I have 2 x sons who graduated in Engineering 16 years ago - OPs experiences are different from their current experience & salaries .
One is a Chartered Engineer whilst the other is a Senior Engineering Manager - they both earn north of £200K. In fact one is taking on 6 x trainees, just out of Uni, they start on £36K + Bonus (5-30%) with excellent prospects for the right attitude to work. An engineer (ie not a team leader / manager!) with 15 yrs experience is on £90-£100K + bonus (10-50%)
In my working days as a graduate from the 60s I earned a max of £84K aged 56, typically £60-£65K over my last 10 years before I retired 8 years ago. So to me Engineering is what I should have done. 8 doors up and down my street we have another 6 x newish / about to graduate engineeering students (Chem/Mech & Electrical) and they all seem to be picking up a job right away!
Wow, Falkirk Bairn, both you and your two engineering sons have indeed done very well relative to the typical average remunerations earned throughout the UK by professional engineers in most disciplines. It must be that you have all worked in the OIL or Pharma or Aero/Marine Insurance Industries since only those industries can afford to pay such generous salaries due to the rich resources and financially bouyant nature of the business they conduct. The bonus payments you quote are also unusual in my experience and in many parts of the design engineering industries - bonus payments were unheard of. In my career as a Telecommunications Design Engineer and Programme Manager, it was only many years after leaving design and moving into OFTEL in a regulatory advisory role that I learned that some of my old work colleagues, who had moved from design into 'Marketing and Sales, were enjoying similar salaries to the senior design staff but were also receiving very generous bonus payments as 'commissions on sales' of what we had designed for them - equal to up to a half or more of their basic salaries!
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Hello All, very interesting thread. Philosophical in many ways. If we knew what was round the corner we would not turn it-or are we fated too? I do agree that in construction now we get quite a few 'Engineers' and 'Managers' who have never engineered nor managed anything but the title is better than a wage rise for some wannabees. I left school in 1964 and served an apprenticeship, which included night school then thankfully in 1966 day release which saved 2 nights at college. Better in my opinion than a degree because of the diverse training actually on the job and the personal development of working with experienced men. That early experience counted heavily in my favour in later years. I remember a particular manager who managed the testing and development house. This man had been there, done that and wrote the book. He was rightly revered in the company and beyond. He had a favourite saying to young graduates, wet behind the ears and nursing their first disappointment when their project failed. " Never mind lad, just because you're clever doesn't stop you doing something foolish". It is sad that 'Engineer' seems to have been added to the title of almost every discipline know to man. Refuse Disposal Engineer or Dustman to you and I ( no offence to dustmen, valuable job in society) but it just demonstrates the way the title has been diminished. However what is in a name or title if you are paid your worth, that is the important part. At least I did enjoy the vast majority of my working life, but I did work with real engineers and managers. Cheers. Concrete
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I find it odd that you group teachers with engineers.
Engineers/technicians/mechanics are the people who work, and make things work. They are educated, then expected to start learning proper when the education is finished. In truth good engineers never stop learning. They are judged by, and often rewarded by their performance, so are most other professions, however, teachers (and civil servants) reign with seeming impunity. Getting rid of a poor teacher (or civil servant) is akin to getting rid of herpes. The only downside of teachers leaving the profession, is that on the whole, their replacements are just as bad. The qualifications they bandy around are thrown at them, it's difficult to avoid getting qualifications.
I was recently on a module of an MSc course, in an engineering discipline, and many of the candidates didn't know what e was or how logs functioned, some were destined for the teaching profession.
As an engineer, I would not like to be thought of as a teacher equivalent.
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Ordo,
The teachers would dearly love to impart knowledge of e or logs. The problem is the league tables by which they're judged and the exams that drive the tables.
And then of course the here today/gone tomorrow politicos who drive the agrenda for both teachers and civil servants.
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Ordo,
The teachers would dearly love to impart knowledge of e or logs. The problem is the league tables by which they're judged and the exams that drive the tables.
And then of course the here today/gone tomorrow politicos who drive the agrenda for both teachers and civil servants.
Well the fog is now clearing to reveal - the most recent advertising campaign on the internet that is being 'pushed' at us as we browse - namely the one that invites the reader to 'guess' how much a Teacher can expect to get as a starting salary. The answer is given as from £21,000 to £27,000 for starting positions 'In England' where the exact salary depends on the type of school (primary or secondary), the subject specialism (an additional premium is generally paid for maths and the sciences), and of course the geographical location with a rapid rise towards a £27,000 (minimum for any subject) for teachers based and teaching in Inner London, and proportionally less for Outer London and/or similar 'Fringe Areas' all around the country of course.
In stark contrast a recent advert for a 'Graduate RF Engineer' has been posted widely via various jobs agencies (e.g. GlassDoor.com) on behalf of British Aerospace Engineering (BAE) Systems with jobs based at either Filton in Wiltshire or Great Baddow near Chelmsford in Essex. The job is calling for 'Graduate RF Engineers', wishing to join a 'leading organisation' offering 'rewarding careers' in 'a leading edge, state of the art, technically challenging, professional engineering environment'.
The Candidate should ideally have gained some post graduate experience of using MathCad and of programming in C, or C++, i.e. NOT just a raw 21/22 year old Electronics Graduate but someone who is typically 23/24 years old who has stayed on at University and done a Masters Degree studying RF circuit design engineering digital signal processing and who has got some practical design experience under his or her belt - and the salary on offer - Circa £20,000 per annum !
Need I say more, the salary and post garduate experience demanded of the Graduate RF Engineer says it all: PUBLIC SECTOR E.G.TEACHING, GOOD - PRIVATE SECTOR E.G. PROFESSIONAL ENGINEERING, VERY POOR !
Edited by Firmbutfair on 17/06/2014 at 15:38
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FbF
I agree the salary for the BAe post is derisory.
My son out law, who graduates this year with a Masters in Marine Engineering (four year ourse from A level), starts on something closer to the teacher's pay with another defence contractor - and not in London.
The question in all cases is whether what is offered is sufficient to recruit, motivate and retain. I wouldn't go into today's teaching profession for £37k never mind £27 (and the out of London national rate - in so far as there still is one - will be a lot less).
Edited by Bromptonaut on 17/06/2014 at 19:28
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There's no premium or extra paid if you are a science or maths teacher, believe me. You can get better grants to train to teach those subjects, but you start on the bottom of the rung like anyone else when you start. Unless you have huge amounts of relevant experience or extra quals, in which case you'll be lucky to negotiate yourself up to the second lowest rung on the pay ladder.
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There's no premium or extra paid if you are a science or maths teacher, believe me. You can get better grants to train to teach those subjects, but you start on the bottom of the rung like anyone else when you start. Unless you have huge amounts of relevant experience or extra quals, in which case you'll be lucky to negotiate yourself up to the second lowest rung on the pay ladder.
Thanks for the update, Bobbin Threadbare, the premium for maths and science teachers was an assumption on my part - I AM SORRY. I am clearly 'out of date'. (My wife was a full-time secondary Maths teacher for three years before she left to look after our two sons - and she used to complain about the way the headmistress used to hand out most of her 'scale points' to 'undeserving senior staff' who had only a few 'A' level pupils to teach when my wife had several full size classes (of 32 each) to prep for, teach, mark home work and then finally write detailed reports for every year). My wife's first 'free period' was not until Thursday afternoon, and she often 'lost' that when any other staff were 'off for rtainig or off sick etc' . Years later, when my wife finally returned as a 'supply teacher' working only in our local primary school teaching maths, english, music, drama, geography, history etc she was aware that maths, science, english and ICT teachers in secondary schools were being offered non-consolidated annual salary premiums of between £1000 and £5000 p.a. to hold onto mature staff and/or encourage 'fresh blood' into the profession via the PGCE and similar entry routes.
It must be very frustrating for you to see what some of 'the popular press' says about teachers, average or 'typical' salaries, working hours and career prospects when in reality, most teachers (say two thirds to three quarters of the teaching fraternity) are being paid LESS than these AVERAGE figures that are bandied around so freely.
This abnormal distribution of income mirrors the general situation amongst the working population at larger where a similarly uneven bias is revealed by figures from the ONS. As a Chartered Engineer- I think that teachrs are the most important public sector working group since they are cahrged with the responsibility of moulding, directing and encouraging future generations of managers, doctors, lawyers, engineers, technicians, health workers, administrators, and community workers etc I would say that a mature teacher should be able to coammand the same sort of salary as a Back Bench MP - dream on :-( !
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Addendum and Modifications to my response to Bobbin Threadbare:
Thanks for the update, Bobbin Threadbare, the premium for maths and science teachers was an assumption on my part - I AM SORRY. I am clearly 'out of date'. (My wife was a full-time secondary Maths teacher for three years before she left to look after our two sons - and she used to complain about the way the headmistress used to hand out most of her 'scale points' to 'undeserving senior staff' who had only a few 'A' level pupils to teach when my wife had several full size classes (of 32 each) to prep for, teach, mark home work and then finally write detailed reports for every year). My wife's first 'free period' was not until Thursday afternoon, and she often 'lost' that when any other staff were 'off for training, stress or off sick etc' . Years later, when my wife finally returned as a 'supply teacher' working only in our local primary school, teaching maths, English, music, drama, geography, history etc. she was aware that Maths, Science, English and ICT teachers in secondary schools were being offered non-consolidated annual salary premiums of between £1000 and £3000 p.a. to hold onto mature staff and/or encourage 'fresh blood' into the profession via the PGCE and similar entry routes.
It must be very frustrating for you to see what some of 'the popular press' says about teachers, average or 'typical' salaries, working hours and career prospects when in reality, most teachers (say two thirds to three quarters of the teaching fraternity) are being paid LESS than these AVERAGE figures that are bandied around so freely.
This 'abnormal' or 'skewed' distribution of income actually 'mirrors' the general UK situation amongst the entire working population whereby two thirds earn less than the so called National Average Wage. {N.B. This very uneven bias towards the very many 'super earners' in our society is revealed by figures from the ONS - back in the 70s it was only about half earning below the national average). As a Chartered Engineer with strong Maths, Science, English and language skills (necessarily) - I think that primary and secondary school teachers are the most important public sector working group since they are charged with the responsibility of moulding, directing and encouraging future generations of managers, doctors, lawyers, engineers, technicians, health workers, administrators, and community workers etc. . Additionally a teacher should be a 'role model' for his or her pupils and I would SUGGEST that a mature teacher should be able to 'command' the same sort of salary as say a Back Bench MP - £67,000 - i.e. have such 'pay parity enshrined in law' . Certainly back in 1979, when I finally reached the heady heights of 'basic salary parity with a back bencher' I thought I had, at long last, 'really made it' at age 31 but it has been 'down hill' for most 'professional engineers' in the UK ever since then - Ho Hum never mind eh, at least no one can take away the satisfaction I have enjoyed in my work and in my professional achievements consolidated over a career of more than 44 years.
May I wish all you aspiring engineers and teachers the very best of good fortune and hope that these gross anomalies and imbalances will be redressed in future years.
Edited by Firmbutfair on 18/06/2014 at 14:21
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