[HANASHIR:2341] Re: wages

[Ilana Rosansky <rabstud...>]

>Brian,
>
>Is that for real?  Do teachers somewhere get $65 - $100 per
>week for Sunday class?  Is that on this planet?
>
>How much must a year of religious school cost in such a place?
>Does the cost then discourage participation?
>
>                                        Terri

Dear Terri,

Jewish educators' pay varies widely from community to community and from
synagogue to synagogue.  Most likely you are referring to a number for
Sunday morning (in a school where perhaps the teachers don't teaching on a
M-W or T-Th afternoon). The Sunday salary could represent 4 hours of
teaching time.  By and large, in the NY area, teachers are paid
$1,000 for an "annual hour".  That means: if you are teaching 6 hours per
week for anywhere from 30-35 weeks, you would earn $6,000.   Let's take the
conservative estimate of 30 weeks X 6 weekly hours.  That's 180 hours of
work for the year (not counting meetings, preparation, etc...). That's
about $33/hour (before taxes).

Given that the teacher has to be there by 3:00 or 3:30 in many communities,
on weekdays, that limits who is even available to teach.  And that is
before we consider the range of skills one must have to teach Hebrew
language, history, customs, art, music, etc... to (primarily) middle class
children who would rather be anywhere else, in the late afternoon when they
are tired, hungry, interested in some play and socializing, are often
'off-the-wall', frequently miss school in favor of sporting events, rarely
do homework (can you imagine learning language without regular review?),
etc....  Moreover, the average principal really wants to find the
dedicated, talented, and creative teacher who has the knowledge and skills
and is interested (willing?) to deal with late afternoon behavior of
children who really don't want to be part of the enterprise....  Now, how
many people are there who would work late in afternoons and Sunday mornings
under these conditions for so little money?!!!!

Well.. now you have a fuller picture...

Ilana Rosansky


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Ilana (at) oursquare(dot)com


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