Teacher pay should be raised

Trevor Brady teaching his 2nd period AP Gov/Econ class ( Annika Umholtz, staff writer)

By Annika Umholtz, staff writers

What’s the difference between a teacher and a large pizza? The pizza can feed a family of four. 

Every teacher has borne the brunt of their own salary joke at least once and every student has heard the joke at least twice. Though we use wordplay to cope with this situation we’ve grown accustomed to, teacher pay is a real problem. Our educators deserve better.

A Santa Rosa City Schools (SRCS) teacher’s salary is decided based on how much education they’ve received and the number of years they’ve been teaching; a classification system developed in conjunction with the Santa Rosa Teachers Association (SRTA). Most teachers start out in Class One, meaning they have graduated college with a bachelor’s degree and have taken 30 additional units of education—units they have to pay for. This gets them an annual salary of $66,412 before taxes. And considering typical California living expenses, a single adult requires about $44,000 per year to live comfortably—but if they have a child the living expenses increase by about $50,000. If there are two adults, their living expenses are $67,175—which cuts it close to a teacher’s starting income. 

Table of average California living wages based on number of family members (Photo courtesy of: https://livingwage.mit.edu/states/06 California Living Wages, studied by Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

The California Department of Education states that the average highschool teacher salary is $83,849, but in order to achieve anywhere near that income while working in our district, they need to abide by the SRTA certified contract salary schedule. A teacher would need to have a bachelor’s degree, 75 extra units, and eight years of teaching experience. Meeting these requirements puts their salary at the most similar income listed by the schedule: $83,548. And according to the schedule, the maximum annual salary a teacher can earn is $108,435, but that’s only after teaching for 25 years and having a bachelor’s degree, master’s degree, and an additional 75 units. It takes incredible effort to work your way up to an income that even begins to be reasonable. 

SRTA Certified Contract Salary Schedule depicting how much teachers get paid based on experience and education (Photo courtesy of  https://www.srcschools.org/Page/2207, Salary Schedule created by Santa Rosa Teachers Association)

A bachelor’s degree is the base requirement to be a teacher. And completing a master’s degree will get a teacher a $1,200 per month raise before taxes, but the district will offer the same raise even if you get a Doctor of Philosophy, Doctorate in Education, or a Bilingual Authorization. Those differing levels of education are treated equally and will not cause the district to pay more for a teacher, even if they are more qualified. 

Low teacher wages and high California living expenses are an unfair combination that forces teachers to worry about the strain of money. Not only does this constant trouble divert some of their attention and time away from their students, but it restricts when they’d be able to properly care for and raise a family. 

As previously stated, one way a teacher can increase their pay is by getting more education. To accomplish this, not only do they have to balance their 40 hour work week—often longer—with their own lessons on the side, but they have to pay for this additional education themselves. “Right now I’m getting my master’s in education at Sonoma State University,” Scott Wallach, social science teacher and former Associated Student Body adviser, said. He explained that it costs $6,500 per semester and he needs to complete six semesters to get the units he needs. That’s a total of $39,000 that he has to pay for on a teacher’s salary. “I had to take out a loan,” Wallach added. Once he finishes getting his master’s degree, he’ll receive a $9,000 raise, but he’ll have had to pay more than that to get there.  

Wallach also described his future plans, saying that he won’t be able to retire until he has 35 years of teaching under his belt. However, the salary schedule stops providing wage increases after 25 years of teaching. “I’ll have to go a whole decade without a pay increase and then I’ll retire at the age of 61,” Wallach concludes. 

He also recalls that for about the past eight years at least, his annual salary has not kept up with rising inflation rates. Last year specifically, the inflation rate was about nine percent. However, on July 1, 2022, the SRTA Board of Education approved only a four percent adjustment for teacher salaries. Next year, it’s predicted that teacher salaries will be adjusted by 4.5% instead, but that will still be far below the inflation that will be occurring at the same time. 

Unlike most jobs that have 260 work days in a year, teachers only get 185 work days because of shorter school years. When school’s out there’s not much people can do to earn money solely working as a teacher. “I call summers forced unpaid leave,” said Wallach. Unless they direct summer school, participate in extra trainings, or do extra official work, they just don’t get paid during that time. Teachers have the option of spreading out their salary over 12 paychecks so that they still receive money over the summer, but they don’t actually make more that way. 

Teachers are expected to be able to plan their entire curriculum and set up their classroom in one day because that’s all the time they’ll be paid for. If they go over that mark then it’s their problem even though that kind of preparation takes way more time. 

This summer, Wallach, social science teacher Joseph Silvestri, and various Carrillo English teachers will be spending a week working together to create a whole new class on ethnic studies for next year. Only one week of this collaboration is paid for, so if they go over that time—which is likely to happen—then they will be working for free over the summer. 

Despite not being fully compensated for their skills and passion, most teachers express that they love their job and it’s not all about the money. “No one goes into this expecting to get paid a lot,” Wallach explained. And there would be even more teachers, with more skills if the pay was more attractive—which would assist with the current teacher shortage issue. “In a perfect world, I wouldn’t have been qualified enough to be a teacher,” Wallach stated, desiring a situation where becoming a teacher is more competitive so that students are ensured to get the best of the best in education. 

Trevor Brady, the AP macroeconomics teacher, expressed how teachers “are quite literally entrusted with future generations, making them compassionate and intelligent. We shape young leaders. That deserves a better salary. Teachers wear many hats, we go above and beyond what we’re contractually paid for. Teachers shouldn’t have to worry about the strain of money so that they can focus on students.”