect (as in Finland) for the professionalism of teachers.

There is one more step. There must be a way to weed out the poor teachers without ruining good teachers. More on that tomorrow.