Does Teacher Pay Matter?

Over at her substack, Anne Lutz Fernandez has an excellent piece entitled "Yes, What We Pay Teachers Matters." Like most everything Fernandez writes, it is absolutely on target (you should be subscribing to her if you don't already) and I just want to underline it, then wave my arms and holler "And furthermore...!"

Fernandez is looking at a new report from Sylvia Allegretto at the Economic Policy Institute that shows, among other things, that the teacher pay penalty-- the gap between teacher pay and pay for similarly-educated professionals-- has been growing over the last three decades to reach an all-time high. The gappage appears to have accelerated in the mid-90s.

Some, like the folks at Reason magazine cited by Fernandez, argue that it's not so bad because blah blah blah shuffling numbers around. But considering averages and other benefits does not improve the picture. 

Fernandez also notes the other perennial argument against paying teachers well-- teachers don't care about money and they aren't motivated by it and boy do my old fart hackles raise at every similar argument posted by someone who also posts that damned stupid "Teachers do it for the outcome, not the income" meme. 

Teaching is nor supposed to be some act of self-sacrifice, immolating yourself so that you can illuminate the lives of students. For one thing, it's not sustainable. It's not even functional, because (as they don't tell you in teacher school), you can give every last atom of yourself and it won't be enough. You will burn out early, and--bitterest of ironies--you won't even be very good at it, because what can a person who has no life of their own teach students about life?

Don't get me wrong-- teaching is absolutely a noble and supremely worthwhile profession of service. But that doesn't mean teachers shouldn't be paid well. 

But paying teachers more doesn't raise Big Standardized Test scores, some will argue (well. instead of "raise test scores" they'll say "improve student achievement" or "increase teacher effectiveness," but that just means "raise test scores"). But nobody who is serious about education will argue that the only and most important function of a teacher is to raise test scores.

The "teacher shortage" is the least mysterious issue in education. Here's Fernandez:

Of the ten states with the worst teacher shortages, the majority have pay penalties worse than the national average. But across the nation, shortages are worst in high-poverty schools, where teachers tend to be paid less. Given that these are the schools serving some of our most vulnerable children, teachers in them should be paid more—a lot more. Instead, we have had decades of chronic underinvestment in schools, particularly in urban and rural areas. This is the case in red states and blue states, as decades of austerity have denied lower-income neighborhoods and towns the resources for decent infrastructure and staffing.

Teacher shortages are both a recruiting and retention problem. The solution is not either/or: Keeping the best teachers requires competitive pay and better working conditions. I’ve written elsewhere about some of the bad ideas going around about how to solve the teacher shortage and about how some working conditions can be improved so teachers can teach more effectively. The only evidence of teachers being paid and treated poorly is not the sound of doors slamming behind them. We should be at least as worried about the effects of teachers working under stress or moving between schools as we are about them quitting the profession.

Exactly. Nor do teachers who are struggling with their professional situation make a great advertisement for the profession. I don't think it's any coincidence that the number of people choosing to enter the profession came about when students graduated from high school after twelve years of test-centered schooling had stripped autonomy from teaching.

Look, nobody enters teaching hoping to become super-wealthy. But money is power and choice. When you're twenty-something, maybe you are less bothered by having less power and choice about things like where you live and what you drive. But eventually that lack of power over your circumstances may start to chafe. And it's one thing to say, "Well, I can manage doing without some nice clothes because I'm doing noble work" to yourself and quite another to tell a spouse or your children that they have limited options because you're teaching.

And while teachers have been losing economic power, they've also been losing professional power. Not that it was ever great for some folks--it's not hard to find teachers who can tell stories of being treated like one of the students instead of like a responsible grown up professional. Add on NCLB and Common Core, both predicated on the idea that 1) schools were packed with terrible incompetent teachers and 2) we'll assume you're one of them until you prove otherwise. Teach to the test. Implement these materials with fidelity. Align your instruction strictly to these standards created by people who have never done your job.

Sometimes, money isn't just money. Look at the very rich--they don't need to make a few hundred thousand more because they need to be able to purchase more stuff. But money is a way for them to keep score-- "I made money on this, so I must be right and smart and winning!" 

I'd argue that in the context of a profession that has been stripped of power and autonomy, low pay becomes just one more poke in the eye. That's why increased pay, while it would certainly improve conditions, would not by itself be a complete fix. Paying people more while you keep treating them poorly will not turn the tide.

There are credible arguments that the "teacher shortage" is Not That Bad, though at least in my neck of the woods, superintendents would disagree. Some teachers are making a decent living, and some schools are doing okay with staffing. Some states are doing well at recruiting, and some are doing well at lowering the standards for the profession.

But the teacher pay penalty is one more symptom of two issues that are fundamental to so many of our education debates-- the desire to avoid paying one cent more than we absolutely have to for public school funding, and the desire not to pay taxes to educate Those Peoples' Children. Both of those desires are getting full expression in the privatization movement. 

Better working conditions for teachers would lead to a better education system. Better working conditions lead to more interest in the field, which means school districts can be more selective. Those better working conditions include a broad collection of factors, including better supports, better disciplinary backup, better curricula and instructional materials, better physical setting, and yes--better pay. It could be done. But I'm not going to hold my breath.