Three Salary Ideas Worth Exploring

The “salary chart” based on years of experience virtually guarantees we underpay our best teachers and overpay others. We can’t afford to do either.

So here are three ideas worth exploring:

—Broad salary bands—Create “benchmarks” based on years of experience, but leave a lot of flexibility on either side of that benchmark. So for example, the benchmark for a starting teacher might be 50k, plus or minus 5k, whereas the five year benchmark might be 55k, +/- 5k, the ten year mark 60, +/- 5k, up to the 20 year mark of 70k.

The scale depends on the market and the school’s resources. But I believe we should make it as wide as possible, starting with the lowest salary necessary to secure a young teacher and the highest possible on the back end. When young people join us, they can afford the low wages. But after marriage and kids, our salaries don’t keep pace with their exploding expenses. We lose a lot of talented teachers in their late 20’s, right when they’re hitting their stride!

The wider our scale, the faster we can accelerate salaries. It’s a mistake to raise salaries by focusing on the entry salary, pushing everything up from there. Rather, we should focus on widening step increases.

—Teachers as “Partners”—In law firms, new lawyers are “associates” who receive annual salaries. But after 8 years or so (it varies by firm), if chosen, they can become “partners” (owners, really) who share in the company profits. At year end, the firm distributes its revenue over expense to the partners depending on their “share.” Junior partners own a tinier portion of the firm than senior partners. If they are not chosen to become partners within a certain window, they leave.

How might this work in our schools? Full disclaimer: I’ve never done this. But what if our Council designated a certain number—let’s say, 30K– that if our school had a good year, with revenues exceeding expense by 30k or more, we would “revenue share” that 30k with our “partner” teachers, in addition to their salaries? We would have to set up some rigorous requirements for becoming “partners,” just as law firms do. But it would be a way to incentivize and reward long time teachers.

—More intermediate leadership positions-We typically only have two “levels” of leadership: assistant principals and principals. We may have talented teachers whom we’d like to pay more, but don’t have “positions” that justify the bumps they need for us to do so.

For large schools with multiple classrooms per grade, I like the idea of “lead teachers” for each grade, with extra curricular responsibilities.

I’ve known many small schools, led by beleaguered principals in need of admin help, but without the means to hire an AP. I’ve recommended they segment as K-2, 3-5, 6-8 “units” and then appoint a teacher as “unit leader” for each. They can then give these teachers a substantial bump in salaries for their additional responsibilities.

Five Contrarian Views Concerning Catholic Schools

We have operated our schools with certain assumptions that I believe no longer help us—indeed, holding onto them may even be hurting us. 

Here are a five, with brief comments:

“Our tuitions should be low, consistent with the gospel mandate to protect the least among us.”

A noble sentiment, but we have a competing obligation to pay our teachers a just wage, and if we don’t, we won’t be able to sustain their long term commitment, to the detriment of our mission and our competitiveness. Better to aim our tuitions at mid-market rates and then assist our most vulnerable families with financial aid. 

“Diocesan schools should be very similar, with the same calendar, roughly similar times, the same curriculum, teacher requirements, etc.”

Insisting so only makes our under-resourced schools less competitive—why wouldn’t parents drive a few extra minutes to the school offering the same program with better resources? Instead, we should give these schools a fighting chance by encouraging them to offer unique programs: Why not dual-language? Year round? Classical? Extended day? Diocesan central offices should view themselves as laboratories for innovation, not as regulatory agencies to protect diocesan liability. 

“We should pay our teachers according to a strict pay scale based on degrees and years of experience.”

This virtually guarantees we are under-paying our best teachers and overpaying others. I haven’t used a strict salary scale in twenty years. I use benchmark numbers—for example, I might say 45K for a first year teacher with a B.A., but consider a range of plus or minus five thousand off that benchmark depending on how difficult it is to fill that position and how competitive the candidate or important to the life of the school. 

“Principals should protect and defend our least gifted teachers from our most demanding parents.”

Principals should defend teachers when they are right, not when they’re wrong or because they’re mediocre and need us as advocates. Of course, even our best teachers can be off their game for a while due to difficult circumstances, like a death in the family, an issue in their marriage, or health issues. Those are temporary circumstances and the community will have to trust the principal. But our first obligation as principals is to our kids and families. Often, our parents are rightfully upset about a mediocre teacher. That doesn’t mean we take a public position against that teacher, but behind  the scenes we should give these teachers a specific improvement plan. If they can’t hit those marks, we must let them go, sooner than later. 

“Principals must do what they think best, independent of what parents think or want.”

While it is true that the mission of the school takes precedence over any one’s preferences, a principal who discounts parent preferences leads foolishly. Yes, I understand that parental love can skew objectivity. But I’m not talking here about specific situations involving someone’s child as much as what the parents hope and dream about the school more generally. Do they want us to invest more in our athletic programs? In a fence to protect their kids? Is there a general consensus on a coach or teacher? We must listen to our parents and deliver where we can. “Parents are the primary educators” isn’t just nice talk. It means they are partners with us. 

Improving Salaries!

How can we pay our teachers better and at the same time, make our schools more affordable to  our families? I believe this is the central dilemma facing our schools just about everywhere.

But rather than viewing these as opposing tensions, I believe we can use one to help the other— if we structure our advancement program correctly. 

Here’s how I tried to do that when I was principal of St. Michael in Fairhope, AL:

Whatever our actual total financial aid gifts were each year—after all the dust settled— we listed it as a line item under expense. On the revenue side, we coded tuition as if everyone was paying full freight.

At St. Michael, that aid number was about $600,000, given to 30% of our 350 students.

I also had a line item under income for our annual fund appeal at $250,000. I considered this our "ordinary” philanthropic income and tasked our advancement director to raise this each year.  If we were successful with our annual fund, together with tuition, fees and subsidies, I could offer our teachers modest raises each year. That was our “baseline.” 

But if I wanted to make real headway on salaries—which I believe is THE challenge for our schools—I needed to spend my limited time as school principal on "extraordinary”  philanthropy.  What is the most powerful way to do that? 

I believe it's by asking wealthy Catholic families to give students "the gift of a Catholic education." I have found they're receptive to appeal that if they are convinced the money is going directly to families for this purpose.  

In other words, my aim was to begin to offset the 600K number listed as an expense for financial aid with gifts and scholarships. 

We did that in three ways:

First, we asked older Catholic parishioners to consider becoming  “Guardian Angels” for younger Catholic families, inviting them to “pay the gift of their Catholic education forward.” Every August we would take kids (in uniform) and talk at the end of masses to ask for pledges or a donation to help families. 

The money would go into a “Guardian Angel” fund available for the next year. If parents applied for financial aid, I would give them what I could through the school’s budget. But if they needed more, they went to their pastor, who could then ask me to withdraw GA funds and apply it to their student account. I didn’t spend that money—only the pastors did. 

The pastors appreciated it, because they were able to help their families directly, without tapping into parish money. They were the "good guys," and I was happy with that. It also opened them to us making that appeal each year in their churches. Pastors are rightfully hesitant to see donation dollars leave their parish for other causes! 

Older Catholics responded generously. I didn’t transfer money into a student’s account until I received a thank you from the student  to their anonymous guardian angel, and then I would send that letter to the donor. The donors thus knew their money wasn’t going to an administrative “black hole.” Each year we would receive about 150K in GA donations. When we withdrew money from this account, we would list that "income" in our operations. I never used all of it in a single year, figuring the appeal might become less successful down the line, perhaps with even a long term goal of morphing it into an endowment fund.  When I left the school in 2022, the number had grown to about 300K.  

The second way we offset the financial aid number was through recurring scholarships. For a minimum gift of 25K and a commitment to re-supply the gift to that level each year, we would offer a deserving student a half tuition scholarship named after a loved one (see here: https://stmichaelchs.org/scholarships-to-st-michael). These were roughly 5k each. I would ask the family to restore the fund that by 5K each year, minimum. Or, a family could “endow” a scholarship that paid a 5K scholarship if they made a gift for100K. I placed these gifts in a Catholic foundation account and anticipated a 5% yearly return.

In early May we would host a “scholarship breakfast,” inviting both the donor families, the student and the students’ parents to meet each other. I would say a few words about each scholarship and the person for whom it was named. Hearing those words about a loved one, and meeting the child they were helping in that loved one's name meant a lot to our donors. It also gave the recipient a chance to say thank you face to face!

Finally, we sought legacy gifts aimed at assisting students with financial aid. The largest came from a donor whom I met originally as a Guardian Angel donor. (I wasn't smart enough to understand this when we first started the GA program, but it turned out to give me fantastic “leads” on people who were supportive of our schools,  open to the idea of creating family scholarships and possibly open to a legacy gift.) His gift to us upon his death endowed ten half tuition scholarships each year

Sum total, after six years as a school, we were offsetting the 600k of financial aid with almost 250K of scholarship or GA income each year, which really allowed us to do more for our teachers. Alas, not all of that went to them, as other needs arose. But it helped a great deal!

I don’t presume this “template” works for every school. As the expression goes, “Once you know ONE Catholic school, you know…one Catholic school.” I do think the Guardian Angel appeal could  have traction elsewhere, as the piety of “guardian angels” appeals to an older generation of Catholics, and I believe connects to an altruistic instinct to pass on the gift they have received from their Catholic schooling. 

The fella who endowed the ten scholarships was an older man, in his 80’s, and had difficulty standing. When he called me to his home and told me of his intent to give St. Michael everything he possessed upon his death, I got choked up, and asked him why he was doing that.

I will never forget his response. He rose to his feet, a little wobbly, but with fire in his eyes, and said, “When I went to St. Joseph elementary school, my parents paid the sisters five dollars a month for tuition. When I went to the McGill Institute (high school), they paid the brothers one hundred dollars a year. Those schools changed my life! It’s PAYBACK time!”

In summary: Aim your efforts to raise extraordinary gifts at financial aid. It will give you the best means to pay your teachers more substantially.  

It works! 

My Pre-Prom Letter to Parents

How do we communicate what we know as principal to parents about what teens are doing during their watch without intruding upon their rightful sovereignty, or coming off as paternalistic or preachy? It isn’t easy. What I’ve done is share stories of how other parents in my career have handled similar situations, using both good and bad examples. Here’s a letter I’ve sent to parents about after-Prom parties as an example.

Dear senior parents,

The school prom is a just three Saturdays away—on April 13. The official prom hours are between 7-11 p.m. It’s likely that many students will leave prior to 11, but even if they stay, the million dollar question will be: What will they do next? 

I do not presume to tell you how to handle your children that evening—in my view, that’s a parent’s decision. But part of my job as principal is to be a repository of information,  sharing with you what parents have done in the past. So let me me share three approaches parents have taken: 

The “default”—Kids were on their own. Some students “camped out”  all night on someone’s property, with dates sharing tents. Others rented hotel rooms. Some kids were home by a certain time as their parents instructed. 

The “good”—Three or four families organized a series of progressive “after-parties.” Recognizing their homes could not hold 100 kids at a time, they divided things up, and organized the night in two stages: with 3 “stage one” parties at their homes from 12-1:30, and then a “stage 2” big breakfast from 2–3 a.m. in the school cafeteria for everyone. The parents knew their kids should be home by 3:30. The “pact” the parents made with each other was there would be no drinking allowed at any of these venues. The parents invited everyone in the class so that no seniors were left out. 

The “bad”— Years ago in a previous school, a parent thought it would be OK to host a “small party” for 20 of their child’s “closest friends” at barn on their property, allowing them to drink if they turned in their car keys. But word got out around town, students began arriving from other schools, and soon there were 100+ kids, most of whom the parents didn’t know. Alcohol flowed freely. Propriety and confidentiality prevent me from becoming too specific about all that happened, but crimes were committed, arrests were made, things were posted on social media, parents from our school and other schools were outraged, and I was besieged with angry letters and phone calls. I spent the entire next week dealing with police, calling parents from other schools, and suspending students, with one expulsion.  It was a calamity. 

Please know we are here to support you. I am happy to offer the school cafeteria if three or four families want to host an after prom event. Give me a call to set something up. May God bless you these next few months—graduation is almost here! 

Onward and upward,

Faustin

The Crazy Life We Expect of our Student-Athletes—How High Schools Can Help Them Balance

At 6 a.m. every weekday, the lights to the nearby high school stadium turn on so that basketball players can begin their weightlifting and conditioning. Inquiring, I learned that access to the gym is too precious to waste time on conditioning—there they must run plays and hone their shooting and passing skills.  So on a typical day, a player wakes up at 5 a.m., conditions and weight-trains from 6-7:30, showers up, eats breakfast, attends school from 8:30 to 3:30, goes to practice from 4-6 p.m, comes home, showers, eats, does homework from 7:30 p.m to 9 or 10, then goes to sleep in time to be rested enough for the 5 am —9:30 p.m. gauntlet the next day. 

That’s the “new normal” for high school athletes in big time athletic programs. And on one level, it’s a beautiful, disciplined life for a kid, which keeps him out or her out of trouble. And look, I think there is tremendous value to high school athletics! Students learn to delay gratification, sacrifice for the good of the team, put themselves second, win and lose with grace, and build virtue in so doing. As my football coach in a former school once quipped: “My most important ‘trophies’ are letters from former players, thanking me for their experience, the memories they have, the brotherhood they formed with teammates, the values they learned that made them better husbands, fathers, and employees.” Summarizing, he said. “It’s a lot more important than football.” 

I agree with that!

But on another level, expecting this much from high school kids is greatly worrisome to me, for it demands such allegiance and sacrifice that kids have very little time for anything else.  

I want our student athletes to be competitive. I want our coaches to feel like they have the means to build programs that can win state championships. But I also want our schools to help our kids live balanced lives, where they can branch out into other areas, such as music, or student government, or service clubs, or participate in religious initiatives. I want them to have room in their schedules to take classes that are demanding if they are capable, without ramping down because of their athletic commitments.  I believe students flourish when they are encouraged to become “Renaissance” young men and women, active in many things, the more different, the better.

But am I just adding to their stress by asking them to juggle even more? Possibly! But here’s how I tried to help things stay balanced when I was a high school principal:

1. First, an 8-period schedule was essential. This gave athletes a chance to take weight-lifting and conditioning during the school day as part of their normal schedule. They met in multiple periods. Our coaches would have preferred having them all at once in an “Athletic P.E.,”  but the schedule wouldn’t allow it. However, they realized they could be more efficient rotating through weights —less standing around—with smaller classes.
2. Because of this extra period, I would not allow pre-school practices. Sleep matters, especially over time!
3. I would not allow Sunday practices for any reason. We “Kept holy the Sabbath” which allowed everyone, including our families, a chance to recharge.
4. All students were required to take two years of the Arts. Most of our athletes were in choir—some opted for a third and fourth year because they enjoyed it. Some even took band (see pic). This requirement helped bring some healthy variety to their lives.
5. We built “club time” into our weekly schedule, 25 minutes every Thursday, so that participation in other clubs was possible for our athletes and others with after school commitments.
6. Tutorials for classes were everyday after school, Monday through Thursday, 3:15-3:45. The teachers went from 7:30-4 p.m.  No practices could begin until 4 p.m. so that student-athletes could attend them. No tutorials on Fridays. 
7. The school day was a bit longer to fit everything in: 7:45 to 3:10 M—Th and  7:45-2:45 on Fridays.  Everyone, including teachers,  could leave 30 minutes earlier on Friday.  It felt like a “bonus” each week!
8. For students taking three or more A.P. classes in their senior year,  I assigned them one period a day, no more than two students at a time, to another teacher, where they could work quietly in the back of the class, while the teacher taught other students. This “study period” incentivized A.P. enrollments, gave our kids extra  time for homework, and didn’t cost us another teaching unit to host a study hall. (It also helped me create a working master schedule, as these periods could land anywhere on a student’s schedule, which helped since seniors taking A.P, classes had so many singletons in their schedule.)

These practices helped our student-athletes live less crazy lives. I’m including our bell schedule to show how it all fit together. Was it perfect? No! But it helped.