Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: The best way to improve education is to raise teachers’ salaries.
In general, in some developing countries where the quality of education is poor, the salaries of teachers are not high as well. Whether such correlation can prove that the best way to improve education is to raise teachers’ salaries? Although some people may deny this point of view, I totally support it. I think it is important to raise teachers’ salaries, because it will improve teachers’ enthusiasm, make more people choose teachers as their jobs, and it is an indicator that the status of education in a country does be elevated.
First, one of the main reasons to raise teachers’ salaries is that it is beneficial to make educators more concentrate on teaching. If so, the quality of instructing will be improved as a result. It is well known that some teachers have part-time jobs to earn more money, like being private tutors, writing for newspaper. Then how can the quality of teaching be improved if teachers cannot focus on their students at school? Even though not all of these teachers do such jobs for extra money, a large amount number of them choose part-time jobs because they lack enough salaries to lead decent lives.
In addition to the enthusiasm of teaching, increasing teachers’ salaries will encourage more well-trained people to choose teacher as their jobs. Nearly each year, many graduates whose majors are related to teach give up their professional field and take jobs in the field of business. According to a survey conducted by China Daily recently, one of the most significant elements to determine which kind of jobs graduates will choose, is how well the salaries are. In this case, if those who are in the major of education are not likely to be teachers, others who are not experts but love to teach have less possibility to become educators.
Some people may argue that there are some other ways to improve education, such as improving hardware in the schools and building more schools. However, I want to say that the willing to raise teachers’ salaries is an indispensable standard to indicate that governments value education. Instead of some hardware facilities, well-trained and highly-skilled of teachers are always the key factors to improve education.
To sum up, I agree with the statement that to raise the salaries is the best way to improve education. It is of vital importance because it will motivate current professionals, encourage more potential talents to decide being teachers and show the sincerity of government to improve education.
TOEFL listening lectures: A university lecture by a professor of Physics