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Today, Mi is 33 and founder of a startup that aims to give Chinese kids the kind of education American children receive in top U.S. schools. Called VIPKid, the company matches Chinese students aged five to 12 with predominantly North American instructors to study English, math, science and other subjects. Classes take place online, typically for two or three 25-minute sessions each week.
Mi is capitalizing on an alluring arbitrage opportunity. In China, there are hundreds of millions of kids whose parents are willing to pay up if they can get high-quality education. In the U.S. and Canada, teachers are often underpaid—and many have quit the profession because they couldn't make a decent living. Growth has been explosive. The three-year-old company started this year with 200 teachers and has grown to 5,000, now working with 50,000 children. Next year, Mi anticipates she'll expand to 25,000 teachers and 200,000 children.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @08:23AM
That's what we tell people, right? Just keep your skills up!
If you keep your skills up, you'll always be in demand!
Keep your skills up, and you can be a billionaire!
In the U.S. and Canada, teachers are often underpaid—and many have quit the profession because they couldn't make a decent living.
Impossible!! This must be a lie.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by GungnirSniper on Thursday December 22 2016, @08:57AM
Teachers here are underpaid in desirable assignments, not unlike game programmers.
It's hard to have respect for the teaching profession in this country when they are so heavily unionized and have used that power to legally codify themselves into guild-like protections. You need a special teaching degree in most states, so even if you have a Master's or above in something else you're not qualified in their eyes. That keeps teachers from experiencing the real world and keeps those that have other careers away from bringing that outside knowledge into the classroom. So anything that knocks down their walled garden is a good thing.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @09:12AM
To be qualified, must be Node.js coder and nothing else. JavaScript experience makes you useless. C++ experience makes you worse than useless.
You were saying something about crippling overspecialization?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Thursday December 22 2016, @04:38PM
What you are saying sounds more like a problem with dumb HR hiring than with overspecialization.
WANTED: Programmer with 20 years experience in Rust or Go lang.
If your boy is chewing on electrical cords, then ground him until he conducts himself properly.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Francis on Thursday December 22 2016, @10:36AM
It's astonishing that this bullshit was actually modded up. The people who did that ought to be ashamed of themselves for encouraging this sort of mindlessness.
In other words, you know nothing about public education and would rather bash unions that actually address any of the problems related to the system.
Teachers require special certifications because teaching requires a lot more work than just mastery of the content area. I mean seriously, I deal with the results of untrained teachers on a more or less daily basis. Just because you know how to solve a math problem, does not qualify you to teach somebody else to do it. Most days I wind up cleaning up after a teacher that doesn't understand how to teach and I've made quite a bit of money over the years from that.
The order you sequence material, the connections you draw, the things you gloss rather than cover, the things you cover rather than gloss and the approach you take all require special training if you want to do it effectively. But yes, let's just bash the unions that are actually advocating for the appropriate funding, because we all know that teachers are rich and do no work of any sorts.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Thursday December 22 2016, @12:29PM
I'd say you're both right. There is more to teaching than knowing how to solve a math problem. Unions do degrade the quality and performance of teaching as a profession.
I taught English in Japan, and the level of commitment by the teacher and his involvement with the totality of his student's life is on a whole other level from America. He spends most of his waking hours with him. If the student gets caught shoplifting or something like that, the cops call the teacher, not the parents. In America, thanks to unions, the teachers knock off at 2:30pm after having started at 8am; and in that 6.5 hour day they've had a 90 minute prep period and an hour lunch. So they work slightly more than a half day each day. They get about 50 flavors of religious holidays off, and they don't have to work for 3 months out of the year, in the summer. And, they are not held accountable at all for how many of their kids pass assessment test or what kind of grades they get or whether they can read or do basic math. For all that, they get paid multiples more than the median national salary, and enjoy very generous health and retirement benefits. And when they do something bad, it is nearly impossible to get them fired. (All this I have seen intimately from serving on the school board) Result: 2/3rds of the kid fail the state-wide tests. Not, "pass with an A, B, C, or D," but "F," for failure.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 5, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Thursday December 22 2016, @04:25PM
In America, thanks to unions, the teachers knock off at 2:30pm after having started at 8am; and in that 6.5 hour day they've had a 90 minute prep period and an hour lunch. So they work slightly more than a half day each day. They get about 50 flavors of religious holidays off, and they don't have to work for 3 months out of the year, in the summer.
As someone who actually taught secondary school in the U.S. for a few years (a little over a decade ago), you're exaggerating quite a bit. Most teachers I know spent several weeks of "summer vacation" doing planning, creation of new materials, etc. (because they knew they wouldn't have time during the regular year) and all the schools I worked for REQUIRED us to attend additional summer training sessions/conferences, which took up another 2-3 weeks. You're right that teachers get more "vacation" than most professions, but it's not the amount you claim. And frankly I was happy whenever I did get a long weekend or whatever, because it often finally allowed me to catch up on backed up grading.
I've never heard of a public school with an "hour lunch." Teachers generally get a lunch period that's the same length as students get, which is typically around 25-30 minutes. That "prep period" is about the only time you have to not only prepare new materials, but to grade assignments, tests, etc., and there is NO WAY that 90 minutes is adequate prep time per day if you actually want to give real attention to your students.
When I was teaching high school (math and physics), I had 140-150 students per year in six class sections. If I used that full 90-minute prep (and not every school has that much time during the school hours), that gives me approximately 36-40 SECONDS per student per day to grade assignments, tests, etc., and that's assuming I use no time at all to do things like, you know, PREP for teaching, make new handouts, test questions, project materials, etc., let alone basic stuff you might need to do like photocopies, administrative paperwork, etc. I don't think I ever had time to do any grading during a prep period, because I was always immersed in a variety of actual prep work and random administrative tasks each day.
And actually at the 2 public schools I taught at, we didn't have a prep period each day: a couple days each week or during certain parts of the year we were assigned "duty" during those periods -- monitoring halls, lunchrooms, etc.
Simply put, there's no way you can be a responsible teacher and get away with your "work slightly more than half a day each day." Have I known some teachers who basically did that? Sure. I knew some delinquents who did nothing, were out the door at 2:45pm each day, and got paid anyway. But most of my colleagues were there for hours either before or after school (or both). It was very rare that I spent less than 9 hours at school each day, and frequently I took additional grading home to do in the evenings or on weekends. And that's after I sacrificed a lot of more pedagogically sound stuff -- I eventually gave up on giving too many tests and quizzes that required detailed grading in my physics classes, for example. I resorted to "ScanTron" multiple choice things just to keep myself sane. And just consider the amount of attention required to grade even one lab report where you expect some "creative" thinking. For 150 students, even looking at each one for 2 minutes each, you're looking at 5 HOURS of grading for just one assignment. If you want to spend a decent amount of time fixing grammar, correcting more subtle mistakes, improving writing, etc. and do 5 minutes each, that's 12.5 hours of your time dealing with one lab report assignment.
That stuff adds up FAST.
The last year I taught high school, I moved to a private school that was one of those elite academies that's a feeder to the Ivy League. There I was lucky enough to have only around 50 students, but I worked harder than ever, because expectations were so much higher. Of the science teachers in the rooms around me whom I got to know well, all of us spent at least 9 hours/day, and those of us who didn't have kids frequently worked well into the evening, planning new labs and other creative activities, trying to get stuff to work, etc. We'd frequently go for a quick dinner together and continue until 7 or 8 or 9pm at night. I still recall the time my fellow physics teacher came into my room at something like 10:30pm one night to get something and found me asleep on a lab table, because I was so exhausted.
Were we required to be there? No. But it was the school culture. And, you know, out of the 10 AP physics kids I had that year, 6 went on to Ivy League schools, so there's that. You have students ready to be challenged, and you need to meet their challenges, so you work harder. All of us did. At that school, if you disappeared right after the bell each afternoon, you probably wouldn't be hired back the next year.
Anyhow -- bottom line: I know there are plenty of "slackers" in the profession, and plenty who take advantage of union rules (not possible in all states or school districts) to slack off more. But in my years actually teaching, those folks were far outweighed by the number of teachers I knew who were working far beyond the school day most days. And those teachers (again, which I say were the majority of teachers I worked with) were definitely not paid well given their effort and qualifications.
Just my experience. Will likely vary significantly from school to school and depending on state law/regulations.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @06:01PM
U.S. teachers who give a shit, and there are a lot of them, will get to school earlier, stay there longer, and bring work home. They prepare for the next school year during the summer and go to mandated workshops. There are far less than "50 flavors of religious holidays off". Benefits and pay vary but are not that great in some states... and this is for someone with a college education.
Stick to talking about Japanese schoolkids. Did any of them touch you inappropriately?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by bradley13 on Thursday December 22 2016, @01:24PM
There's something wrong with your reasoning...
You agree, on the one hand, that "teacher require special certifications". I.e., one cannot be a teacher, unless one has certification X. Then you respond to criticism of these required certifications by saying "I deal with the results of untrained teachers on a more or less daily basis". If the certifications are required to be a teacher, then what exactly is an "untrained" teacher?
I went to a lot of different schools in the US, because my parents moved a lot, basically a different school every year until high school. There were public schools, private schools, and at least one odd hybrid somewhere in between. The public schools, with their certified teachers, were by far the worst. Teachers who openly "didn't like boys". Teachers who couldn't stand kids who were smarter than they were. Teachers who didn't understand the material they were teaching. I'm sure they all had the right certifications, but too many of them were useless.
In the non-public schools, the teachers generally did *not* have teaching certifications. Instead, they had subject matter qualifications. The teachers liked what they taught, and they taught because they liked kids and enjoyed teaching. These schools were - without exception - better than the public schools with their "certified" teachers.
For very young kids - pre-school, kindergarten, maybe first and second grade - knowledge of child development and child psychology probably is more important than anything else. However, by the time 3rd or 4th grade comes, teachers need to have a deep knowledge and love of their subject. It should not be possible for a 10 year old kid to stump his math teacher. Geography teachers must know which continents countries are on. History teachers need to love history, so that they can convey its importance. Language teachers ought to be fluent in the language they are teaching. These things are *not* secondary to courses in pedagogy; the reverse is true. Pedagogy is something you teach on the side, to enable subject experts how to teach kids.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 4, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Thursday December 22 2016, @04:50PM
If the certifications are required to be a teacher, then what exactly is an "untrained" teacher?
I just wanted to note that the whole "certification" thing is a lot more complicated for public schools, particularly in "shortage" areas (which are typically math and science teachers in a lot of states). When I taught high school, I started off as uncertified -- in fact, the whole reason I even got into teaching was that I heard a news report about how many classrooms would be starting the school year with a substitute on the first day of school due to teacher shortages, so I started looking around for positions to do a bit of "public service" at that point in my life.
Anyhow, it varied from state to state, but I was hired under what was called an "emergency permit" which generally granted teachers 3 years to become certified, thought there were some sort of exemptions that I think could allow that to even be extended another year or two under special circumstances. Things changed a bit with "No Child Left Behind" which was initially sold as something to stop this practice of uncertified teachers -- but most states basically just renamed things and ultimately ended up with a similar system.
There's a LOT of this going on in most states. And once you factor in the "burn-out" factor among teachers, where the MAJORITY of new teachers leave the profession within ~5 years, you realize that a lot of these new folks either never finish their certification or quite soon after, meaning there's a LOT of uncertified teachers continuously required to staff public schools. Again, this is highest in areas like math or science, since people with those degrees are more likely to be able to find jobs with better salaries elsewhere.
But the net effect of this whole certification shuffle at many public schools is that the worst public schools are often stuck with substitute teachers or people who are hired with no real hope of ever becoming certified in this area. The first school I taught math in, I was hired along with a woman who had a psychology degree. She was also assigned to teach general math, though as far I as can tell whenever I entered her classroom, the students did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. She seemed like a reasonable person, but I'm guessing she was just using this "emergency permit" thing to get a year or two hanging out with high school kids until she could actually find a job she'd prefer more.
Not an argument for or against certification in general -- just noting that the system is NOT just as it is claimed to be where all public school teachers are certified. And certification requirements vary VASTLY from state to state, and expectations in individual universities for education degrees or teacher prep programs also vary significantly in rigor.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @05:20PM
In the first grade here, the problem "X - 9 = 9" was given, but with a blank instead of an X because variables are algebra.
The teacher would accept 9 and 0 as possible answers. When asked by a volunteering parent why 18 was not acceptable, the teacher said it was incorrect because 2-digit numbers hadn't been covered.
The kids will be confused forever because this causes inconsistency and because unlearning is hard.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Francis on Thursday December 22 2016, @05:48PM
That's a problem I often encounter where there's multiple solutions, or usually methods, but only one of them has been covered.
And yes, that solution would be wrong if they haven't gotten to the point where they've covered that. However, neither 9 nor 0 are correct answers to the problem as using a 9 would give you an inequality with 0 = 9 and 0 would also give an inequality as -9 is not 9.
That kind of incompetent curriculum causes a lot of the students I get to still need help with remedial math. And not even math, a lot of them struggle just with arithmetic. They haven't even gotten to the point where they're doing anything other than strict calculation that you could just type into a calculator to do for you either.
One of the hard truths is that the place where the best teachers need to be is teaching those beginning students as your first experience with new content is where you develop a sense of whether it's even possible to succeed.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Thursday December 22 2016, @05:43PM
That's because at the college level there's no requirement that you have ever had a teaching degree. It's a straight up masters in the content area and often times a PhD because clearly that qualifies them to teach. All too many colleges will focus more on the faculty's published work over their classroom abilities.
The college I work at is pretty good over all, but there's little ability to really pick good part time faculty to fill out the mix. Many of them are only around for a few quarters anyways as it's not a viable living without working in multiple districts or having a second job.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @01:51PM
Master's or above in something else you're not qualified in their eyes.
I know people with a PhD that are not qualified to teach someone how to put on a glove.
Programs like Teach for America program are a great idea, but not every subject expert is competent in teaching.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Nerdfest on Thursday December 22 2016, @11:08AM
The *average* high school teacher's salary in Ontario (Canada) is $87000. Hardly underpaid. Considering the number of people that want to teach, I'd say quite overpaid.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Thursday December 22 2016, @11:35AM
What do other people with similar amounts of education get paid in Canada. Also, are they required to fund their own continuing education to maintain their credentials and how much work are they expected to do?
In the US, teachers get paid far less than other occupations with similar requirements for education. They also have to spend large amounts of time and money on classes to maintain their credentials and wind up working on their own time to do things like grading and preparing.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by khallow on Thursday December 22 2016, @11:53AM
What do other people with similar amounts of education get paid in Canada. Also, are they required to fund their own continuing education to maintain their credentials and how much work are they expected to do?
Sounds like we have a case of too much credentials contrary to your assertion in your other post [soylentnews.org].
Teachers require special certifications because teaching requires a lot more work than just mastery of the content area.
I'll note here that I don't respect the certifications and credentials that are currently enforced or issued for teachers because I think it's a deliberate intent to restrict the supply of teachers by those teacher unions.
I mean seriously, I deal with the results of untrained teachers on a more or less daily basis. Just because you know how to solve a math problem, does not qualify you to teach somebody else to do it. Most days I wind up cleaning up after a teacher that doesn't understand how to teach and I've made quite a bit of money over the years from that.
There are ways to train teachers that don't require pointless certifications and credentials that don't reflect actual ability of the teacher. Ultimately, the goal here is hiring and keeping good teachers. Credentials are evidently getting in the way of that according your above post.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Thursday December 22 2016, @06:28PM
The certifications aren't pointless, one way or another you need a way of telling who has and who hasn't had at least some exposure to the methods used in the trade. We can quibble all day about which standards make sense and which ones don't as well as how to fix it, but at the end of the day, it's not realistic to have teachers teaching long enough to know if they're any good. It's just too costly and time consuming.
As far as my previous comment goes, there's basically no requirement if you're teaching at a college, those requirements I referenced are for the K-12 public schools. Private schools and colleges don't necessarily require that the teacher be qualified to teach. But, the whole idea of going back and taking classes regularly is that it helps the instructor keep current as well as remind them what it's like to teach. The last thing you want is to have a teacher who hasn't taken any classes in decades and can't even remember what it takes to pass a test teaching the class.
As for credentials getting in the way, no they don't. What gets in the way is a lack of proper pay, lack of proper working conditions and having the teachers be responsible for paying their college and credential fees while still expecting them to make poverty wages and put up with the long hours.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 23 2016, @12:32AM
one way or another you need a way of telling who has and who hasn't had at least some exposure to the methods used in the trade.
But of course. You can evaluate them in the classroom. You can speak to their references. That's better than credentials.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Francis on Friday December 23 2016, @04:43AM
No, just no.
So, you're suggesting that every time a school needs to hire a new teacher, that they waste class time for a dozen or more students for each applicant rather than just accept the practicum done once by an accredited trainer? How is that better than the current set up where the prospective teachers get feedback and experience in an environment set up to handle it?
Also, references are something that you get in addition to the credentials typically anyways. They're not a replacement for a properly monitored practicum in any reasonable way. Whenever you've got somebody watching the classroom the students behave differently even if the teacher doesn't. I remember being unintentionally screwed over by students on multiple occasions because they were trying to make me look good, but them looking like good Chinese language students wasn't what I was being evaluated on. I was being evaluated in part on the energy in the room which was mysteriously absent whenever the head teacher was evaluating me.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 23 2016, @05:04AM
So, you're suggesting that every time a school needs to hire a new teacher, that they waste class time for a dozen or more students for each applicant rather than just accept the practicum done once by an accredited trainer?
That would be better, particularly since they're going to waste the time of the students on an unknown anyway. Might as well be one that you've actually seen at work.
I remember being unintentionally screwed over by students on multiple occasions because they were trying to make me look good, but them looking like good Chinese language students wasn't what I was being evaluated on.
Which would be no different a problem if you were credentialed or not.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Friday December 23 2016, @05:23AM
First off, where do you get students to sit through those lessons from? Students are students, they're supposed to be studying. If you're interviewing for a job at a college, you might get away with having them give a lecture, but for the K-12 system there's just no time to do that. Students arrive at a set time and leave at a set time, when are you going to have the teachers doing their lessons? Students have enough to do with their own studies without having to sit through lessons that aren't related to their material and they aren't being graded on.
As for the second point, coming in with a credential means that you've proven a base level of competency. There's a lot less pressure involved and generally schools don't have your entire career at that school resting on the result of a single class session with students you don't know.
The current system is only broken in so far as the teachers are being poorly compensated, presented with unreasonable conditions and a more or less complete lack of support. How are you going to figure out if a teacher can handle that with just a test lesson? At least with credentials, the teacher has a set of tools available for addressing things like that.
Removing the regulations isn't going to help. If you want to avoid the regulation, just take a look at private schools. Some of them are great and cost a huge amount of money to attend and others are significantly worse than public schools because they're not bound by the same regulations about hiring trained teachers.
The whole idea that this is somehow a substitute is at best half-baked.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 23 2016, @05:54AM
If you're interviewing for a job at a college, you might get away with having them give a lecture, but for the K-12 system there's just no time to do that.
You do realize that there's more time for that in the K-12 system than in college - for all parties concerned, don't you? Teachers work less hours and students are going no more than half the speed of a college environment. What's different is that college professors tend to take hiring very seriously because having a good, compatible colleague can boost their own career, even if only indirectly via boosting the reputation of the department.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @06:46PM
I'll note here that I don't respect the certifications and credentials that are currently enforced or issued for teachers because I think it's a deliberate intent to restrict the supply of teachers by those teacher unions.
I feel the same way about MCSEs, and CPAs, and MRAs and MREs! All of them are, as George Bernard Shaw put it, "conspiracies against the laity"!!! And I also do not respect any credentials to be a Soylentil, or a khallow, because the intent is just to mindless catapult the propaganda.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 23 2016, @12:35AM
And I also do not respect any credentials to be a Soylentil, or a khallow, because the intent is just to mindless catapult the propaganda.
How did you even find this site without the proper credentials!? The butler was most emphatically told not to let these people in!
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Thursday December 22 2016, @11:55AM
They do not have to do classes to keep up their credentials (although many will work towards a masters to get a salary increase). They get summers off of course, and teach from generally 9:00-15:30, leaving lots of time for grading, etc, in a normal work day. They typically also have 'free' time during the day because of free time slots, etc. Many will do after-school activities though, which pushes marking to their own time. Here, they also have a fantastic pension plan. I have lots of relatives that are teachers. The only real down-side is being limited in when you can take vacation, although there is a long Christmas break, and spring break in addition to the summer. If you actually like teaching, it's a pretty sweet deal.
My complaint is not so much the money on its own, it's the money combined with the number of people that want to teach. The supply and demand ratio should push down the salaries, allowing more teachers, smaller class-sizes, and better employment.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @02:06PM
The supply and demand ratio should push down the salaries
If China is willing to pay more, then the market value of those teachers is higher than their current salary (which would mean they're currently underpaid).
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nerdfest on Thursday December 22 2016, @02:39PM
I will put money on China not out-paying Ontario teachers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @12:36PM
Public school teachers have the summer off, are coddled by pensions (which disappeared in the private sector 40 years ago) and protected from incompetence by tenure.
Oh, without tenure teachers would be at the mercy of arbitrary management? Welcome to real world.
Nobody who hasn't been a teacher can comment on the teaching profession? Well, that's a nice way to put yourself above criticism, isn't it. Maybe politicians should claim the same deal.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday December 22 2016, @01:26PM
Maybe politicians should claim the same deal.
You can't judge me until you've accepted a hundred thousand dollar bribe from the fine folk at Soulless Corp? Sounds intriguing. "Note to self..."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @02:32PM
Hm, all the former Nortel employees must have missed the memo.
(Score: 5, Informative) by datapharmer on Thursday December 22 2016, @12:29PM
Where in the world are you getting that number? According to salary.com "The median annual Teacher High School salary in Ontario, CA is $59,745, as of November 30, 2016, with a range usually between $47,338-$70,178"
Not that it is terrible, but that's 27k away from reality, and in the U.S. it can vary widely. In some inner city schools (where it can by physically dangerous to teach) you can make $85k+ to risk your life in gang territory, or you can take a much safer job teaching online in Pennsylvania for under 13k a year.
If you can work 20 hours a week at $20 an hour (the rate cited in the story) you would make over 20k. Why wouldn't you work half the hours for almost twice the pay as you could in Pennsylvania for the same job?
(Score: 3, Informative) by aclarke on Thursday December 22 2016, @01:54PM
I don't know where Nerdfest got his number, but it's possible he's quoting in CAD and you're quoting USD. C$87,000 is about US$65,000. That's still above your number, but it's easy to see how two different surveys could produce numbers with a US$5000 difference in average salary.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Nerdfest on Thursday December 22 2016, @01:55PM
The number's came from the National Post [nationalpost.com], and are just for Toronto, so my mistake. Toronto is probably the most expensive place to live in Ontario as well.
13K a year is certainly *way* too low.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by SunTzuWarmaster on Thursday December 22 2016, @07:04PM
I've always wanted to run the numbers.
I live in Orlando.
Median household income here is $41K (source: http://www.bestplaces.net/economy/city/florida/orlando). [bestplaces.net] This is right around "assistant manager of Walmart" (43K), "GM of the Olive Garden" (39K), and what I consider to be a "normal job" - not enough to really buy a house ($49K, source:http://money.cnn.com/infographic/real_estate/what-you-need-to-earn-to-afford-a-home/) (unless two people work).
Median (primary school) teacher salary here is $53K (source:http://www1.salary.com/FL/Orlando/Teacher-Elementary-School-salary.html).
Teachers here obey this schedule (https://www.ocps.net/pages/schoolcalendar.aspx), which indicates 2 weeks for Christmas break, 1 week for Spring break, 8 weeks for summer break, and ~4 holidays on top of that. In comparison, a federal Post Office employee (or any other federally employed person, including STEM folks) with 3-15 years tenure gets 10 federal holidays and ~3.9 weeks of vacation. Let's call it 6 weeks.
Let's assume that they both work 8 hour days, the teacher is getting about 12 weeks of vacation yearly to the has-a-degree-entry-level-GS-7, or assistant-manager-of-post-office-GS-7. Teacher is making 4 weeks of additional vacation, which is valued at 1/12*53000=$4500. All things being roughly equal (assuming federal pension/401K are roughly equal to county pension/401K), the 'normal job' comes out around $41K+benes, and the teacher comes out around 57.5K+benes. 'Normal job' probably requires a business degree or technical training, and teacher job requires a 4-year degree. This indicates that teachers, as a category, are out-earning the median income by $16.5K in "total package". Draw your own conclusions for overpaid/underpaid; these numbers indicate that a family can afford to live in a house with a teacher as a sole breadwinner (just barely), but cannot afford to do so with most jobs.
Final note - in my state (FL) anyone with a STEM degree can choose to be a teacher and has a 2-3 year grace period in which to obtain a teaching certificate (which is trivial). Few do, for a variety of reasons, some of which are likely economic. There is a proposed bill to set starting teacher salary at $54K ($50K+vacation premium), while starting salary for a "Bachelor of Science" degree ($71K), or "Bachelor of Engineering" ($81K) is somewhat larger (source:http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Location=Orlando-FL/Salary/by_Degree#by_Years_Experience). There is, of course, ongoing state-wide debate on whether people with a degree in Biology should teach high school physics (90+% of teachers aren't certified in the subject they teach in this state).
(Score: 2) by Osamabobama on Friday December 23 2016, @12:21AM
Just to throw some more confusion at the matter, it should be mentioned that "Ontario, CA" is often used to represent a city in San Bernardino county, California.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by aclarke on Thursday December 22 2016, @01:45PM
Canadian teachers among top paid worldwide, study finds [thestar.com]
OECD finds us fourth highest of developed nations, according to new report on the state of education around the world.
Teacher pay: Canada near the top of the OECD class [theglobeandmail.com]
Where The World's Best-Paid Teachers Can Be Found [huffingtonpost.ca]
Canada is #3, USA is #6 in this particular metric.
Teachers in Ontario at least have a very strong union. At a time when fewer people get full benefits with pension, the contrast is becoming more stark and obvious. I think teaches are worth what we pay them but overall their compensation packages with pension are very good here.
(Score: 2) by aclarke on Thursday December 22 2016, @01:57PM
I see the reference to underpaid Canadian teachers comes from the Bloomberg article, not from Phoenix666's posterior.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Thursday December 22 2016, @02:51PM
That's straight from the article. No lumping on my part.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 22 2016, @05:45PM
Not everybody can teach well. Just because lots of people want to teach, that does not mean they would do a good job at it. Given the impact giving a good education to a child can have in the economy $87,000 a year per teacher is a pittance. It is in effect investing in the future of the country.
You need good wages to retain good teachers, sure some will take low wages for the love of teaching, but you can't expect all the good ones to. So if those wages result in a good education for the children, then those teachers are certainly not overpaid.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Thursday December 22 2016, @08:50PM
You're assuming that the teachers in place are good, which is not always the case, and the unions generally involved ensure that that does not change easily or quickly. Also, studies generally show that money is not as big a factor as you would think.