This is the sixth part in a series I’ve been writing this week about the report, How the World’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top, which is an analysis of the world’s school systems to find out why some schools succeed and others do not.
Today, my focus is on the section of the report that examines teacher salaries. Most top-performing school systems pay teachers starting salaries at or above the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) average, as a percentage of GDP per capita. The OECD average is 95 percent of GDP per capita.
The typical range for top performers is between 95 and 99 percent. Top-performing school systems that fall within this range include: Singapore (95 percent), Finland (95 percent), Australia (95 percent), Hong Kong (97 percent), the Netherlands (99 percent). In contrast, the U.S. falls below the OECD average at 81 percent.
South Korea pays teachers starting salaries of 141 percent of GDP per capita, which is much more than is necessary:
Top-performing systems have found that while raising salaries in line with other graduate salaries is important, raising them above the market average for graduates does not lead to substantial further increases in the quality or quantity of applicants.
To attract the best and brightest students to teaching, the top-performing school systems offer salaries comparable to other graduate starting salaries. They use three strategies to afford paying teachers higher starting salaries: 1) spend more, 2) frontload compensation, and 3) increase class size.
1) Spend more:
However, most of the top performers spent less on their school systems than the OECD average—they have found other ways to fund higher starting salaries.
2) Frontload compensation:
Finland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Australia, and England, in effect, frontload their compensation: the starting salaries are good, but relative to other OECD countries, subsequent increases in compensation are small. In Finland, the difference between the average starting salary and the maximum teacher salary is just 18 percent. By paying good starting salaries, Finland attracts strong performers into the profession. Teachers who are committed to teaching stay despite the salary; others who are less committed leave, as their compensation decreases relative to their peers in other professions. Systems which frontload compensation succeed because of two factors: first, salary progression is less important in the decision to become a teacher than starting salary and, secondly, teacher retention is generally not correlated strongly to salary progression.
3) Increase class size:
South Korea and Singapore employ fewer teachers than other systems; in effect, this ensures that they can spend more money on each teacher at an equivalent funding level. Both countries recognize that while class size has relatively little impact on the quality of student outcomes, teacher quality does. South Korea’s student-to-teacher ratio is 30:1, compared to an OECD average of 17:1, enabling it to in effect double teacher salaries while maintaining the same overall funding level as other OECD countries (teacher salaries are the main budget item in any school system budget, typically representing 60-80 percent of spending). Singapore has pursued a similar strategy, but has also frontloaded compensation. This combination enables it to spend less on primary education than almost any OECD country and yet still be able to attract strong candidates into the teaching profession. In addition, because Singapore and South Korea need fewer teachers, they are also in a position to be more selective about who becomes a teacher. This, in turn, increases the status of teaching, making the profession even more attractive.