Teachers' salaries

Press, 29 January 1986, Page 16

Teachers' salaries

Sir, —I am heartened by the assurance of the Minister of Education that any decision on the salary claim of secondary school teachers will take into account the positions of other comparable groups. It is scandalous that all secondary teachers, even those in subjects where there is no recruitment or retention problem, should be paid more than primary teachers of the same levels of qualifications and service. The job is no more difficult, and certainly no more important; and if kindergarten teachers could be given three-year training and a larger age group to deal with, a single

salary scale could serve all three. I would have thought that < secondary teachers would appreciate the importance of attract-

ing a proper proportion of our most able young people into kindergarten and primary teaching, rather than perpetuating the dangerous myth that the younger the learner the less should be the teacher’s pay.—Yours, etc.,

STAN L. JELLEY. January 27, 1986.