Try to verify the figure with the teachers' unions here. They claim they don't keep track...

And, the kids are being sent to private schools on teachers' salaries, which has to be a major commitment for the parents.

Regardless of all the criticism of Public School Teachers, it's nice to know that they aren't total fools.

Michael
It could mean they are overpaid, couldn't it?

h-man:

On average, yes, public school teachers are overpaid for their part-time, semi-skilled labor.

The ones who go the extra mile tend to be very underpaid relative to their contributions.

There was some talk a few years ago that teachers should be paid like experienced engineers. I asked a teacher acquaintance (who was touting this) what would happen to all the current teachers who'd be out of jobs, since at six-figure salaries most would be crowded out by people with better qualifications. I got angry silence. It's too bad. As Michael says, the best are underpaid, because the worst get the same pay. Unions will fight real pay-for-performance with their dying breaths.

I belong to my children's school's PTA. It is a private, Catholic school. On our board are 2 public school teachers. They often tell us about all the wonderful programs and resources available to the teachers and students in the public schools that we simply do not have the money for anything comparable.

When I'm tempted to look into the public system, I just remember these teachers send their kids to private school.

When I was in Catholic school, a classmate's mother was the principal of the local public high school. I did think it was strange at the time. In fact, this was the mother of that OU quarterback from a few years ago. Dreupal...Heupal, or something?

Urban public school teachers send their children to non-urban or non-public schools. In our city, the teachers either use parochials and charters or they live just over the city line.
If you were to put pins in a map showing where the teachers who are parents of school-age children, you would form a donut.
To send one's children to public school in the city is to subject them to distraction, harasment and assault from other students and at best neglect and at worst politically correct, multicultural indoctrination from the school.
It is quite bad. Our Social Studies curriculum is heavily skewed toward teaching the greatness of ancient Egypt, (which seems to be rooted in a Shockleyite delusion concerning the ethnicity of the ancient Egyptians), and the cortributions and accomplishments of Islamic culture. Would anybone subject his or her children to this if they had the choice?
It's time to crush the infamous thing,I say.

I suspect that Lou is right. Ask Mr. Bonsteel and Mr. Doyle what proportion of the remaining 75.5 per cent are sending their children to *suburban* public schools.

I feel that teachers' salaries should be based on their personal performance. A first-year AM kindergarden teacher who helps children glue uncooked macaroni to paper is not at all in comparison to a 1st grade teacher showing these kids how to read and write for the first time in their lives. Teachers are the absolute basis and foundation of everything. Doctors wouldn't be able to save lives if someone didn't teach them how, police wouldn't be able to due their duties unless trained by some sort of professional, the list could go on. Even though yes, on average,an elementary school teacher works from 9-3 only 9 months out of the year, there is still plenty to be done before and after that time frame. I know this for a fact because my mother is a teacher and she leaves the house every morning at 7:30 and usually doesn't return until 5 or 6, and still has grading to do and lessons to plan until the wee hours of the night. "Summer vacation" is always spent going to workshops and trying to improve the ciriculum for the upcoming school year. So the issue can be set back and fourth, and I agree on their wages being too high and too low; it all depends on the particular teacher. Many of them are the start of every child's future, and I feel that is undoubtedly priceless.