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Day 3: IT Salary Showdown — Comparing 3 Programming Careers

Lesson Overview
Time 50 minutes
Objectives Pull salary and demand data from H&L for 3 IT careers; cross-reference with BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook; complete the IT Salary Comparison worksheet
TEKS d(1)(C), d(5)(A), d(5)(E)
Deliverable Completed IT Salary Comparison worksheet (3 careers × 5 fields)
Materials H&L Workbook Ch 12, Chromebooks, BLS Computer/IT pages, printed IT Salary Comparison worksheet, projector

Warm-Up (5 min)

WARM-UP: Do you think all programming jobs pay the same? Predict: Which programming career do you think pays the MOST?

Quick share. Most students will guess Game Developer or App Developer. The actual answer is usually Backend Engineer or Software Engineer at a large company. Bridge: "Today you find out for real, using the same data professional career counselors use."

Activity 1: H&L Salary and Demand Data (15 min)

[H&L PLATFORM] Direct students back to the H&L IT cluster. They need to pull salary and demand data for 3 specific careers: Software Developer, Web Developer, and ONE other programming or IT Hat of their choice (App Developer, Game Developer, Network Administrator, Data Scientist). For each Hat, they check the H&L app's localized DFW salary range and demand indicator (growing / steady / declining).

Walk students through the H&L Hat profile layout on the projector. Show them where to find:

  • DFW salary range (entry-level → experienced)
  • Demand indicator (usually a graph or symbol)
  • Education level
  • Daily tasks

Students record this data on a notes page in their workbook. They will move it to the worksheet in the next activity.

Facilitation Tip

Students often miss the difference between entry-level and experienced salary. Point this out explicitly: "An entry-level Software Developer in DFW makes around $70,000. After 10 years, that same person can make $130,000 or more. That difference is what 'years of experience' means in IT."

Activity 2: BLS Cross-Reference + Salary Comparison Worksheet (25 min)

Source: BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook (free, government-maintained, used by professional career counselors)

Direct students to the BLS pages for their 3 chosen careers:

For each BLS page, students find:

  • Median Pay (national; located in the Quick Facts box at the top)
  • Typical Entry-Level Education
  • Job Outlook (e.g., "Much faster than average, 25% growth")
  • Number of Jobs (current employment count)
  • One sentence about what they do (from the "What They Do" tab)

Students fill in the printed IT Salary Comparison worksheet (3 careers × 5 fields):

Field Career 1 Career 2 Career 3
Career Name
H&L DFW Salary
BLS National Median
Typical Education
Job Growth Rate

After students complete the worksheet, they answer 2 reflection questions on the back:

  1. Which career has the HIGHEST salary?
  2. Which career has the FASTEST job growth? Are they the same career?

DOK 3: What conclusions can you draw about the relationship between education level and salary for IT careers in the DFW area? Is more education ALWAYS worth it?

Facilitation Tip

The most common student mistake: they confuse "median pay" with "starting pay." Median = the middle of all workers in that career, not the entry level. Show them: "If you Google 'starting salary Software Developer DFW,' you get a different number than the BLS median. The median is what you make in the MIDDLE of your career."

Exit Ticket (5 min)

EXIT TICKET (Comparison Matrix) · Printable PDF:

Use your IT Salary Comparison worksheet to fill in the matrix below.

Career 1: ___ Career 2: ___ Career 3: ___
BLS national median pay
Typical entry-level education
Job growth rate (BLS)

Bottom line: Which of your three careers has the BEST combination of HIGH salary AND FAST growth? Name it, then in one sentence use a specific number from the matrix to back your choice. (d(5)(A), d(5)(E))

Differentiation

  • Support: Pre-fill one column of the IT Salary Comparison worksheet (Software Developer) as a model. Students complete the other 2 columns.
  • Extension: Students compare their 3 DFW IT careers to the same 3 careers in San Francisco. The salaries are higher in SF, but cost of living is much higher too. Discuss: which is actually a better deal?
  • ELL: Bilingual worksheet headers (Career = Carrera, Salary = Salario, Education = Educación, Growth = Crecimiento). Allow ELL students to use the BLS pages in their preferred language via browser translation.