By Stuart Singer, The Teacher Leader

I do not want to get into the politics of the situation.  If governors around the country feel compelled to battle unions, so be it.  I do not want to get into the specifics of balancing budgets.  I understand that states cannot print money so financial shortfalls mandate pain for everyone.   I do not want to talk about how much money other people should be paid.  That is an assessment employers should be making.  But when I am bombarded on a regular basis by a narrative blaming teacher avarice for much of the monetary ills of 2011, I have to speak out.

When stalking ineffective teachers is not enough

For the past few years, educational policy makers across the country have pointed to poor student achievement as a direct reflection of the inadequate instruction they are receiving.  Newspapers have publicly humiliated teachers by publishing their students’ test scores with the approval of the Secretary of Education and other school leaders.  Bill Gates has invested millions of his dollars to find better teacher evaluation techniques.  I, too, have endorsed the need to find ways to remove underperforming teachers from classrooms as quickly as possible.

But now, thanks to the budget wars in Wisconsin, what was previously a rational discussion between thoughtful adults has turned into something akin to an argument between children during recess.  The litany of complaints against teachers could be ignored as childish and silly if it were not so widespread and fraught with serious ramifications.  On national television, teaching has been described as a part-time job because they only work nine months of the year and teachers are home every day before 3 p.m.   Some talking heads have opined that teacher unions are capable of making demands that would be the envy of the Teamsters union.   One 24-hour cable news network vilified the Wisconsin teachers for causing $7.5 million in damages to the building they had occupied.  Two days later that figure was corrected to a still lamentable but significantly smaller amount of $350,000.   According to other pundits, the chaos wrought by educators is nearly biblical in nature.  Teacher pension plans are described as equivalent to corporate golden parachutes.  When it comes to teachers, simply having health insurance is considered an extravagance.   But possibly the most outrageous assertion of all is that teacher salaries are the primary state budget-busters for this fiscal year.    And to think, some teachers thought that assigning too much homework was the reason they were so often maligned.

A good time for some number crunching

Some of the “facts” being used to justify the attacks on teachers and their unions are inaccurate; others are either misrepresentations or worse.  A realistic discussion must begin with an analysis of the basics.  The salaries of teachers in Wisconsin are far from exorbitant.  Their average is approximately $51,000 per year.  That ranks 24th in the country and trails two nearby states - Minnesota and Michigan. 

The actual comparison to the private sector is an apples-to-oranges equation.  Trying to compare performance bonuses, stock options and buyout clauses to pensions is murky at best. Within this past week Borders Books as part of its bankruptcy agreement is requesting $8.3 million in bonuses for their employees.  The claim is that they are losing employees at a rate of five per week.  Incentive payments for the top executives would range from $4.7 million to $7.1 million each.  One of the company’s arguments is that many of these people have been with the company for less than a year.  Then there are retention bonuses to non-executives which average $37,000. Border’s attorney wrote, “The debtors have concluded that the critical employees are highly talented and that it would be difficult if not impossible to replace them given the debtor’s current circumstances.” When corporations fail, they use monetary incentives to retain their best personnel; when schools fail, the teaching staff is fired without regard to the level of talent.  And no one seems terribly concerned with the potential loss of outstanding teachers or the unlikelihood of finding equivalent replacements during the current fiscal crisis.   

Additionally, when comparing teachers to the private sector no one seems to be taking into account the educational level of a typical teaching staff.  Every teacher has at least a college diploma.  Normally about half have advanced degrees and many possess doctorates.  How does that compare to those other work forces? 

A mathematical reality check

It is time to talk about pensions.  I am receiving a very nice one.  It almost matches my salary when I retired.  This generous package is the result of paying 15% of my paycheck into three retirement plans—the state, the school district and Social Security.  Using the Wisconsin figures of $51,000 per year on average for my forty-year career I would have contributed $7500 per year for four decades.  That is a total of about $300,000.  Throw in the accrued interest and if I receive a very generous $60,000 in total retirement annually, one could argue that the first eight to ten years are on my own dime.  Could it be that teachers are not robbing the taxpayer?

A few other realities need to be discussed.  No one is going to become wealthy with an income of $51,000 a year.  The majority of the teachers I hired could not afford to live in the county where they taught.  The unmarried ones usually had roommates; those with children normally commuted more than thirty minutes to find affordable housing; some of my most talented teachers left the teaching profession for other, more lucrative careers.

Teaching is no more of a part time job than farming.  During the ten months classes were in session at my school the parking lot was full by 7:00 a.m. and the majority of those cars were still there at 4:00.  Evenings and weekends were often reserved for grading and lesson planning.  Summers were spent taking classes, refining classroom skills and networking with other teachers.  Some people had to find ways to augment their income by doing a variety of part time jobs.  Which leads to the question—how many bankers or lawyers must tutor or supervise recreation centers to help purchase a second car? 

The unkindest cut

Without doubt the most unfathomable part of this discussion is the manner in which the words “teachers” and “greedy” are used in the same sentence.  Teachers can be described in many ways but avarice or materialistic would hardly serve as a descriptor.  

There is, however, a context in which the word “greedy” can apply.  Over the years, I had the good fortune to work with more teachers than I can count who were absolutely convinced that their subject was the most important one in the building.  As a consequence they would grab for as much of their students’ time as they could to share with them their excitement about and knowledge of the curriculum.  To that end, they would engage in fierce battles with other teachers, coaches, parents and outside interests.  Some might describe that as greed; others refer to it as great teaching. 

These people do not deserve to be a political punching bag.