THE statement in the Association of Colleges’ briefing paper quoted in The TES (July 6, 2001) that there “is now no significant difference in the average levels of pay for lecturers and school teachers” is nonsense.
The 1999 figures from the then Department for Education and Employment simply quote the average pay of all people on academic salaries in schools and in colleges.
Since 1999, the differential between the pay of school teachers and college lecturers has been further increased by Government action.
A key factor is missing - the level of responsibility carried by the staff. As the governor of a small secondary school and as principal of a college, I am aware that in both establishments there are heads of departments whose salaries are approximately pound;30,000.
In the school, the departments consist of one or two people responsible for the delivery of the national curriculumGCSE for a subject area; in the college, a department will have 20-plus staff responsible for delivering courses to hundreds of students.
RR Lewin Principal and chief executive Bracknell and Wokingham College
