To help address funding and teaching resource disparities across districts in the state, Texas leaders developed the Teacher Incentive Allotment (TIA). The Allotment aims to make the teaching job more appealing and sustainable, particularly in rural areas and in areas with a high concentration of economically disadvantaged students. This document…

As the COVID pandemic has led many Americans to reevaluate the status quo and expand their sense of possibility about new ways to organize work, it's time to reimagine the fundamentals of the teaching job. Reimagining the teaching job demands that leaders at all levels reconsider the ways in which people, time, and money in schools and school…

This fact sheet shares 2023 survey and focus group findings from early educators eligible for from the Early Childhood Educator Pay Equity Fund in the District of Columbia. Findings describe the perceived of the payments on the child care field. Early educators share that the Pay Equity Fund helps advance fair pay that reflects their credentials…

Teachers' salaries are widely debated around the world, with divergent views among the actors of education. Salaries have risen very little over the last decade and have even fallen in real terms in almost half of OECD countries between 2015 and 2022. However, salary levels are just one of the many factors contributing to the attractiveness of the…

States have taken different approaches in addressing the need for increased compensation among teachers by spreading pay increases across multiple years, linking increases to performance, and connecting them to sweeping K-12 policy changes, such as school vouchers. The earn-as-you-learn Registered Apprenticeship model is an increasingly popular…

Providing Missouri students a highly qualified, appropriately credentialed workforce has grown steadily more challenging over the past decade. Unsurprisingly, the pandemic made it even harder. Multiple surveys indicate Missouri educators' growing dissatisfaction over the last two years. These data, coupled with figures on declining enrollment in…

Pursuant to California Education Code Section 84362, each community college district is required to allocate at least 50% of its annual education expenses, as defined by law, to the salaries and benefits of classroom instructors. This requirement ensures a significant portion of educational expenditures directly supports classroom instruction. The…

In 2021, the DC Council established the Early Childhood Educator Pay Equity Fund ("Pay Equity Fund") to improve compensation for early educators in licensed child development centers and homes. The fund leverages a tax on individuals earning more than $250,000 a year to sustainably fund supplemental payments to early educators in efforts…

The article describes possible explanations for the relative decline in teacher salaries during recent decades. The article focuses on the Norwegian case, but the situation regarding teacher salaries in Norway is equivalent in many other countries across the globe. Based on comparisons with other professions, three contributing explanations are…

Public schools are the cornerstone of this nation's communities, democracy, and economy. The challenges and deep inequities facing schools today are largely the result of decades of disinvestment, compounded by a global pandemic. All of this has led to a breaking point for the system of public education. In 2023, lawmakers and stakeholders are…

The signs that faculty are suffering, disengaging, and even leaving the profession surround us. We contend that we have to consider carefully what motivates faculty members to be faculty so faculty developers can be better positioned to help faculty re-engage. Integrating data from a preliminary survey we conducted, we offer five steps that…

How are teacher pension benefits funded? Under traditional plans, the full cost of career teachers' benefits far exceeds the contributions designated for them. The gap between the two has three pieces, which may (with some license) be mnemonically tagged the three R's of pension funding: "redistribution," "return," and…

The author's statement to the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions on the challenges faced by America's classroom teachers focuses on a few of the factors that lead to teacher frustration and burnout that higher pay, however well-intended, does not change. They include, but are not limited to, poor teacher preparation,…

The Public School Forum's Top Education Issues outlines the Forum's priorities on what should be at the forefront of education policy decision-making each legislative biennium as the Forum works toward eliminating the systemic inequities that exist throughout the educational system and ensuring that every child has access to a high-quality…

In 2018, West Virginia teachers staged a statewide strike which lasted almost two weeks and included schools across all 55 countywide districts. The main reported strike issues for West Virginia teachers included cuts to their healthcare coverage by the state and relatively low salaries. Prior to the strike, West Virginia teachers ranked 48th in…