HEADS UP

School principals among Europe’s biggest earners

IRELAND’S head teachers are among the best paid in Europe with top level secondary school leaders taking home six-figure salaries.

A new report reveals school heads in the principality of Liechtenstein have the highest wage packets with up to €170,000 in annual earnings which is just over 50% more than their Irish counterparts who can earn a top salary of €112,000.

Ireland ranks eighth among nearly 40 countries when it comes to salaries for secondary school principals.

Irish heads can earn twice as much as Spanish or Italian educators and nearly four times as much as Greek head teachers.

Luxembourg heads are second on the list with a substantial salary of €153,000.

Our nearest neighbours in the UK are in fourth place with state school heads earning a top wage of just over €123,000, although the head teachers in private schools can earn much more. The annual salaries of principals are part of a newly released European Commission report on teachers’ pay.

RANKING

School heads earn different salaries depending on the size and other characteristics of the school in more than half of the education systems. Ireland also ranks eighth in terms of starting salary for primary school teachers while the nation ranks 12th on the table when it comes to the starting salary of a secondary school teacher.

In secondary education, the smallest percentage increase between the starting and top salary is found in Lithuania at 3% but Ireland is in stark contrast with a 89% jump through the career of a teacher who can almost double their starting salary.

The report – Teachers’ and School Heads’ Salaries and Allowances in Europe 2016/17 – noted pay and conditions in eastern Europe are substantially lower than in other parts of the continent. It also revealed Ireland, along with the UK, Spain and Greece, are among the nine countries where real salaries of beginning teachers are now lower than in 2009 and 2010.