The Waterbury Democrat., 1938-10-28

mhEu~BgNUBA AGAoADkb
 The average salary of hlgh- school teachers in Waterbury IS 18th in rank among the SG cities both in mean and In medlan salary. This is only slightly above the average but places the city in a fairly favorable position.
 Jamltors
 Janitor salaries In your city are 2Srd in rank in both mean and median salaries. Low salaries for the janitorial staff, as in other branches of the school service, will tend in the long run to dis- courage ambitious and able men from seeking such positions when they can be paid more elsewhere.
 Principals
 Another group of workers, few numbers but of crucial import ance in developing the program of education, consists of the school principals. It has well been said that the principal sets the tone of the school; 1t is essential that the men and women who are attracted to the principalship be persons of high professional competence, who are possessed of qualities of lead- ersfip. Industry and other branches of public service are willing to pay high salaries for such qualifications. Boards of edu- cation cannot hope or wish to rival industry in paying the ex- tremely high salaries which make luxurious living possible. But they can, by wise salary scheduling, of- fer the promise of Q truly profess sionai standard of living to the leaders among the educational staff.
 1t is unfortunate that the salaries of principals in Water bury are low as compared with other cities in your section of the country. Supervising elementary schools principals, with their rnedlan salary of S277b, are re ceiying less than is paid in such positions in 22 of the group of cities being studied. High-school principals are 50 few in number that average salaries for separate cities would have little mean. ing. But for the 34 cities taken as Q whole, the me- dian salary of high-school prin- cipais in 1897 was s4e33, nearly seven hundred dollars above the S4lb0 which the three high-school principals in Waterbury were re. ceiving. Fourteen high-school principals in this group of cities were receiving salaries above Sb500.
 Maximum Salaries Scheduled for Teachers in Waterbury gre Tsea- s0nable as Compared with Other
 School Systems
 It is important not merely that the average salary of school efn. ployes be attractive: 1t iS of equal or even greater importance that opportunity be given for progress toward q satisfactdry maximum. Those who have studied school cd. minlstration most carefully agree that it is desirable to provide c DtkAtb VI Htbuluk HiShSAHStitD WI c fairly long period of years, reaching eventually . maximum salary which makes 1t possible for the mature teacher to maintain c dignIfied standard of living. A good salary schedule should serve to attract and retain competent people for the school service.
 You are fortunate, in Water. bury. in having c salary schedule which provides reasonably at- tractiVe 1laxi m nm salaries Thirty-onc of the other cities in the groups used for comparisons gave US information regarding their basic salary schedules in i030 -37. We find that Waterbury in close to c middle position on maximum salaries of high.school teachers and on salaries Of teach. CTS in the lower elementary grades. Your schedule for eighth. grade teachers however, is much lower than is typical for seventh and elghth.grade teachers in other cities. many Of which include these grades in the jun!or-high school.
 The table which follows, Table c, shows that Waterbury ranks 18th in maximum salaries scheds uied for the lower elementary grades. For salaries Of eighth grade teachers the rank of Wa terbury' is 18th for women and 2Bth for men. The maximum high- school salaries in Waterbury are 18th from the top, both for woe men and men.
 Tn the comparisons on salaries that we are making we have not considered many important queB- tons regarding the structure of your salary schedule. Educational research and experience have developed Q number of principles of salary scheduling since your basic schedule was drafted in 1920. For example. to mention only one, there is q strong tendency to ad- just amounts of salary to fecog- nize differences in levels of pros fesslonal training attained by various teachers and to place less emphasis on differences between school divisions such as eIe- fnentary and secondary. I venture to predict that sometime within the next few years your Board of Education, like many others thru- out the country, will review care- fully the provisions and the ade- quacy of your whole salary schedule, giving particular at- tention to those features which will offer incentives to profess ionai growth. It should Dc . source of pride to your community that 50 many members Of the teaching staff have shown the professional