Teacher Pay

TEACHER WAGE DIFFERENTIALS

A THROW OF THE DICE?

By Stephen Wilson

 

'Today I got paid 1500 rubles. I thought -'Are you serious?' I pay 2000 rubles for household utility bills. I probably have several variants. Ask the school of art for charity or find means of aid from social networks or turn to help from the Administration of the President,' stated music school teacher Marina Minina from the town of Toropets in Russia who has recently had her hours cut drastically from 29 hours a week at school to just a few hours. She is hardly alone. According to a survey by the Union 'Teacher', school teachers in as many as 60 regions earn less than the minimum wage of 12,130 rubles a month. Their poverty has been compounded by the withdrawal of bonuses as well as stimulus pay. In some regions the pay only amounts to 30% of the minimum wage and can fall to around 5.2 thousand to 7.5 thousand. Although the 'average' salary of a teacher in Russia is estimated at 31,000 rubles this figure conceals more than it really reveals. There are staggering differences between the regions. How much a teacher can be paid depends on which region they are unlucky to find themselves in. It is as if pay seems to depend on the throw of a dice. In the majority of rural regions pay tends to be from between 20-30 thousand rubles a month. In Voronezh school teachers receive 21.7 thousand rubles a month while a teacher in Moscow can be paid 51.6 thousand a month, while a teacher in Saint Petersburg earns 35.1 thousand a month, a teacher in Krasnodar makes 25.9 thousand rubles.  

 

But wage differentials don't simply depend on geographical location. They also can depend on what subject the teacher specializes in. Teachers of Foreign Languages, especially English, tend to earn the highest salaries, followed by teachers of Physical Education, and thirdly Physics teachers. In contrast, teachers of biology, chemistry and Russian earn less.Those pay differences partly reflect the persistent boom in learning English as a foreign language where acquisition of fluency can significantly boost you pay in some Russian companies. One of the results of this boom is an irrational imbalance in the provision of teachers. There are just too many English teachers but not enough Russian or Math. You have  absurd situations where  qualified teachers of math or handicraft are teaching English in schools to primary school children because the pay is better. You even have strange situations where some impostors pretend to be native speakers because they understand a native teacher can ask for higher fees than a Russian or African teacher. Their accent can often betray them. Now I know why so many potential students kept asking me, "Are you really a native speaker?" and "Can you show me your passport?"

 

And sometimes your pay will depend on whether you get on well with the director who can provide you with extra hours or vice versa, cut your hours. Fall out with your director and you can easily end up on the blacklist kept by the Ministry of Education. So how much you are paid can depend on childish caprice and an infantile whim such as, "I won't give you a pay rise or hours because I don't like you'. Falling sick also leads to less pay. During the pandemic an estimated 20% of Russian school teachers have fallen ill.

 

If you ask many Russian school teachers what they earn they can't tell you. That is because their pay varies erratically from month to month. Even if a teacher asked the school administration what their pay is they could not come up with a figure.

 

A school teacher's pay also depends on their social rank. At present this is broadly divided into three categories- a novice teacher, a teacher of the 1st category and a teacher of the highest category. While a teacher in the first category earns 10% more than the average teacher, a teacher in the highest category earns 15% more. The Russian government intends to introduce two more categories such as a methodologist and instructor. The Union 'Teacher' opposes this on the grounds that the money to pay for such newly qualified teachers will be taken from the pockets of other school teachers. It simply reinforces an already unjust pay system. You will be paying Peter by robbing Paul.

 

The Russian government acknowledges that the pay system is unjust and are proposing ways to render it more transparent and consistent. For instance, they aim to introduce an advisor to the school director to ensure extra payments of up to 15,000 rubles are enforced. But many teachers believe that such payments will go into the pockets of those closest to the directors. One of the main reasons for unfair wages is the massive corruption which pervades the whole educational system. The system of payment is not transparent and so many schools have different ways of paying their teachers that one wonders if there exists a system of payment at all! The system of education is full of so much chaotic disorder that a teacher never knows where he or she stands. Given low pay, overwork, rising red tape, testing and larger classes is it any wonder that a recent survey by the Union Teacher found that as many as 75% of school teachers experienced some symptoms of being 'Burnt out' such as chronic fatigue, forgetting things and indifference to their work tasks? It is high time someone gave school teachers a break!