UK IT manager in secondary school - looking for similar role in the USA

[k-strider]

Hi not sure how many edugeekers are US based but i currently am an IT manager in a small ish secondary uk school students 12-18yrs about 1,100 in total.  My wife is American citizen and our daughter is a dual national only 5, we keep thinking about moving... her family is in Prescott Arizona and some in LA as well, so in all reality if we went it would be there.. though my love of the USA is more where i met her Missouri or other southern proper red states... 

I was curious if similar roles exist in the US working for school districts or even colleges and what the sort of salary would be? - I am fairly certain (after very briefly looking at it) if we did decide to move we can get my green card based on my wife's citizenship so i not looking for the added complication around being sponsored for a green card.. just curios what sort of jobs are there pay benefits... what would be really cool to know is anyone who has worked in this sort of Job here in the UK and the USA for a comparison... 

 

 

[TheHyperTechie]

The jobs are definitely there. I can't comment on the best places to look, but I am sure Indeed (change location) and sites such as Tes are a good place to start.

 

I quite regularly see job discussions on Reddit for this sector, salary wise (from what I have seen) it appears to be much better than the UK. Obviously, you have to factor in cost of living etc, but I would say IT jobs in general are more rewarded there. If I didn't have full time life commitments here in the UK, I would be probably be looking to do similar, not exclusively the US but just somewhere else...

[machy]

Paging @Hoyt

[synaesthesia]

Would be an interesting move, particular for someone going from here to the other rather than having been doing it all the time in the states.

From what I've seen, it can be a completely different scenario from one block to the next - one school may have the latest and greatest and the next along barely any IT provision at all. Hard to say from here of course but I suspect they don't have a body enforcing or "highly recommending" standards as we do, or if they do it might be on a more localised basis. (And that's another rub - "local" to them could be an area far bigger than the entirety of the UK!)

Certainly a larger percentage of Mac usage in edu over there so if you've any experience managing those it'll be a bonus. 

If you do, it'd be wonderful to see a comparison after you've settled in!

 

I thought about this many moons ago thanks to being eligible for dual citizenship (mother is Kansas born) but my wife and kids now wouldn't be too pleased with the notion!

[Ditto]

I decide to dig in to this a little and did some AI based digging. A summary:

 

Pay & Salary Comparison

Role Type	England (Education)	United States (K-12/Higher Ed)	Nordic Countries (SE/DK/FI)	Western/Central Europe (DE/FR/NL)
IT Technician (1st/2nd Line)	£24,000 – £32,000	$45,000 – $65,000 (~£35k-£50k)	kr 320,000 – 420,000 (~£30k-£40k)	€32,000 – €45,000 (~£27k-£38k)
Data Manager (MIS/Exams)	£30,000 – £45,000	$60,000 – $85,000 (~£46k-£65k)	kr 450,000 – 580,000 (~£42k-£55k)	€42,000 – €55,000 (~£35k-£46k)
IT Manager (Network/Infrastructure)	£40,000 – £60,000	$85,000 – $120,000+ (~£65k-£92k)	kr 550,000 – 720,000 (~£52k-£68k)	€55,000 – €75,000 (~£46k-£63k)

 

The biggest factor in favour for England was LGPS pension. So, if in England and you are not on LGPS or something as strong, you are missing out the biggest benefits. Term time only was seen as depressing a salary, but then you ge tthe holidays! It was normal for more senior roles to be 52 weeks. England was reported as extremely high work load.

[Hoyt]

I am in a rural U.S. district, so I don't know what they pay in the bigger cities.  Entry level IT jobs which still require some experience start at about $40,000 and go up.  Top pay for my role in my department is around $60,000.  I have to maintain eight sites (seven schools and one support site).  The cost of living isn't too bad in the rural areas yet, but it is going up like it is everywhere.

 

As mentioned different districts will have different technology levels.  I am thankful that we finally got away from all Apple products.  The management just isn't as good as with Windows and Chrome devices.  They are also still very overpriced.  Except for vocational programs our students get by just fine with chrome OS devices.  Teachers have a wired desktop that is hardwired to a display panel or projector and a chromebook for whatever they want to use it for.

 

As far as employee qualifications they can vary wildly as well.  Most of y'all are head and shoulders above myself and my peers knowledge wise.  Basically our administration doesn't believe anyone in the IT department should be making as much money as teachers or Administrators.  That keeps experienced and certified I.T. applicants from applying here.  That being said, it seems to be a more relaxed environment than what y'all are in, which isn't lost on me at all.

 

The more conservative areas tend to be less hassle, so that may be something that can help you decide.

 

As far as benefits go they will vary as well.  When it's convenient for the county, they claim we are state employees.  When it's convenient for the state, we are county employees.  Fortunately we are covered by the state pension system.  A lot of other states have better benefits than mine does, but some aren't as good.

 

In my district they are very generous with time off.  In IT we are twelve month employees, but we get a decent smattering of holidays off here and there.  They also let us accumulate paid days off and they let us use them pretty much whenever we want.  They know the pay isn't great compared to other districts in the U.S., so that is something they can give us that doesn't cost them a lot.  My joints appreciate being able to mark off when they need rest.

 

I have a very small view of the big picture, but these are some things I thought of off the top of my head.

[k-strider]

thank you all.. i am in the LGPS so that was a concern as i would be leaving it early probably about 20 years in the pot.  the other was holidays i get 43 days off here (inc the 8 bank holidays) which is a lot... which should mean visiting the USA from here would be easy ie 3-4 weeks most summers but the costs are so high we have only managed it a couple of times  - that was my concern if living in the USA we would never get home for any period to visit family.   Thanks HoyT for the information that is kinda what i was after pay pensions working for the city.  Having worked the same job for 20 years i don't have any current industry qualifications just my Computer Science Bsc 2:1 from early 2000s...  maybe i should concentrate on picking up a couple before we move (if we do) i think it would on balance be a better place to bring our daughter up which was the incentive to move.... especially if we ended up in a more rural county in a southern state... I do miss Missouri 

[Hoyt]

One thing I didn't think to mention that I see y'all talk about is part time or work from home scenarios.  Basically here we all work five days a week (four ten hour days in the summer).  It seems a lot of folks in your area have different work schedules/environments.  That being said, it tends to guarantee a full paycheck.

 

In my district the teachers salary is spread out over twelve months, so they still get paid even in the summer when school is out.  I don't know how they do it in other districts though.

 

Another thing I will mention is we have a lot more open and free space over here once you get outside the big cities.  It took me a while to realize that folks in other parts of the world do not truly understand how big the U.S. is.  We have states larger than some countries, and there are fifty of them.  A lot of folks in the world make fun of us because we only speak one language, but we can drive for days and never encounter another language or currency.

 

I don't know if any of these things may matter to you, but I thought I'd mention them just in case.