ALBANY, NY — Close to one-fifth (18.6 percent) of all public-school teachers and administrators employed by school districts outside New York City were paid more than $100,000 last year—including most education professionals on Long Island, according to salary data posted today at SeeThroughNY.net, the Empire Center’s transparency website.
The public educator pay data are based on Fiscal Year 2020-21 salary information reported to the New York State Teachers’ Retirement System (NYSTRS), which covers public school teachers and administrators employed outside New York City.
The union contracts that drive school employee pay levels are also posted at SeeThroughNY.net.
Of the 62,507 NYSTRS members getting six-figure pay last year, 84 percent were employed in downstate suburban districts, including 31,887 on Long Island and 13,294 in Westchester and Rockland counties.
At school districts in upstate New York —the 50 counties north of the mid-Hudson—four percent of NYSTRS members were paid six-figure salaries.
Statewide, the percentage of NYSTRS members earning six-figure pay has almost doubled in the last 10 years.
Average pay for NYSTRS members was highest in the mid-Hudson ($92,194) and on Long Island ($92,174). Upstate, the highest-paying regions were Western New York ($65,168) and the Capital Region ($63,125); the lowest-paying regions were the North Country ($53,930) and the Southern Tier ($56,409).
Statewide, the highest paid NYSTRS member was Joyce Brown, president of the Fashion Institute of Technology, with total pay of $504,022. The next-highest paid NYSTRS members were Charlene Murphy at $474,026, Louis Wool at $460,793, Diane Demarinis at $445,243 and Colleen Henriquez at $433,890. All but Wool worked at Central Islip Union Free School District in Suffolk County, Long Island — a school with six of the ten highest-paid NYSTRS members on its payroll.
| Region | NYSTRS Average Pay |
| Capital | $63,125 |
| Central New York | $58,569 |
| Finger Lakes | $58,303 |
| Long Island | $92,174 |
| Mid-Hudson | $92,194 |
| Mohawk Valley | $57,378 |
| North Country | $53,930 |
| Southern Tier | $56,409 |
| Western New York | $65,168 |
The Empire Center, based in Albany, is an independent, not-for-profit, non-partisan think tank dedicated to promoting policies that can make New York a better place to live, work and raise a family.
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