The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1919-05-12
SHAME OF TEACHERS PAY.
Serious Situation in American Education
Appeal for Better Treatment.


What then have the teachers received
at our hands in return? They haved re-
ceived little of honor and somewhat less
of pay. Other classes have prospered
other classes through powerful organ.
izations have secured generous wages
The teachers have no spokesman, how
ever, to demand even the simple justice
of living wage, so to them we give
their petty prewar pittance so meagre
50 pitifully inadequate. that it places a
burning brand Of shame and disgrace
upon this nation.
The men and women who are making
the Americans of tomorrow are being
treated with less consideration than the
janitors who sweep out the buildings in
which they are employed; they are earn.
ing, on the average, less than the wages
given to the scrubwomen employed in
the public buildings of the United States
government. Normal school graduates
receive less salary than street-sweep'
ers; high school principals and superin'
tendents less than section foremen; eoun-
try school teachers less for instructing
the farmers children than he pays his
hired man to feed his hogs.
In certain town of Illinois, for in
stance, the average wages Of 10 miners
for one month was s2l7, while the aver
age monthly salary of Is teachers in
the same town was $50. In another
town miner, who, by the way, was an
enemy alien, drew more than $1,000 last
year, while the salary OF the high school
principal in the same town was $765,
We welcome with all our hearts the
long belated recognition that is being
given to the man who works with his
hands. We believe that this same work
ingman will be the first to join with us
in asking better pay for those who teach
his children.
No wonder there are $4,000 vacancies
in the teaching forces OF the schools. No
wonder the ranks are being filed with
weak men and with immature women
who merely use the profession as a step
ping stone to something better. No won
der there are 10000 teachers in the
United States who have had no schooling
beyond the eighth grammar grade. Small
wonder, indeed, that 100000 Of ouF
school children are being trained by
teachers, mere boys and girls themselves,
who have had no professional education
whatever.
When we consider that the 10000
teachers of America are paid an average
salary of $500 year; when, moreover,
we consider the fact that living costs
have actually advanced 1903 per cent since
the beginning of the war, thereby cutting
the buying power of those insignificant
salaries in half we can easily determine
that only a fool or martyr would
choose teaching as profession, or would
long remain in it unless these terrible
conditions were swiftly remedied.
The teachers ask no largess at the
hands of fortune. They enter their pro-
fesson for service, not riches. But they
invest years and money in preparation
for their life work, and the knowledge
they gain is shared with others who,
themselves, use it to their own profit.
Teachers, then, by every right and in all
justice, expect a return that will permit
them and their dependents to live de-
Gently and in comfort.
Let each community invest in schools
so that il may thereby invest in trained
manhood and womanhood that can play
their part in the great period of rebuild.
ing and reconstruction that lies before
us, Let each community set for its goal,
as far az practicable, minimum wage
of at least 81 900 year for the teachers
of America This would cost the nation
perhaps as much as we spent so glor-
iously in but one week of the great. war.
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