Teachers' job satisfaction jumped in the last decade, a survey found.
But while suburban teachers have grown more cheerful about the quality of education in public schools, urban teachers have grown more worried. They cite violence, drugs, teen pregnancy and diminishing public support as their main worries, the Louis Harris and Associates survey released Wednesday found.Urban teachers also were less pleased with their schools' curriculums and academic standards than suburban teachers. That could indicate "a slow, steady dangerous drift toward inequality" between city and suburban schools, said Sibyl Jacobson, a vice president for Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., which financed the survey.
Overall, the survey found teachers like their jobs more today than a decade ago and are more likely to recommend the profession to others.
In addition, teachers are nearly twice as likely now than in 1985 to say their jobs pay them a decent salary, the poll found. And more teachers felt they were recognized when they had performed well.
"There is a real, objective basis for these findings, and that is the rise in teacher salaries and the restructuring many schools have undertaken," said Linda Darling-Hammond, a researcher at Columbia Teachers College in New York.
The survey, done annually since 1984 for MetLife, also was sponsored this year by the Education Commission of the States, a Denver-based group financed by state governments.
A random sample of 1,011 public school teachers were interviewed by telephone nationwide over the summer. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus five percentage points.
The survey found 54 percent of teachers very satisfied with teaching as a career, compared with 44 percent in 1985. Two-thirds said they would recommend the career to young people.
Seventeen percent agreed strongly that their jobs allow them to earn decent salaries, and 46 percent agreed somewhat. That was up from 8 percent and 29 percent, respectively, a decade ago.
Teachers' salaries steadily rose throughout that period before leveling off in the last few years, Darling-Hammond noted. The average public teacher salary nationwide last school year was $36,744, a recent teachers union survey found.
In addition, many schools have undertaken reforms that give teachers more decision-making power, Darling-Hammond and others noted.