Dan Genz, The Examiner
2008-06-23 07:00:00.0
Current rank: Not ranked

WASHINGTON -

A year ago, there were four Montgomery County teachers earning more than $100,000. This year, the number soared to 145. Next year, there will be more.

There is a small, but growing number of teachers in the Washington area who are pushing past the six-figure salary threshold and paving a little-known path for their peers to follow.

Since the first few made it past the $100,000 mark a few years ago, the number of such high-paid educators has quickly climbed and now includes teachers in at least five area school systems.

The $100,000 teacher has long been a reality in other parts of the country — such as the New York and Connecticut suburbs — where the cost of living is high, but it is only now becoming attainable locally.

In the school year that just ended, 14 teachers in Prince William County, 12 in Arlington County, six in Fairfax County and one in Manassas Park earned more than $100,000.

Educators chalk it up to blistering competition among school systems and teachers moving toward longer schedules and assuming extra administrative tasks.

Fast-growing school systems forced to hire hundreds of teachers annually compete for entry-level talent in costly battles that eventually drive up compensation for everyone, including the longest-tenured and highest-paid teachers.

“We do the best we can for the teachers, but I don’t think it’s the very top end where most of the attention is,” said Kate Harrison, a spokeswoman for Montgomery County Public Schools. “Teachers who make that much money are teachers who have been working a long time.”

And they often work overtime. No one on most local salary scales can make $100,000 without extended schedules.

Woodbridge High School family and consumer sciences teacher Pamela Emert picked up an extra class on top of her duties as department head and sponsored two student organizations.

“You have to be in it for the children. You can’t be in it for the salary,” she said.

That used to be how teachers would explain away the low salaries, not the high paychecks.

Montgomery County spending critic Robin Ficker, a former Maryland state delegate, said he supports paying effective, experienced teachers $100,000 as long as schools move to eliminate what he called extra layers of administration.

“I have a real problem with all these administrators who are being paid over $100,000 for what should be an eight-and-a-half-month job,” Ficker said.

But as salaries rise, one concern is the toll on the allure of administration jobs, said Loudoun County schools spokesman Wayde Byard. It takes away the incentive teachers have to move into the traditionally higher-paying jobs as school principals and supervisors.

The highest-paid teachers in the District, Manassas City and Loudoun County do not make more than $100,000, according to public information requests from The Examiner.

Fewer than 100 teachers in Prince George’s County now make more than $100,000, all on 12-month schedules, spokeswoman Tanzi West said. The school system did not provide a report of its teachers’ salaries by press time. Alexandria also did not reply to requests for information by press time.

“We ought to have a lot more teachers making that level, and we’d get a lot more teachers into education,” said Joe McElfish, a Manassas Park health and physical education teacher entering his 37th and last year in the profession. “After you’ve done it for 30-some years, teaching doesn’t look so bad. It’s those years when you’ve been doing it for five or 10 years, you’ve got the long hours and you’re raising a family, when teaching looks real tough.”

dgenz@dcexaminer.com