Teachers by the numbers
Editor’s note: This is the sixth and final segment in a multi-part series on the 2009 Illinois Report Card.
Area schools have received their report cards, and the results showed how are students are doing in math, reading, science and writing.
But while the school report cards show the results of how students are performing on standardized tests, they also tell us more about the teachers who are educating our children.
Which schools have teachers with years of experience, and how many schools have numerous teachers with masters’ degrees?
Which teachers and administrators are earning significant salaries, and which are just getting by?
How did your school district’s teachers measure up last spring?
Average years teaching experience
Most of Bureau County’s teachers have been in the classroom for many years. In 11 of the county’s school districts, teachers have been teaching longer than the 12.5 years that are the state’s average. The Neponset School District once again tops the list, with teachers there having an average of 18.6 years of experience. Princeton Elementary comes in second, with an average of 17.5 years, and Bureau Valley’s teachers have an average of 17 years of experience.
On the other end of the spectrum is the Leepertown School District, where teachers have an average of 8.4 years experience.
Years of higher education
Across the state, 55.8 percent of all teachers have obtained a master’s degree, two percentage points higher than last year. That percentage drops in Bureau County, with only two school districts exceeding that percentage. The district with the highest percentage of teachers with master’s degrees is once again Hall High School District, where 69 percent of the teachers have their master’s degrees. Princeton Elementary is the other district to exceed the state average with 60.2 percent.
The district with the lowest percentage is Neponset, where only 5.1 percent of the teachers have a master’s degree. Neponset is followed by Dalzell, where 8 percent of its teachers have earned a master’s degree.
Teachers salaries
Once again, only the teachers at Princeton High School earn more than the state average, with PHS teachers earning an average salary of $68,719, about $7,300 more than the state average. Coming in second is Hall High School, where the teachers earn an average of $54,968.
After those two districts, averages drop below $50,000. The lowest average salary is earned by teachers in the Cherry district, with an average salary of just $32,427, followed by Dalzell, with an average salary of $34,637.
Administrators salaries
Administrators’ salaries also lag behind the state average in every district across Bureau County except for the Princeton High School District, where the average administrator’s salary is $114,308, and the Ladd School District, where Michelle Zeko fills the superintendent and principal positions. Ladd’s average administrator’s salary is $107,378, just above the state average of $106,217.
The lowest average was again found in Dalzell, where the average administrator salary was $45,465.
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