Abstract:

Mary Tedrow watches her mentee come to terms with the reality of her monthly net pay---and the difficulties of establishing a new career and home without a paycheck until late September--and describes her own shrinking pay as health care costs climb.

Tedrow, M. (2004). Paycheck blues. Teacher Leaders Network diaries. Retrieved from the Teacher Leaders Network 10 Apr 2008. Link:http://www.teacherleaders.org/old_site/diaries04_05/other/MT02.html

Full Text:

Paycheck Blues

I had a demoralizing moment the other day. My mentee received her first paycheck as a working professional. She was wailing because the bottom line was less than she had anticipated.

In our system, new teachers can request an advance of $1500 when they start, because their first paycheck doesn't arrive until the end of September. My mentee hadn't realized that a portion of the $1500 would be taken out of each month's pay until it was repaid.

Our district's compensation and payment policies place a huge financial burden on the new teacher. Because new teachers start early in August, most must go almost two entire months before receiving any compensation for their work. In addition, many move to town and set up housekeeping, which includes paying enormous security deposits for rent and utilities. The salary advance adds the stress of beginning a career in debt, a stress that seems unfair to young professionals who may also be burdened with the debt from student loans and who are finding their first taste of teaching on their own an enormous challenge.

Even if the young teacher isn't paying all these "launch" costs out of his or her own pocket, the system is essentially asking for a donation from a new teacher's family to get them started in a career. When you compare this situation to the moving and set-up support that many new corporate professionals receive, we see one more reason why it's difficult to recruit and keep quality teachers.

Anyway, my mentee was understandably upset when she discovered her paycheck was minus the first repayment of the "loan." She had calculated carefully what she would be getting each month and the monthly deduction on the $1500 had not been factored in.

"Oh, no!" she exclaimed. "I only have $2600 for the month. Now I'm further behind than when I began."

I blanched.

Even with the repayment deducted, her net pay was $100 more a month than mine.

I kept this information to myself, not wanting to scare her off from her chosen profession, one I love and value. But I'll bet even money that I turned visibly white. Suddenly I had the image of myself running in the wheel of a hamster cage.

I'm 50. She's 27.

I have a Master's Degree. So does she.

I'm Nationally Board Certified, which adds a modest stipend to my system's salary. She is not.

I receive a stipend for advising the school paper. She gets one (a much larger one) for coaching the cheerleaders.

I have sixteen years' teaching experience.

She has none.

Though my husband claims I've never understood money, this much I know. The biggest cut into my pay comes from buying health insurance. The cost of my personal health insurance (and the health insurance of my mentee) is covered by the system as a benefit. But I also purchase health insurance for the rest of my family, something I am unwilling to go without. That cut comes to $716.49 a month, an expense that has been raised $140 a month in just four years.

And, I understand this. The health insurance payment is being taken out pre-tax. That means I'm not paying my contribution to FICA on that $716.49 a month. To me, that means my potential social security check is actually staying stagnant the longer I work.

And I know this. Human Resources has promised that health insurance costs will continue to rise every year into the foreseeable future. (Our neighboring school system has just begun to require their teachers to contribute $40 a month to their own coverage, so it's entirely possible that our current employee benefit will also begin to fade away.)

It is clear to me that if I were single, I would find it very hard to live on just my salary alone (or even my mentee's salary). As a parent with two dependents in college, it would be impossible. My daughter, a brand new veterinarian, makes more than I do each month and is barely keeping up with her own expenses. I would be in terrible shape if I didn't have a husband and two other paying positions: freelance writing and adjunct professor.

So maybe the issue here is not teacher pay but the larger issue of health insurance coverage in this country. Even so, how does it make me feel to have less "purchasing power" than the teacher I am mentoring? Pretty crummy.

Could it really be that in spite years of service, I am falling behind? Would it be best for me to advise my mentee that she'd be a fool to have a family on a teacher's salary?

On that afternoon, as I watched my young mentee express her frustration, I felt sorrier for me. I have the distinct feeling that I have been running in place for 16 years.

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