With $9 billion in the state’s general fund “and revenues increasing,” Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas says Arizona can afford increasing funding to education. She’s calling on the state Legislator and Gov. Doug Ducey to immediately appropriate at least $400 million that would specifically be invested on teachers in the classroom, according to a press release from Douglas’ office.
The proposal is one of many Douglas plans to unveil during her “AZ Kids Can’t Afford to Wait!” campaign.
“As I traveled the state during the campaign, and then for several months on my ‘We Are Listening’ tour, the number one concern I heard was the lack of funding and support for teachers,” Douglas said in a media statement. “After seeing revenues so far above forecasts just a few months into this fiscal year, I believe that Arizonans can no longer afford to wait to provide higher quality education to our children.”
She suggests using Proposition 301 (in 2000, Arizona voters passed an initiative that allows for a sales tax to contribute to education funding. The money would go towards increasing teachers’ salaries, reward “high performing” teachers, among other areas) to identify which teachers are “eligible recipients.” The $400 million, she says, could be spent on teacher salaries, hiring more teachers to reduce classroom sizes, or a combination based on local needs.
“We don’t need court cases and lawsuits to fund our school system, we need commitment and leadership. I applaud the efforts of the Governor and the Legislature to increase overall funding and to focus on classroom spending. However, the 8-year-olds who were trying to read when the ‘temporary’ cut to the 2 percent increase was made in 2009 will all graduate or drop out before having their funding restored under all the current plans being considered,” Douglas says. “We have an entire generation of children for whom over $1 billion dollars of education was not provided. We can never go back and provide that education to them. How many more children must suffer the same fate before the leaders of our state truly prioritize education?”
From the press release:
The proposal calls for $400 million from the general fund to be appropriated by the Legislature and the Governor in a special session. It does not count any current funding against that number, nor does it envision any changes to First Things First funding. If the Governor’s state land trust plan is approved by the Legislature and the people in some form, any land trust education revenues in excess of 2.5 percent would count toward the figure, so long as the State Treasurer verifies the expenditure would not deplete the corpus of the land trust.
The Superintendent will also be working with Arizona’s Congressional delegation over the next several years to return federal lands to our state, so that the state land trust corpus can grow through land use leases and the sale of new lands. However, the core of the proposal is that under any circumstances, the entire $400 million must be made available every year with no drop off in the future. Schools cannot hire teachers and make plans if they cannot count on having the money available.
This article appears in Sep 10-16, 2015.
8 year olds can’t read, and mo’ money will fix it? You could spend a trillion dollars and it won’t change the dropout rate. I’m not falling for that nonsense any more.
If you don’t like teaching Suntran is hiring.
Better idea Roger, use this $400 M plus the monies already owed the districts by the state (somewhere between $318M and $1.3 B) to provide Arizona teachers with the same free health and retirement benefits enjoyed by SunTran’s bus drivers and mechanics. These benefits would help local districts and the state attract highly skilled teachers as the supply continues to lag well behind the supply.
Oops, I mentioned highly skilled workers in short supply, better kick in an additional $10/hour for the teachers.
Tucson is closing schools left and right. We need more teachers? Get rid of the ones not contributing at 1010. Then let’s talk, after you lower my property taxes.
We are lacking quality students. They are tearing down schools. Looks to me like there should be plenty of money. Sounds like Suntran drivers make more than teachers. Is that true?
Rat,
When you load in the free healthcare and retirement, yes they are. Especially the 50%’ers who are making $20/hr before adding the free benefits and overtime. You are looking at bus drivers and mechanics making $64K (with freebies and BEFORE the overtime).
“As I traveled the state during the campaign, and then for several months on my ‘We Are Listening’ tour, the number one concern I heard was the lack of funding and support for teachers,” Douglas said in a media statement.
Did she happen to talk to any parents?
Rat – as far as the comparison of the bus drive salaries to the teacher salaries, there was no adjustment in statement of “salary” for the 10 month work schedule of teachers versus the 12 month work schedule of drivers.
How many illegals are we paying for? How many teachers is that?
Lots of money available – for illegals.
It won’t get fixed until we all know the truth. What does a teacher earn after 10 years?
Thanks for input above.
10 years experience and a M.S. in a hard science earns $32K at a local school district.
Does that sound like a lot of money to you?
Fenyman – 34k is the starting salary for 10 months of work, no experience in TUSD. Average teacher pay in Phoenix, excluding all stipends and incentives from the base is $46k. Again, for 10 months of work, not 12.
And they have probably the most lucrative retirement system of all.
10 months of 10 – 12 hour days. Teachers come in early and stay late. They take papers home to grade, and they work on their weekends. They do more work in 10 months than a bus driver does in 12. What? That’s right, try again.
HumanBean
Bull pucky. The work day is 7 hours. Almost all professionals work off the clock. That’s why they’re paid salaries, not hourly.
If money is what they are after, why did they choose teaching? And why are they entitled to an annual salary with 10 WEEKS paid vacation from the first day on the job?
I’m looking at my son’s school calendar. It’s 9 months plus one week, and that does not include the two weeks off for Christmas, days off for other holidays. The 10 month is bullish*t. Make that 14 WEEKS PAID vacation.
And if you want to get to the truth, yes, teachers are invaluable to our children when not indoctrinating.
However, if you bring up the education they receive to perform the job, i.e. the reference to the masters, one must first acknowledge that a Bachelor in Education is by far the least challenging degree to achieve. The masters doesn’t even bring them up to bachelor’s in other fields.
And how many billions are being stolen from the taxpayer to fund the education of illegals?
Put bluntly, they’re are far too many teachers on the payroll, mostly because the K-12 public bureaucracy refuses to accept technology and the insistence of liberals that we treat illegals better than citizens or endangered species.
Rat T after 12 years by base salary is 34K a year. I teach very few undocumented students but I do teach 41 students per class period and spend my nights and weekends grading over 200 students’ work. I love my job. I can only afford to do it because my husband works in the private sector. I have never seen a paycheck over 900 because I am unemployed for 2 months and stretch my paycheck out over the summer. I too pay into my pension and to upgrade my insurance to usable. Please remember that TUSD might have its problems but it is only one school district. My students deserve more attention to their work and their learning and I deserve a living wage. All I ask is for my salary to keep up with inflation, manageable class sizes and classroom supplies like board markers, printer ink, textbooks and/or databases. I would like a library and librarians who can support my students acquisition of knowledge and a safe school in which the roof doesn’t leak. Go volunteer at a school and see that most teachers are competent professionals who want what is best for their students.
“’As I traveled the state during the campaign, and then for several months on my ‘We Are Listening’ tour, the number one concern I heard was the lack of funding and support for teachers,’” Douglas said in a media statement.
What, Again said: “Did she happen to talk to any parents?”
Of course she talked to parents.
But more importantly, she listened to them. Dozens of them–from the Tucson area alone–at the “We Are Listening” tour at PCC last May (and again in Oro Valley a couple weeks later). She also listened to teachers, administrators, and other education proponents. (I’m guessing you weren’t there, or you’d already know this.)
As for teacher salary, Tucson is shameful. Consider: some 22 years ago, I completed my student teaching at a small, rural school (think: low cost of living) in west Michigan. My supervising teacher had 20 years of experience, a Master’s degree, and was highly qualified to teach secondary English–almost identical to my own qualifications (I’m also HQ in secondary mathematics).
And my supervising teacher–back in 1993–made 16K/year more than I make right now teaching full-time at one of Tucson’s “higher paid” schools. So, yeah, in my opinion, Diane Douglas is right on the money.
Isn’t interesting that the amount of salary is always supplemented by additional benefits that are not mentioned?
According to the TEA and the 2014-2015 bargaining agreement, a teacher with 10 years experience is hired at 39k plus a 2k stipend for the masters. Funny how that 34k turned into 41k. There is also the direct distribution of state sales tax dollars from Prop 301. And concerning contributing to the pension, taxpayer contributions far outweigh the contributions by the beneficiary. And remember, that comes with a 14 week PAID (by the taxpayer) vacation.
But since most teachers are liberal, they can’t see they’ve simply been duped into supporting Douglas who it just seems like yesterday was the wicked witch from the north.
Oh, the power of a teacher pity party.
How many billions being stolen from Arizona taxpayers to pay for educating the illegals?
If being a teacher is such a great, easy, well-paid career, then why do we have such a massive shortage of teachers? Even the best school districts in Arizona will hire just about anyone (certified or not), especially to teach math or special ed, because there simply aren’t enough applicants.
There is only a shortage of teachers because of the vast numbers of illegals filling the seats.
Guess whose exploiting the illegals for greed, denying our own children the education they deserve, for money in their own pockets.
It would really help to see a complete salary, benefit, pension expose on a TUSD teacher. It seems pension on principals are nearly $100,000 per year. Is that fair to taxpayers or teachers? Do educators also qualify for SSI benefits?
I never stated TUSD and I stated the qualification was an M.S.
There is too much “unaccounted for” money floating around TUSD.
I can tell you from personal knowledge that the pension on principals is not $100,000 a year. Mine is 1/3 of that. Depends on how long you worked, how much education you attained, and how old you are which adds up to the total pension benefit. Teachers are paying a substantial amount of their health benefits and retirement benefits into the system throughout their employment. Most teachers earn a Master’s degree during their service, not before. That means they are going to school after hours and during the summer to improve their skills and stay current with both requirements and practice. This is not free, although after you have completed the advanced degree, you get paid a little more. 10 weeks of paid vacation is ridiculous. Some teachers spread that salary over twelve months so they don’t have to work in the summer while they go to school or travel to improve their skills and knowledge. Most don’t because it barely covers their family’s needs. If a teacher is the sole support of a family of several members, it is very hard to make the mortgage, etc. on one teacher’s pay.
Incidentally, teacher contributions to the retirement fund are EXACTLY the same as taxpayer contributions. That is required by law, and that 7% or whatever it is this year comes off the top of the salary, so reduce the actual spendable income during the year.
I am amazed and frankly disappointed at most of the remarks above. Arizona schools are funded at that absolute bottom of almost all of the states. We are either 47th or 52 among the States, DC and Puerto Rico. No matter how you examine the orange it looks the same. Instead of recognizing this, some commenters blame illegals, accuse the school of some sort of shell game with the money the money that they do get. Some commenters think that teachers have an easy work life with copious benefits and most of the summer off. Others simply blame teachers, students, parents anyone but themselves.
The reality is much different. Teachers work hard, put in long hours preparing for the classroom, grading papers at night their day goes much beyond the time in the classroom. Many that I have spoken with need to supplement their meager pay some with food stamps others by temp work during summers. Many teachers take money out of their own meager pockets to buy needed classroom supplies. Our teachers need more pay, more money in the classroom, many schools need repair, new books, technology all these cost money. An education is absolutely vital for us to attract business, and prepare this next generation to become contributing citizens. Our parents and their neighbors paid for out education, it’s time for us to play it forward.
gcb1 – Why in the world am I, a Pima County property tax payer contributing 50% to your pension? Get out of my pocket. It’s not your money. I earned it.
Michael S. Ellegood – of course we’re at the bottom of per pupil funding – you know why? Tucson – 5th poorest city in the country and the taxpayers are footing the bill for thousands and thousands of illegals, just in Tucson!
Seattle teachers have walked out on students and are demanding a 14 percent pay raise. Union reps have turned down 10% plus colas.
Which would have equaled about the same increase.
Teachers have been poorly represented by their union. Funny thing is they are using the same argument Tucson teachers are using.
Sad and tired. Just got my new property tax statement. Just look at the portion going to public education. This is ridiculous.