Comment by bsder | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bsder | Hacker News Reader

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Define "hour". Hour in the classroom? Possibly. Assume a 12 week semester and 6 hours per week. Last time I taught a semester, I got about $5,000, so that is nominally $70 per hour.

However, that doesn't count time answering student questions. That doesn't count office hours. That doesn't count making up homework or tests and grading them.

For me, each class I teach is about 40 hours of work per week. If that is your number, then I got paid about $10 per hour. And I would have been better off at McDonalds as I would have gotten benefits for being full-time.

For those of us who like to teach, this is a Catch-22. It is good for students to have teachers who have been in industry--however, the pay is lousy relative to that same industry. At the same time, I would also be providing cheap labor to the university who should be paying someone a reasonable amount of money.

In my case it was hour in the classroom.

It did not account for answering questions by email, it did not account for grading them.

As I wrote below, if a teacher taught 8 hours of a class at 100$ / hr, he would be paid 800$, even if he has to spend 10 extra hours grading a student.

But to be honest they weren't giving that much homework, and only one test at the end of the class. I'd estimate for every 80 hours taught, there might have been only 10-15 extra hours. Which for 100$/hr or 300$/hr is worth it.

40 hours of work per week!? Eight hours a day, five days a week, for every class?

Yes.

I have to prep 2 3 hour lectures per week. Each lecture easily takes 8 hours to prep. 6 assignments--have to make them up, set up automated tests, get things set up in source code control, and help students when things come back wrong if they can't figure it out. A midterm and a final--have to make it up and correct it. Add in office hours as well as replying to students via email and I'm easily at 40 hours per week.

This is why so many teachers just prep once and regurgitate each class (including assignments and tests). It's just sooooo much less time consuming.

Don't feel bad. My poor TA (who was a student in a previous class I taught) was stunned too--"It takes this much time?!?!?! And you did this by yourself for our class?"

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