Mark Anderson had always assumed that teaching at a private
school required a certain tradeoff:
What you gain in smaller
class sizes and better working conditions, he thought, you give up
in salary.
So when he was offered a job three years ago at
Whitfield School, an independent school in west St. Louis County, he
was floored by a salary figure that exceeded what he was making in
the public schools.
"It shocked me," said Anderson, who was
lured to private education from Kansas City public schools with two
years of experience.
Faced with a new economy and a changing
education industry, many private schools here and elsewhere say they
are boosting teacher pay to public school levels and
beyond.
"The news in the industry is that we are quite
quickly becoming more competitive than the public schools on
salaries," said Patrick Bassett, president of Independent Schools
Association of the Central States.
Bassett, who tracks
private schools throughout the Midwest, has a limited amount of hard
data on the trend. Surveys of 200 regional private schools point to
a steady rise in teacher pay in the past several years - including a
6 percent rise this year.
Bassett's latest figures show
Midwest private schools paying an average of $33,365. Public school
average salaries in Missouri and Illinois are still higher. The
National Education Association reports that Missouri public school
teachers earned $34,746 on average in 1998-99, while that figure in
Illinois was $45,569.
Private schools in the St. Louis area
do not disclose their salary levels individually. But several area
heads of schools say they have taken big steps in recent years
toward reaching parity with public schools.
Most add that
they can't stop there.
"I don't want our salaries to match up
with private and public schools," said Mary Burke, who heads the
Whitfield School. "I want them to match with the corporate
world."
Burke foresees a day not far distant when a teacher
with a master's degree could demand and get a $75,000
salary.
That kind of a figure might seem ludicrous today in
most private schools. One time-honored axiom in the industry is that
teachers will work for 25 percent less pay than public educators in
exchange for a more favorable work environment.
Today,
private school administrators say factors such as lower class sizes
remain attractive. But salaries close the deal.
"If you want
to attract good teachers, you need to compensate them," said Thomas
Hoerr, director of New City School in St. Louis.
Hoerr and
others say they have a goal of matching or exceeding public school
salaries.
The situation is different at religious schools in
the area, which have also boosted pay but still trail public
schools. For example, the St. Louis chapter of the Association of
Catholic Elementary Educators is pushing a proposal that would have
them reaching just 80 percent of pay scales at public
schools.
Hoerr and others say the favorable economy and a
teacher shortage could imperil private schools if they do not
respond. Meanwhile, national figures estimate that 25 percent of
private school teachers are older than 50 and approaching
retirement.
Keith Shahan, head of John Burroughs School in
St. Louis, said he fears a steady increase in public school salaries
and wonders if private schools will keep pace. "We are competitive
now, but I'm worried about the future," said Shahan.
In the
past, he said, private school faculties often included teachers who
were independently wealthy or second-wage earners. "Today we have to
pay a living salary," he said. As a result, tuition at Burroughs has
risen from $500 a year in the 1950s, to close to $15,000 today, he
said.
Several St. Louis private schools are forming
compensation committees this fall to fend off possible teacher
shortages. In most cases, the groups are looking not only at
salaries, but also at other incentives to attract new
faculty.
Katherine Betz, who heads Rossman School in St.
Louis, said she is looking at mimicking innovations in the corporate
community. Young teachers might respond to mortgage assistance,
while more experienced teachers might want more set aside for
retirement.
Betz has also increased starting salaries
significantly in the past three years, even though doing so has
required hefty tuition increases. Rossman now pays new teachers
about $29,000 - a figure in line with salaries at several St. Louis
area public school districts.
Competing with public school
salaries for more experienced teachers is more difficult. And many
private school administrators in the area predict they will always
have more success recruiting newer teachers.
Burke said she
tries to compensate for that by buying talent. When she finds young
teachers she likes, she boosts their salaries above public school
levels to encourage them to stay. Public schools can't do that, she
said, since they are governed by a salary scale based mainly on
seniority.
William Handmaker, head of Crossroads School in
St. Louis, said private schools must play to their strengths. His
school is looking at a compensation package that not only boosts
pay, but gives teachers more freedom to travel for conferences and
extra training.
He agrees that salaries must and will
increase. But he said the schools will also remain competitive by
continuing to offer teachers better working conditions, more
involvement in school management and greater independence in the
classroom.
Gavin Kark, who teaches chemistry at Whitfield,
said it's those factors that keep him where he is. He said private
schools must be competitive on salaries, but they need not
necessarily win the race.
"Could I make more? Potentially,"
he said. "But it's the smaller class sizes and the administration
here that makes the
difference."
==========
Average
salaries
Midwest private schools $33,365
Missouri
public schools $34,746
Illinois public schools
$45,569
Sources: Independent Schools Association of the
Central States, National Education Association
To contact
reporter Matt Franck:\E-mail: [email protected] * Phone:
314-209-1247
