EDITORIALS

Stop scrimping on teacher pay

The Florida
Times-Union Editorial Board

Teacher pay in Florida should not be among the worst in the nation.

But that’s what Florida’s elected leaders have done in the last decade, with average teacher pay ranking No. 46 in the nation.

Yet Florida is one of the wealthiest states. That wealth should be investing in our future.

Instead, the Legislature has acted like a super school board, skimping on pay raises and removing flexibility from the dollars that are grudgingly allocated.

Since 2007-08, the base student allocation has increased by just $116 or 2.8 percent.

Instead, Tallahassee has used bonuses, which does little to attract or retain teachers.

The Times-Union Editorial Board was visited recently by officers of the Florida Education Association. They are on a bus tour that will eventually cover about 3,000 miles in this sprawling state.

Fedrick Ingram is president of the Florida Education Association, formerly a high school band director for 10 years in Miami-Dade County.

This bus tour is the beginning of redefining the message of public education. It’s a campaign to “fund our future.”

It is based on three principles:

1. Student success must be measured with real practical tools that are efficient and transparent. Teachers aren’t opposed to tests, they use them every day, they are opposed to tests that are irrelevant and distort the entire profession.

2. The best people need to be attracted and retained. This is especially true with low unemployment. Over 3,000 classrooms do not have a certified teacher. Teachers are leaving the profession or staying away from entering it.

3. Fully fund the schools. The association is asking for $22 billion over 10 years with a $2.4 billion investment up front in the public schools. This would only move Florida four spots in state rankings.

The association proposes a 10 percent increase for everyone, and restore music, art, PE and electives. The ratio of student counselors needs to be 1 in 350 counselors, not 1 in 1,000. Each school needs a social worker and a psychologist.

The association plans a massive rally on Jan. 13 in Tallahassee. That is Monday, a day before the session starts, a day before the State of State address by DeSantis.

Gov. Ron DeSantis has proposed increasing starting pay of teachers — moving Florida from No. 26 to No. 2 in starting pay — but that would leave out support staff, experienced teachers and create new inequities.

While the governor proposed a $900 million package, much of that is not new funding.

“Our teachers will push this arc of justice forward,” Ingram said.

How unjust is it? Carol Gauronskas of St. Augustine is secretary-treasurer of the organization, having spent 18 years as a professional with special needs children in St. Johns County.

“When we talk bonus schemes,” she said, “I can’t go to the bank to get a car loan or mortgage with that. As an education staff professional, I never made more than $30,000, and worked extra jobs with extended day, summer school and Home Depot.

“The governor and his cohorts don’t even put me in the equation. We’re looking at poverty and near-poverty wages for bus drivers, paraprofessionals and food service workers.

Teachers simply need to be paid for their extra hour at challenged schools, Ingram said. Bonuses won’t work.

“We say come to this school, it’s going to be a lot of work, it’s going to be challenging, you’re going to have to put in more hours than you ever thought, you’re going to have to think differently about the students you’re working with, but we’re going to work together, and if you join us in this effort we’re going to pay you for the extra hours,” he said.

What if the Legislature fails to act? Then the teachers plan massive political action to demand accountability. They have the public on their side.

In the last 18 months voters in over 20 Florida counties have passed new revenue sources for their local school systems.

Terrie Brady, head of Duval Teachers United, told the Editorial Board that they will fight for public education.

“Every one of those legislators has someone in their family who are either teachers or goes to school,” she said.

The people get it; it’s their elected representatives in Tallahassee who need listening lessons.