I understand that quality early childhood education is the key to a promising future and teacher salaries should be based on their educational background (degrees) to a certain degree.
I have worked with many people that have Associates, Bachelors, and Master degrees that are excellent at teaching, but others who lack the true passion and teaching ability and are not as deserving of a higher salary than those who may only have a High School Diploma or CDA. They tend to be more "book smart", but lack the true understanding of a child's social, emotional, physical, and educational well-being.
I myself learned later in life that I wanted to work with young children. I had gone to a trade school be be an esthetician (spa technician), but found while working in the industry that it was not the best fit for me. I was then offered a position as a Youth Services Assistant at a library. Here I performed storytimes, created programming, bibliographies, helped patrons find books and do research without an MLIS. This was when I found my passion for working with young children.
I went back to school and received a Certificate in Early Childhood Education and also received my CDA Credential. I began working in daycare and found that many of the teachers lacked a true love of the profession and many did not have any wanting to make ECE their career.They had degrees in other fields and just fell "into the profession".
It is so ridiculous to say a person who has a high school diploma is not as qualified as someone with a Masters Degree to work in a daycare center as a lead teacher. Many people have life experience that lends to the richness and culture of the learning environment. They have wonderful ideas and put their plans into action, whereas someone with a Masters may feel more entitled and slack off on their work just because of their degree. In this respect, I would pay the person with the high school diploma a similar wage due to their eagerness and intelligence working with children.
It is hard to make a blanked statement that life experience, hard work, and passion cannot lead to a quality teacher. Just ask some of the richest men and women in the world who formed businesses with only a high school diploma such as Bill Gates this. I'm sure he would say something quite similar. Book smarts do not equal putting teaching skills into use.
I myself would love to work in a school district, but unfortunately do not have the correct degree to do so at this time. Many people have acknowledged my teaching ability and say that I would make a great Kindergarten, 1st, or 2nd grade teacher due to my hard work and diligence.
I also create curriculum on TeacherspayTeachers.com for toddlers to second graders and have gotten many compliments on my work.
Thankfully, some school districts will allow me to work as a teacher's aide in these grades and that is an absolute joy. They understand that due to the economy and need to work that many people can not afford to go back to school for a higher education at this time.
I salute these school districts and hope one day that talent and innate ability in working with the children will lead to a change in our school systems around the country.
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Jennifer United States
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-21-2019 12:30 PM
From: Diana Hurst
Subject: Salary
It is sad that the compensation for Early Childhood professionals is still so low. As a new teacher back in the early 90's with a combination of elementary course work as well as early childhood, I was able to begin with a salary commensurate with the other teachers in a public school setting. However, for some reason, there is a notion that anyone with any BS degree can teach in Early Childhood.
Still one of the biggest hurdles in Early Childhood is that trilemma of quality, compensation and affordability. Here in Kansas, some of us have been looking at what a livable wage should be. In Kansas for an individual (no children) it would be about $24,000 a year. Teachers at the entry level with their BS in public school settings make about $42,000 a year, with a masters about $49,000 and with a doctorate about #57,000. While even these salaries seem a bit low, our early childhood professionals with the same degree levels should be making at least these amounts. Given this information, our teachers with CDA credentials should be making about $29,000 a year and with a two year, AS degree about $35,000. To say the least, this is not happening.
One thing that needs to change is the notion that anyone with a HS diploma can take care of and educate young children. In the private sector, to try to maintain affordability, warm and breathing seems to pass for quality. Yes, a qualified babysitter can take care of one or two children for brief amounts of time, but parents don't realize what is happening in child care centers with unqualified persons. Classrooms can look more like a scene from The Lord of the Flies.
I think as preschools become attached to public schools, they will require a teacher with a Bachelor's degree and salaries will be commensurate. I just hope it will be early childhood qualified professionals at the Bachelor's level and not just anyone with any education degree.
Personally, I would like to see universal Head Start and Early Head Start for all children with qualified professionals in all classrooms. I do think there could be a sliding scale for tuition based on family salaries. That would create more equitable classrooms, too, when having children together from all cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds.
Given that so many of our early childhood settings are in private for profit settings, I do think that licensure/certification should follow the teachers in early childhood just as they do for other educators rather than just or in addition to the settings. In our area, much is given to businesses and industry in the form of TIF (Tax Increment Financing). TIF causes border wars between Missouri and Kansas where businesses are constantly moving back and forth to gain tax advantages. Recently Sly James (the outgoing major of Kansas City) tried to pass a bill for Early Childhood Education with a regressive tax on constituents. Needless to say, it didn't pass. What I would rather see, rather than TIF, are districts being set up around businesses and even farming communities that take into account all the childcare centers in their areas. Businesses and communities would then be designated to make a certain amount of charitable contributions (tax free or tax deductible) to the centers in their areas; but only when the centers are hiring highly qualified Early Childhood educators. It should be at least CDA credentialing at the teacher aid/floater levels, AS/two year degree teachers at the lead teacher levels and bachelors and up at the coordinating teacher/director levels. These tax incentives should follow the amount of contributions made to Early Childhood Care and Education.
With hope for the future,
Diana
Diana Hurst
MA Curriculum & Instruction: K-12 w/emphasis in Early Childhood Education
Professor, Early Childhood Education
Johnson County Community College
12345 College Boulevard
Box 36
Overland Park, Kansas 66212
Office: CLB 434
913.469.8500 ext 3492
Everyone knows that the mind will not be kept from contemplating what it loves. -Mary Astell
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Original Message------
Starting salary for a teacher with a B.A. degree in ECE?
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Peter Tedtaotao
Director
ST PHILOMENA EARLY LEARNING CENTER
Honolulu HI
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