ARE YOU KIDDING? IM SICK OF THE PEOPLE DOING WORK FOR SCHOOLS MAKING THIS KIND OF MONEY. THIS IS WHY OUR REAL ESTATE TAXES ARE SO HIGH, TO PAY THIS LADE 350K TO PUSH PAPERS. WHAT A JOKE.

I hope Uncle Sam taxes the daylight out of her wages..

If people are going to complain about how much teachers and administrators make, then I suggest that they go back to school to find their way into the education field. You made a choice, they made a choice. I made the choice to become a teacher. It’s hard work, but I love it. I work hard at what I do and plan to continue to teach for the next 20 years.

She is rightfully collecting her retirement while continuing to be in the work force. I plan to do the same thing when I retire from my teaching career. I probably will not be making what she is (as I do not plan on becoming an administrator), but I plan to continue working in education once I retire, hopefully teaching in a private/parochial school. I’m only going to be in my 50s, and I don’t think I’ll just want to stop there and collect retirement. I’m one of those who loves what I do for a living. Maybe she is, too. Yes, she’s making a lot of money and who wouldn’t like that?

How is her “pushing papers” for a public school district any different the all of those other career paths out there where others make six figure salaries for doing just that or crunching numbers? What about those sports figures who make millions of dollars by hitting and catching balls? What about all those idiots our government has had to bail out?

She’s got a difficult job ahead of her. This will not be easy as the state of education (anywhere, not just poorer school districts) has been going down the tubes for sometime. I wish her the best of luck.

If people want to complain about Unions, they should complain about the teachers Union. They’re damn near Mobsters and put out an inferior product far worse than any car manufacturer ever produced. The quality of human being that the American Teachers Union puts out is sheer garbage. Human debris that can’t read or write and are as violent as gladiators.

This is unforgivable, especially in this day and age. No one in the private sector has that kind of insane pension benefit coming - No one. The stock market has returned 0 since 1998, so I have to continue working until I’m 80 and in part to pay this persons’ retirement benefits? Kiss my a$$. Both Govt’ and Wall Street are cleaning America out, and it has to stop.

In Missouri, a teacher’s retirement is generated from career-long, mandatory, contributions into the Public School Retirement System (PSRS) — unless it is St. Louis Public Schools (they have a different retirement structure). The system is funded by teacher contributions, district contributions, and investment earnings. If you would like to learn more, visit http://www.psrs-peers.org/ for more information.

To all of you that complain about successful people I will tell you the same I tell everyone else. Life is about the choices we get, the decisions we make and we either reap the benefits of our choices or we pay the consequenses of them that were poorly made. This lady is successful in her choices. It is easy to look at someone else and complain. I used to work with people who complained all day about their situation in life either about a bad marriage, out of control kids or money problems or lack of education etc. I told them that there was only one person to blame. Themselves. They made the choices [or didn't] and if things didn’t turn out the way they expected, the rest of us do not want to hear about it. So to this lady, I say great. Enjoy the fruits of your labor and talent and your career choice. To the complainers, I say take a good look in the mirror and you may see the cause of your situation. If you chose to quit school or not aquire a marketable skill or made other poor decisions, deal with it, but do not critisise someone who did.

Instead of going after teachers/administrators that make too much money, why don’t we focus our efforts on the REAL overpaid professions - Athletes, Lawyers, Health Insurance executives, & politicians. All of these people get paid much more than educators/administrators and they don’t contribute to the growth of society.

Education is the very core of our society. It should be valued. Every decision make is either based on education or the lack of education.

The difference is that our real estate taxes don’t pay the salaries of athletes, celebrities or company officers. A $200k salary for an administrator is WAY out of line compared to what the average teacher makes. Collecting a government pension while working at a comparable government position is also WAY out of line. I would be ok with a pension paying the difference in salary were that salary in line.

It should be noted that for 32 years Dr. Nicastro paid in between 10 and 14% of her salary yearly, matched by the school district. The Missouri Teachers retirement fund has conservatively managed that fund and now she is receiving the pension that she has earned. Good for her.

Reality check you are unforgivable. Why don’t you do a little research first? (Maybe you weren’t paying attention in class too busy daydreaming about making nothing of yourself later in life). Under PSRS (Public School Retirement) I not you are footing the bill of her retirement package. 11 to 12 percent of my salary is skimmed off the top to go into the fund to pay for educator retirees. At approximately 6000 currently (will go up as my pay increases slightly) by the time I retire in 20 years (already in for 10) that will be approximately 200,000 invested into the system. That’s quite a chunk of unused cash at my disposal, but good to know that most of it will be there when I retire. So unless you are an educator (which you don’t appear to be) quit crying foul, go out and get a job or go back to school and get our perks (albeit for much less pay than our peer equivalents in other fields).

As for you ETU union, you really don’t even deserve a response except for what school are you a product of? One of the garbage making facilities you so fondly speak of???

It is apparent from these comments that the people of Missouri do not keep tabs on State employees’ salaries and benefits. This is not new. About 10 years ago, the State of Missouri put up an early retirement incentive whereby employees could draw their full pensions early and also retain their medical benefits. Many were only in their early 50s. Then, the State immediately implemented the ’stem the brain drain’ plan. A good number of those retirees came back to work, limited to 20 hours a week, but were paid an hourly rate of $60. People making $50,000 a year began making that amount working only part-time, also drew their retirement pensions, and had their health insurance paid until they were eligible for medicare. But the reason no one balked at it was because the General Assembly, the Governor (Carnahan, Holden), the Attorney General (Jay Nixon), and the State Auditor (McCaskill), were all Democrats. The General Assembly had been Democrat controlled since the late 1940s. Most State employees were Democrat loyalists and they were being rewarded with taxpayer money because term limits were ending the Democrats reign in the General Assembly. The retirement fund was solvent at that time and since future retiree benefits were guaranteed under the State constitution anyway, then why not fill their pockets while the getting was good. When a story such as this (Nicastro) hits the news, then people act as if they’re shocked at the amount of money employees of this State funnel to themselves. These State employees act as if they made some sort of sacrifice by working 8-5 M-F with 15 paid holidays, 15 days of paid sick leave, and at least 15 or more paid vacations days each year (and teachers get the summer off, too). And most of us wonder just what it is that they do in their air conditioned cubicles in Jefferson City each day. There is certainly no quota of work seen coming out of Jefferson City. Not all college degrees make out like a robber, nor technically trained professionals. The rest of us struggle to pay the heavy tax burden to support this type of double dipping into the tax till. I would say that once a State employee draws their retirement, they may go to work in private industry if they want to continue working, and help to pay that tax burden. And don’t let any person who draws all their salary from taxes try and tell you that they pay taxes, too. That is just a partial return of the tax dollars they are taking.

As someone who has invested the money into a master’s degree plus 15 hours soon to be 30 and only making 50K I do not see myself as being paid an excessive amount of money. I have spent a large sum of my own money to further my education by my choice. My salary is deducted the set rate into the PSRS & I will draw upon that after many years of service. Service that after 17 years continues to get more difficult with the students, parental involvement & changes/ expectations every year. The state of education has changed in time & not for the better, but we cannot impose the blame upon those who work hard each day to make a difference. As for our administrators, tax payers need to give input to their school boards. Investigate the policies, budget and issues that the district (& state) you pay your taxes into makes. I also had an understanding that once retired an educator can only earn a certain percentage of money in order to draw their full monthly retirement amount. I am not sure what formula is at work for Dr. Wright Nicastro (superintendents). I am just content that my administrator now will bring fresh change to my school district.

I don’t begrudge Dr. Nicastro one dime of her retirement or her salary as Commissioner of Education. Being a superintendent - especially of a large school district - is a very difficult and demanding job. So is being Commissioner of Education. Both jobs are similar to being the CEO of a large company, and we’ve all seen the news reports about private industry CEOs and their multi-million dollar salaries and “golden parchutes.”

As other posters have pointed out, Dr. Nicastro has earned her retirement by contributing to the PSRS system over the past 32 years. Mandatory participation in PSRS is one of the perks of being an educator in a Missouri public school district after contributing 13% of each paycheck to that system. It’s forced retirement savings and there’s nothing wrong with the fact that Dr. Nicastro will be reaping the benefits she’s earned.

While $185,000 is a nice salary, Nicastro will earn every penny. People who have worked with her will tell you that she is a workaholic, putting in 80 hours a week at Hazelwood. She’ll work just as hard in her new job. I wish her well.

My wife was a teacher in the Ritenour School District before she retired (Yes, we know Chris Wright - and she is a wonderful, understanding, and helpful administrator). During those 23 years of teaching, my wife was required to contribute anywhere from 9% to 10 1/2% (it kept on going up over the years) of her salary to PSRS (Public School Retirement System), and didn’t contribute to Social Security during those years (but did still have to contribute to Medicare). So why wouldn’t my wife (and Chris Wright, as well) be entitled to take her hard-earned retirement pay (in lieu of Social Security)? That 9-10 1/2% is probably more than most people contribute to SSA and/or to a 401(k). Chris is entitled to every penny of it - whether she continues to work or not!!

If they are not careful, public school teachers will ultimately get the bad rap that the UAW workers are getting. Teachers whining about their salaries has become riduculous!

There is no way this lady is worth the money she is getting paid. To be getting 164 thousand in retirement benefits is more like ripping off the taxpayer. Then these school districts have the audacity to ask for tax increases to help the kids. No its more like helping the school big wigs enhance their pocketbook.

I’m not going to lay out the specifics, but the calculations, yield a very large annuity. People here have no reason to complain. Quit always voting in the union-backed candidate on all these boards, whether it’s the police, fire, ambulance or schools. Get out and vote and support the person who is NOT backed by the union. The unions get a majority on these boards and they give them whatever they want. The voter must restore the balance, trust me, the unions don’t care about the taxpayer and are out to get everything they can, then again, if the people keep voing them in, this is what happens.

What’s up with all this talk about teachers and unions? Other than St. Louis and Kansas City, most teachers in Missouri are not members of unions. I have been a teacher in Mid-MO for 16 years and have never been a member of a union (unless you consider MSTA-The Missouri State Teacher’s Association a union).

Don’t knock the PSRS because it is one of the few things that can encourage teachers to stick with the profession for more than just a few years.

Most administrators in school districts earn every penny they get paid. I’m sure Nicastro has as well. Teachers complain about their salaries because they really don’t get paid what they are worth. Teachers are professionals, yet in many parts of the state, they get paid less than office workers, with much greater responsibility. Just try paying off 4 or more years of college, making a house and car payment and raising a family on the under $35,000 (often under $25,000) that teachers in out-state Missouri get paid. Yes, you do get paid for getting more education, but we have to pay for that education out of our own pockets. The districts do not pay for those classes. Yet the state practically requires us to get a master’s degree after a few years. The additional pay is only $2000 per year once you have that extra sheep-skin. Not to mention retirement. We pay 13.5% of our pre-tax dollars into PSRS. That is way more than anyone pays into social security! In order to make ends meet, many teachers turn to a second job, where they tax us again. And they draw social security out of the pay of the second job, but then they passed a law that says if we get a pension from an agency like PSRS (which we paid for) we get our social security benefit reduced. So while I pay into both, YOU’LL get my social security, I’ll never see it.
Plus, we have to deal with being verbally abused by our students and their parents. Yes, I’ve been called every name in the book, and some that can’t even be written in the book, been hit, kicked, and put in a head-lock, all by students. All for under $35,000 per year. With a MS degree. Congrats Chris Wright Nicastro - YOU GO GIRL!

I’m not against someone getting a decent retirement BUT… We in the private sector don’t get to retire after 30 years. I’m on 36 with 8 to go to get reduced benefits at 62 and I’ll be lucky to 1/3 of my salary from my own investments be we don’t get pensions anymore. It’s 401K or nothing.

You bring up an interesting point, Ray. The private sector treats its employees pretty shabbily these days. While many people say that the public sector should model itself after the private sector, I completely disagree. I’ve always thought that the private sector should strive to be more like the public sector.

You bring up an interesting point, Ray. The private sector treats its employees pretty shabbily these days. While many people say that the public sector should model itself after the private sector, I completely disagree. I’ve always thought that the private sector should strive to be more like the public sector.
— Faith
1:04 pm July 4th, 2009

Uh, the private sector doesn’t rape the taxpayers like the public sector. Every nickel this lady receives will come from or came from taxpayers. Amazingly, the public sector, especially education, is rarely affected by economic downturns. While everyone else is making sacrifices, the public folks are lined up at the tax money food trough demanding more.

I’m working and eligible for retirement. I’m collecting my retirement benefits now from one employer and earning a salary from a second employer. What’s wrong with that? If you earn a retirement from one job and take another that is fine. When you have worked long enough with an employer to retire you get your retirement benefits. Get real; part of the benefit of having a job is earning money for retirement. Having another job after you retire from one is just icing on the cake! Grippers get real!

@Amazedbythelunacy: With all due respect, where have you been the last twenty years? Between the abuse of local TIFs and other corporate tax breaks, corporate lobbyists, the outsourcing of jobs overseas, overpaid CEOs who turn around and fire thousands of workers, and the recent bailout of the financial and automotive sector, the private sector has found all sorts of ways to “rape” taxpayers. This whole notion of holding up the private sector as a paragon of virtue while telling the workaholic CEO of a large school district that her $205k salary is highway robbery is absurd. The private sector counterpart to her job would make more money than Nicastro will make with her salary and retirement combined.

I wish more posters would actually read the preceding comments before mindlessly griping about this woman’s pay. Her retirement is PRE-FUNDED, which means IT WAS TAKEN OUT OF HER SALARY FOR THREE DECADES.

I also wish more posters actually had to do Nicastro’s job for a week. If they did, they’d probably stop complaining about her pay.

Josh, you make valid points. However, you are mistaken if you think that 164,000 a year pension can be sustained by a prefunded account based on her salary history. She would need approx. 2.5 million in that bucket to provide that type of lifetime income.

The PSRS will eventually be busted. It won’t happen in the immediate future so but it will happen. The numbers just don’t add up. Why do you think the amount contributed has been raised nearly every year for the past dozen?

If you are a current teacher/administrator, I highly suggest you put what little money you can away in addition to the PSRS. These folks retiring today are going to drain it before you get a chance to tap it. Similiar to SS.

@Amazedbythelunacy: that $2.5 million is not as outlandish as you think. Even adjusting for inflation and pay raises, 32 years of income into the system (plus district matching) with approximately 8% interest compounded annually (that has been their historic rate of return), plus continued compounded interest on the principal during the payout period would achieve a number pretty close to $2.5 million. It’s worth running the numbers if you get a chance.

It may be a little premature yet to declare that PSRS “will” be busted. A lot can happen in 30-40 years. PSRS certainly faces some questions down the road, but that’s true of virtually every pension plan right now… life expectancies have gone up and retirement ages have not, and until we resolve those issues everyone’s fixed retirement (from Social Security on down) will be in jeopardy at some point. (And let’s not even talk about how unpredictable 401(k)s have been.) Even so, PSRS is still one of the best managed pension plans in the country and has achieved a surprisingly high annualized return on its investments compared to other pension plans.

I’m just glad she’s out of the Hazelwood School District. Under her “leadership”, district taxpayers got much higher property taxes and no improvement in student performance. That’s her specialty: Public relations with a steep price tag and no substance.

Josh,

I don’t know for certain, but I’d bet 1,000 bucks this lady hasn’t always had a six figure salary. If she started out in the classroom in the 70’s, she didn’t contribute much to the retirement system during those times. Her salary probably increased every year and took off once she got into the administration, but that money invested at those later years had NO chance of making it to the amount she needed.

The PSRS is one of the strongest pensions in the country and education has a few positives that will sustain it longer(teachers that contribute for a few years and then leave the profession would be one). However, you stated the exact reasons why it will be eventually busted. The PSRS administrators have steadily increased the contribution amount almost yearly and did so again this year. Soon, 13% of pay plus district match will be going into the system. Infinite increases can’t be sustained forever.

Someone call Elliot Davis. This is disgusting!

@Amazedbythelunacy: Interestingly, Nicastro has been in the upper eschelons of public education since almost the beginning. She was only a teacher (social studies) for five years before vaulting straight into an assistant superintendent position which has left many wondering how she pulled that off. (Based on what I know about her, I have my theories, but I’ll keep them to myself.) Few administrators move that quickly, but I would say that most administrators I know have spent at least half their career in administration, which helps to alleviate things a bit.

You may have missed what I meant about PSRS’s future, although I’m probably weakening my case by pointing out that people who drop out of PSRS can actually get their money back out of the system, albeit with taxes. But I digress. My point earlier was that it is inherently problematic to speak in absolutes — PSRS *will* be busted, PSRS *will* fail — about anything economic, but especially so with events that are as far away from us now as we are from the Carter administration. There’s just a lot that can happen between now and then.

I think the more accurate thing to say is that PSRS *will* go busted *if* something doesn’t change. That *if* would most logically be raising the PSRS retirement formula from the “Rule of 80″ (teachers can retire with 80% benefits when their age + years of experience equals 80) to a higher number, such as 85 or 90. That would admittedly be quite a shock to the system of teachers, especially if it was retroactive to teachers already in it, but it is the most logical fix for a system designed back during an era when the average life expectancy was 70 rather than the 80 we enjoy now.

I understand that there are individuals who treasure the teaching profession. I don’t understand how certain administrators qualify for outrageous pay especially in failing districts. Hazelwood is not a Bluestar, A rated, Exemplary school district. So how can this superintendent receive this amount of pay recognition? Teachers must fight for each and every penny that they are paid. Often the pay raise is so meger that the medical insurance that teachers pay make it appear as if teachers didn’t get a pay raise at all.

I think that districts’ board of Eds should be ashame of themselves giving these type of salaries to individuals. I wonder how many programs have been cut due to this recession…how many teachers have been laid off? This is terrible.

The point is: Administrators from very poor distrists receive outrageous pay. Why? School districts that cut programs for children should not be in the business of paying administrators hugh salaries because they don’t deserve it. I can see it if these superintendents were turning failing districts into sucessful districts. It’s not about what career you choose. It’s about the product that’ being produces. If the product is flawed then why should an administrative leader expect top salary? Taxpayers should be outraged. Yes, pensions are by design teacher input and district input and investment. But where do the funds from the district input come from? I think its from taxes! And…I believe taxes come from taxpayers!!!

Josh,
You hit the nail on the head. You are on point. People in the education profession know exactly what you mean and you’re right. Also, what about the children? Take a closer look at Hazelwood school district. It’s a failing system like all the other districts surrounding it. She’s getting out while the getting out is good.

Taxpayers: revolt!

I thought it was ridiculous paying the superitendent of Detroit School district the salary they offered her (over $200,000 a year). They had to fire her. Now, she wants to sue the district. If Detroit’s school district leaders had done their research they would have known that this lady had been paid out of two contracts before they hired her.

Some of these high priced superitendents are simply greedy. They are not truely concerned about the school district’s success. What’s wrong with these districts’ Boards of Education members? It’s all about who you know. It’s not about the product-our children. Sad…so sad.

The true horror is: Teachers negotiate their salaries…get pennies. Administrators negotiate their salaries…get thousands of dollars. Crazy superintendents + sheep-like staff = failing schools. Oftentimes, teachers don’t even know the salaries of their superintendents. We’ve got a lot of high priced superintendents out here who need to be FIRED…like yesterday. School districts, hold on to your matching funds until the employees produce.