Friday, June 5, 2009

Teacher satisfaction: Public vs. private education

This is kind of an old story but I thought it was interesting:

A new study shows that despite a much lower salary, private school teachers are happier than their public school counterparts.

The study was conducted by the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice and utilized the most recent data available from the U.S. Department of Education's Schools and Staffing survey. Christian D'Andrea worked on the study. "As we went through, we found out that public school teachers on average make about 50 percent more [in salary] than private school teachers do," he points out. "

But as far as career satisfaction goes, the private school teachers are much more satisfied with their careers -- and even more satisfied with their salaries, despite the huge disparity in pay." D'Andrea notes private school teachers had to deal with fewer disciplinary problems and threats of violence than did public school teachers. He adds that public school teachers also experienced a higher level of burnout and were unlikely to teach past retirement age. According to D'Andrea, private school teachers are also more satisfied with their jobs because they typically have to contend with fewer bureaucratic restrictions.

Less bureaucratic restrictions....hmmm

You can find this on One News Now

2 comments:

Miss Charlene said...

I have no salary but I bet I am three times happier than a public school teacher! I have the best students in the world, and theyre my babies! :D

Kristel said...

As a public school teacher, I have to say that I am also very happy in my job as well! I taught in a Christian school for five years and now I've done that much again in a public school. I love my students very much and I love my job! Sure, there are days that are hard - but that was true in a Christian school as well. However, I knew unhappy and complaining teachers in both places, although there may be more in the public school. But just so you've heard the other viewpoint, some of us here in public land really do LOVE what we do and who we teach!