BY JACOB SZETO
PORTLAND – A recent Oregon Capitol News analysis of Portland Public School (PPS) district employee compensations shows that almost one in five school district employees received total compensation topping six figures in the 2009-2010 school year.
One thousand and thirty one of the 5,432 PPS employees earned over $100,000 with total compensation including base pay, pension, healthcare, social security and several other smaller benefits.
Among the six figure earners were 287 classified by Oregon Capitol News as administrative staff, 744 classified as teachers and zero classified as service staff. Of the 287 administrative staff, most were principals, 40 were counselors and 87 were support staff.
Although there were almost three times as many teachers earning six figures as administrative staff, it was representative of the total population. The administrative staff on average earned more. Principals and support staff averaged $125,800 and $126,700 respectively while teachers and counselors averaged about $20,000 less at $104,200 and $106,800 respectively.
Even if an employee wasn’t in the top 20th percentile of income earners, they still could expect averages of $73,800 if they were an administrator and $74,500 if they were an educator.
The average of all service, administrative and educator class employees was $64,600 and was anchored by the 689 service staff who on average earned much less at $45,500.
Annual compensation for all PPS employees totaled $380 million in 2009-2010. Base pay made up 69% of that while the other 31% included benefits such as medical insurance and pensions. To put this in another way, benefits equaled 45% of base pay.
For a district at roughly a forty two thousand student enrollment level, the district spent $9,025.86 per student for staff compensation.
The compensation database was obtained by Oregon Capitol News through a public records request and shows a line by line compensation of every employee in the district, including base pay, medical benefits and pension benefits.
Some of the benefits compensation was calculated using formulas provided by the district if data was not provided.
The database can be found at GovDocs and allows you to search by several different categories including title, department and name.
Hmm, which part of this are you trying to get people worked up about? The 6-figure quote seems misleading, since you’re including the costs of healthcare and benefits paid by the district. Using your 69% number above, sounds like the upper 20% of PPS employees make an annual salary of $69K+. Doesn’t sound so unreasonable to me, though it sure seems like you’re trying to anger people about all the “rich” teachers and administrators in the district.
If it’s just the total compensation number you’re upset about, or the per-student spending, how about some comparisons with similar metropolitan areas? I don’t doubt there are inefficiencies there, but where are they?
Total compensation is the appropriate comparison since the extra benefits relieve the receipient of the cost of providing for themselves such services. And at $100k and above, you approach more than twice the compensation of comparable private sector educators. This is why this May’s Portland school bond measure should receive a collective no from Portlanders. The school construction money relieves the District from having to draw on existing funds to do regular maintenance, allowing it to effectively transfer a portion of the school modernization tax increase to already inflated Teacher and Administrator salaries.
This seems a pretty “values free,” factual report on what taxpayers are paying for the results they are receiving from Portland Public Schools.
Comparing compensation with private school employees is apples to oranges, they typically have less training and typically don’t have to deal with as many special needs children. Are there comparable public school districts out there doing more with less? Where are they and what can we learn from them?
The Oregonian reported that the Portland Metro Area spends slightly over $9,525 per student and has a graduation rate of about 66%. Washington metro areas spends $9,075 per student and has a graduation rate greater than 73%. Seems like we need to reduce costs to increase our graduation rate.
well, for 192 days of work ?
and the results ? bottom in the nation ..
and several other states spend 8,000 ish per student and have 80% graduation rates .
So we spend too much and get too little, so spend less? Sounds like a plan from someone who flunked out of B-school. If the numbers above from Leonard are correct, let’s look at Washington and see what we can learn. How do their demographics compare? Where are they spending less than we are? Teacher/admin compensation? Building maintenance? Where are they spending more?
Norbert:
As John Fairplay noted, simply stating the compensation levels in the way the article does does not imply trying to get anyone “worked up”, tho you seem to be.
Are you objecting to having the data made public?
Altho the public sector does have the obligation to deal with special-needs that private schools can avoid, you are wrong that private-sector teachers are inherently less qualified.
The question is whether we get “value” for the money spent on education, most of which is spent on labor. Do we need all those administrators? Would we have as many well-qualified teachers as we have if compensation were less?
Those are questions that are open to debate.
I’m not worked up, and I have no stake in this game other than personal interest. I don’t doubt that we can get better returns on our public education spending, but in order to do so we need in depth analysis, not just number quoting and demands that we spend less. Find the fat and cut it, but do so in a targeted manner.
Norbert, in what other industry can you receive 100K in salary and benefits, all paid for by private sector money, and get four months off per/year, while being mediocre?
Looks like it is time to quite my job and either work for Portland Public schools or as a Trimet busdriver.
Isn’t it great to see these government agencies bleeding Oregonians dry?!
Norbert, thank you for your nice responses- I agree and appreciate your thoughtful ideas. For some others- teachers don’t get 4 months off- and it’s not a 40 hour work week. For those who don’t know- don’t claim to make it an easy answer- and if you think you do know how easy (and rich) teachers and public employees have it- why don’t you do a job shadow and challenge yourself. Dan, I’m personally glad someone who is not a critical thinker is not in the education field.
Norbert, most instances I know of children in private schools result from an inability to get what they need in public schools. These are the children with special needs. Often, the public schools are not good with these children.
The public schools can be good for bright, motivated students who want to do science and math. Other schools cannot easily match the facilities public schools have, at least in some neighborhoods, in these subjects.
For other children, such as children with dyslexia, public school can be a disaster.
In many instances, modest-income families pay huge amounts for schooling, relative to their incomes, in addition to the taxes they pay to support those who use public schools.
Some parents also give up if their children suffer in public schools and arrange to do home schooling.
The often-repeated lament by public school apologists that they “have” to take children with special needs is too often reflected by a sullen attitude toward children with special needs and a tense relationship between school officials and parents and kids. I find it sad that some sites let this martyr syndrome go unchallenged. I am reminded of the sign at the Country Fair for parking by alter-abled. There are strengths in the children PPS “has” to take.
I’m a little late on this conversation, but I cannot believe what you wrote Mary. I have never heard anything like this before. I am a PPS teacher and I LOVE my special ed. students just as much as I love all my other students.
Here’s the argument that all private sector people make in order to pay their CEO’s millions and millions of dollars every year: in order to get the best, we need to pay top dollar. Well, if they’re allowed to make that argument in the private sector, why are you not in the public sector?
I’m not saying I want more money. All I’m saying is, why would a GOOD teacher move to a charter or private school where they get less money and less job security via their union? The answer: they wouldn’t. I know many of these teachers, and they’re all young, inexperienced teachers who weren’t able to get other jobs. Now I’m not saying young teachers are bad either (I’m one of them), but I was able to get a job. I’m just saying, there are many who weren’t able to get jobs in public schools, and this is where everyone wants jobs. The only people applying to private and charter schools are teachers who are desperate.
I think this whole thing about teachers being rich is ridiculous. When I was going into the profession, everyone was telling me that I was a saint because no one goes into teaching for the money. Now that the corporate media has decided that they want to attack us to take everyone else’s minds off of who put us in this depression, you’re actually going to believe them? We didn’t have anything to do with derivatives or people hording money and not investing it into the economy.
Here’s my financial situation:
I’m paid $45,000 a year.
I have over $30,000 in student loans.
I have $10,000 in credit card debt, mostly from school.
Oh yeah, and I have a master’s degree. Name another profession besides a social worker (which is another public profession under attack) that makes less with a master’s. There is none. When we’re getting compared to the private sector, we’re not getting compared to people of equal education, unless it’s against private school teachers, who I’ve already talked about being less experience and less desired.
Conclusion: I’m not saying we want more money. Sure, cost of living increases would be nice as this is rising quickly, but you know what, we just ratified our contract with none of these. We’re not trying to get rich! We’re just trying to do one of the toughest jobs in the world that we love. Leave our salaries alone and let us teach your children in peace. Stop making up facts (e.g. We’re in the bottom of the United States, public school teachers don’t want to work with special education students, we’re rich) and let us continue to do our best with the limited resources that we currently have. And if you can’t do that, come and be a teacher for a year. There’s a reason that half of all teachers leave after 3 years. It’s extremely hard and it DOESN’T PAY MUCH! But for those of us who remain, it’s an extremely rewarding job and we wouldn’t want to do anything else.
Kyle,
I have 25 years experience as a mover. My income is under $30,000.00 per year. My annual costs are higher. I have donated 20% of my time to help those around me who have come into hard times. Yet, I have no health insurance and no complaints.
Getting rich is not the object: It’s learning and helping others. The most difficult piece in the discussion of Public Union salaries and benefit’s is that they seem unhappy to accept their chosen field and pay.
It seemed obvious to me at a young age that if you want to work 70 hours per week in the private sector, for years, that some day you will *work* your way to the top. This pursuit of money, not to be confused with happiness, is a trade of of sacrifice and choices. Sell you soul or give it away.
The only profession that guarantees more money for more ‘education’.The quality of teaching,the subject matter,the methods used-no,just more and more ‘education’.It’s time for the taxpayers to wake-up and defund this criminal enterprise.Does anyone really believe ‘It’s all for the children?’ So let’s stop with the socialist agenda and return to reading,writing and ‘rithmatic.Taxpayers are being cheated as we speak;most of us are too ignorant to do anything about it.Vote and DEMAND school choice and support good private schools-get the unions out of OUR schools!