It starts in August.

From then on, the salary of primary school teachers in Hesse gradually increases until it reaches the level of tariff A13 in 2028.

Then the educators at the primary level will earn as much as their colleagues at the secondary level II. According to the salary table, that's a big difference.

Between A12, the previous salary level for primary school teachers, and A13, there is a gap of more than 600 euros gross for a career starter.

Elementary school teachers will soon earn as much as high school teachers.

Is that fair?

The philologists' association, the trade union for grammar school teachers, denies this question and refers to the supposedly higher workload at the secondary school.

For his part, he is now calling for the salaries of high school teachers to be increased by one tariff level to A14.

Then the old distance would be restored.

But is the workload at high schools really higher than at primary schools?

One can argue about that.

It all depends on what scale you use.

In some cases, anyone who counts the hours worked may come to the conclusion that there really is an imbalance.

But even within the grammar schools, the workload is distributed very differently.

Anyone who teaches two correction subjects there often sits over their exams even during the holidays.

And the preparation for the material to be taught in the upper school also takes a lot of time.

Conversely, there are also highly committed primary school teachers who offer telephone consultations for concerned parents at half past eight in the evening.

With a good portion of dark

The individual workload is highly dependent on how seriously a teacher takes their job and how enthusiastic they are about it.

Anyone who simply repeats the material from previous years in a continuous loop at high school and teaches subjects that do not require corrections such as German or English in the upper grades will have a more relaxed working day than other colleagues.

Everyone knows of such teachers from their own school days.

But hopefully also from the exact opposite: from hard-working and influential educators who put themselves into it and have found their life's work in the teaching profession.

When the philologists' association speaks patronizingly about the important "basic work" of its colleagues at the elementary schools and in the same breath now demands a salary increase because of the supposedly higher workload, then there resonates a desire for distinction and also a good portion of arrogance.

Nothing changes for the teachers at the high school.

They will not be constrained by increasing the salaries of their elementary school peers.

They just feel unfairly treated because they see their own work devalued because the salary is levelled.

First grade and second grade teacher

It sounds like they are making a distinction between first grade high school teachers and second grade elementary school teachers.

The workload is difficult to quantify.

To be fair, you have to put in a time clock and count the hours.

But then one would also have to differentiate more strongly in the salary within the grammar schools: A salary supplement for German and English teachers in the “correction hell”, less money for sports and art teachers – is that conceivable?

Of course not.

The result would be an outcry.

Remuneration according to performance is not so easy in schools, because the work done is difficult to measure.