Fair payment to teacher

BestTeacher said:
I thought about ability.... but i feel like....it gets so silly when one teacher finds out what the other makes and starts feeling contempt and all the silly stuff..
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Gaining knowledge of what other people earn rarely makes anybody happy. Also, salaries get out of whack among people in the same general pay grade for all kinds of stupid reasons. That seems to me like a fundamental management problem in any industry.
 
I can never understand why more experienced teachers cannot charge more.

Eg. An IT person with 10 years of experience will never work for the same amount of money compared to someone who is just starting.

This only happened in the dance 'industry'.

How do you address the problem of teachers becoming pushy and trying to get beginners to take 3-4 lesson a week though ?
 
This thread is really beginning to make me laugh. :rolleyes: I resent the fact that all studio owners are lumped into a know nothing no planning heap!

Renting floor space for me is not an option. I'll be darned if someone ,no matter how good they are is going to come and reap all of the rewards and give me what is unacceptable to them while I keep the walls up around them. If they're good...then they can go do it for themselves! Now if someone wanted to come in and pay their fair share of all of the bills, well that's a different story, but I don't know of any teachers who want to take that risk.

In my area, there just aren't enough competitive dancers who would go way out to the boonies to support a less expensive studio. For that matter, most competitive students come or originate from the social part of dancing. They don't just appear. They are grown and developed...whether it be on their own or a teacher's help. And yes you can have social and competitive in the same school. Where else do the advanced students come from? There isn't a magic screen that goes off separating the social from the competitive students in the beginning stages.

FTR BT your payscale seems reasonable, but that's not necessarily what is going to keep your instructors. I had a graduating payscale, but the teachers wanted something more consistent, so we came up with a solution. Just remember, it's not just money that motivates people. Feeling respected, growth, recognition, freedom, and having a say in the goings on are just a few of the things that go along way too ;)

I just let a guy go last week. He was way too pushy...kind of the old salesmanship dance industry of yesterday. I couldn't trust him, and most of my teachers didn't like him. I gave him a chance to change, but in the end what was best for my teachers and the well-being of the studio was what led me to my decision.
 
I have a suggestion for a pay scale. How about you pay your teacher based on their level of certification. For instance, a Bronze teacher makes $25, Silver teacher makes $30 etc. Each year when you increase your rates that pay rate increases accordingly. Additionally, each week you can offer a volume incentive. A teacher, regardless of level, makes $100 for teaching 20 lessons, so on and so forth. These numbers probably need a little bit of tinkering since I made them up randomly. This way you are able to both recognize expertise and reward volume. It also provides a two pronged incentive to increase levels of certification and teach out lessons.
 
Larinda made a valid point of mimimum Guarantee - some studio provides that for new teachers for at least $300 or $500 weekly salary until the teacher gets enough lessons/students to be fully booked so the hourly rate x weekly hour exceeds the mimimum gaurantee. So I guess within the minimum guarantee period, the studio owner does have the right to ask the new teacher to do whatever work fill up his/her schedule. Totally understand no owners/bosses would like to see employees sitting around gets paid.
 
foxtrotress said:
I have a suggestion for a pay scale. How about you pay your teacher based on their level of certification. For instance, a Bronze teacher makes $25, Silver teacher makes $30 etc. Each year when you increase your rates that pay rate increases accordingly. Additionally, each week you can offer a volume incentive. A teacher, regardless of level, makes $100 for teaching 20 lessons, so on and so forth. These numbers probably need a little bit of tinkering since I made them up randomly. This way you are able to both recognize expertise and reward volume. It also provides a two pronged incentive to increase levels of certification and teach out lessons.
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I think this is quite fair. Pay rate should be in the right proportion of the teachers' achievements, expertise and credentials.
 
Larinda McRaven said:
But that is just it. Studios do not hire DANCERS. They hire TEACHERS.
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This is the difference between a comfortable business, and a home of inspiring dancing.

Not everyone pro aspires to be a "dancer". Not every student aspires to ride the coat tails of a champion. Some people just like to dance during a lesson on a Tuesday at 8 pm. And then come back with their spouse on a Friday night and do a little social dancing until 11 and then go home. There are studios that offer this. LOTS of them. People on this board just mob and complain that they were ripped off by having a know-nothing teacher and they leave. But the studio still exists. It just exists for a different type of clientle.
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Yes, it exists for people who are willing to pay more, for less. Meanwhile people who can't afford that are led to believe that dancing is beyond their means - the sort of options advertised to them are, but that does not mean that all effective learning opportunities are.
 
I would think that, like students, teachers have options (okay, maybe not so many in the boonies) and can shop around for compensation that suits them (and maybe they have other considerations besides monetary...like working for nice people). I would think the market would dictate somewhat in pay. If studio A is paying their teachers $12 and studio B is paying $20, and everything else is the same, why would someone go to Studio A?

I think, aside from what Easy alluded to about studio owners taking the risk (and from what I've been told, the upfront costs to start a studio can be exhorbitant), I'm sure they hope, like everyone else who owns a business, to turn a profit and save for retirement! It would be great for us students if the owners were all in it for charitable purposes, but that's not the reality.
 
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