HS Coaching Money (and teacher salaries)

Asiatic Flu wrote:

...ignoring them is intellectually lazy on your part.

I disagree. Other than in some uppity private schools mainly on the coasts, private school teachers make less money than public school teachers. They do not HAVE to take those jobs. Some do it for religious reasons or convenience or because they aren't certified and don't want to get certified. We all make choices in life.

It would be disingenuous for a public school teacher making $90,000 a year to lock arms with a private school teacher making $28,000 and sing "we shall overcome".

OHteacher wrote:

I am a elementary teacher in a Central Ohio suburb. My base salary for 7 hours a day and 186 days a year is $81,700.

My coaching stipend for one sport is $8286.00 and if I retire today my pension is $53,972 yearly. I am comfortable.

http://buckeyeinstitute.org/teacher-salary

Sounds cool to me. Nice job, brother.

The district I taught in hasn't given any teachers their contractually promised raises in almost a decade due to financial shortfalls. This is a common scenario. So for many teachers, things are not "ramping up fast" but in fact are totally stagnant. But this all varies from county to county, district to district.

This is a serious problem: About 50% of teachers leave the profession within 5 years because the working conditions are often bad, especially in tough schools, and the compensation for talented people -- while not terrible -- does not match other opportunities. When promises don't come through for raises year after year, sticking around seems pretty grim when there are better opportunities.

For example, I went back to grad school and got paid a stipend 3/4 of the 10 month teacher salary just to study and TA/RA. And I worked about half as much and could use the other time to earn money in other ways (coaching, web site work).

What actually needs to be put to bed is blanket statements about teacher pay and work in a profession where working conditions and pay are so closely tied to where (both geographically and the kind of school) you work that it makes such statements almost entirely meaningless.

Anyway, FWIW, I taught high school for 3 years and coached HS track for seven. I worked 12 months a year (summer school etc) and made like 49k, which for a typical 10 month teacher would be 40k or so. (The 12-month deal ended after 3 years.)

I coached three seasons -- head coach in cross country, asst in indoor track and outdoor track. For all three sports I think I made 7000 dollars before taxes.

MO coach wrote:

Average salary in my district is around 54k, with an average experience level of 13 years. That gives the best idea of what teachers are making over most of their careers.

Yeah, and that figure is pulled down by low-paid beginning teachers who often decide to do something else who are then replaced by another low-paid beginning teacher. Given those circumstances, an "average" salary of $54,000 is pretty good.

Flagpole:

Every state/district is different and cost of living should also be considered.

For example:

$3482 for a cross country head coach in Albuquerque, NM (https://hrd.aps.edu/jobs/Jobpost.exe)

The highest salary for a teacher in Albuquerque earns $67,646 after 40 years on the job with a doctorate.

North Carolina: teaching 16 years and make $37,000 plus $6,000 total for coaching cross country, indoor and outdoor.

Pay freeze since 2008....

49 other states flagpole.

I guess I should point out it's public school and North Carolina is receiving a lot of negative press about the teaching situation. Ranks nearly last in teacher salaries nationally.

previous poster mentioned $8200 stipend for Ohio coach. is that for the year, or per season?

i coach in CA and end up with about $4000 per year after taxes. for the time i put in, that's about $3/hr. when you factor in gas getting to/from the school it's about $2/hr.

it's very very difficult to be or find a good walk-on coach due to the finances.

You're surprised by this? The fact that they make great money is the worst kept secret around. Not to mention that while I'm slaving away in an office all July and August, they're enjoying their summer off.

It's nothing new.

Sure they deserve it, but Engineers also deserve the whole summer off. We work hard too.

Teachers probably deserve what they make. It takes a special person to competently teach kids with enthusiasm and do it for many years. I wasn't a real teacher, but I taught efl to kids and it was exhausting.

I wonder though how sustainable public employee salaries are. A beginning teacher or police officer in the US after a couple of years makes as much as what a teacher or police officer makes at the top of the scale in France. Maybe the US is just at a higher level of development? France's costs are controlled at a national level. Also, teachers in France and many other countries like Korea are national government employees and must have been above a certain percentage in a national exam. Can states and municipalities control their costs? Is it sustainable to have $100k teachers, police officers, and firefighters? Million dollar university presidents?

Flagpole wrote:

My daughter's CC and track coach (he's the head girls coach for both) makes a total of right on $12,000 a year for coaching those sports. He is also a Social Studies teacher at the high school and makes a little over $80,000 a year for that. He's 44 or 45 years old. So, with both of those, he makes over $92,000 a year, and this is in Central Ohio.

I think he deserves to make that money. I don't believe though that teachers really have any legitimate beef with the salaries they make. Yes, at some private schools, they will make less, but they have the option of trying to find a better-paying job.

You HS coaches out there, do you make that much coaching your teams?

Inner-city, East Coast 8 years in with a Masters, making $61k for teaching. Now, I know just outside the city I teach in, those same stats would get between $70-85k, and the kids taught are completely different.

For coaching, I get $4500 for CC, nothing for Indoor, and $3500 for Track Assistant. We also don't get buses or anything transportation except to dual meets in the city or ANY Indoo meet, so I drive to all invitationals with kids in the car. No reimbursement for gas, tolls, etc, or the extra insurance I carry. I figure with all the hours put in for coaching I make less than minimum wage for those hours, but I wouldn't trade it for anything.

I'm decently compensated but know people who work in charter schools in my city with similar qualifications who make $10-15k less. I also know that I deal with a tougher teaching environment than friends in the suburbs who make significantly more than I do, but I love my kids and wouldn't trade them for some trust-fund kids out in the wealthy 'burbs.

Starting out in my county in Florida is right around 38,000 yr. with each year a pay increase of roughly 40-80 cents hourly. Not bad in my opinion when you only end up working 9 months or 180 days out of the year w/ weekends&holidays. Coaching track or cross country is roughly between 1 - 2k as well.

Base pay in our district in Houston area is $50k. Roughly $300-500 per step after that. I think you max out at 35 years.

Masters stipend is $2k, doctorate is $3k.

Track and XC stipends (head both) are roughly $10k combined.

I think most Texas metro teachers are in a decent wage range, but I do think that the above salary posts are not considering cost of living. $80k in NYC might not be that great.

What city?

In Boston, BPS teachers regularly make 50% more than many suburban counterparts. The guy I coach with - same exact education and service time as me - makes 30k more than I do. I work 12 miles outside Boston.

Coaching in Boston is pretty non-existent in Boston outside basketball, but when you're base salary is that good, who needs it?

I, too, taught in a Boston suburb. My last year I earned $80k for teaching (Masters+30) and $17k for coaching three seasons. Now I collect a $68k pension. Living the dream.

BPS teachers do NOT make 50% more than suburban counterparts. It varies by district, and Boston teachers do make more, but part of that was a negotiated pay raise in which the teachers gave up significant job security.

Other things to take into account when considering how good a salary is: class size, number of classes you teach, other responsibilities (study hall, hall duty, etc.) that take away prep time during the day...

And, I think the comparison one should make is between teachers and other professions: if you have a professional degree, and are continuously taking other grad-level classes throughout your career, you would make more in most fields than you do as a teacher.

And, to those of you who mention pensions: teachers pay into the pension - in my district, 11% of annual salary goes into the state pension fund. It's not free money. If I could keep that 11% and invest it on my own, I would be better off.

Our retirement is pretty good, but state legislators want to get a hold of it and privatize it.

We pay into it and the state and district match. We aren't able to claim social security.

We also do not have unions in Texas. No collective bargaining.

SF Bay Area, teaching 27 years, make $58K plus $1400 for XC and $3K for frack. Cost of living is insane compared to must states but at least I don't live in Ohio Flagpole.

NOOHIO wrote:

SF Bay Area, teaching 27 years, make $58K plus $1400 for XC and $3K for frack. Cost of living is insane compared to must states but at least I don't live in Ohio Flagpole.

Seems odd since California has the second-highest average teacher salary at over $69,000. -

Private school?