Rapid pay hikes urged for new teachers in Arizona

A new report takes a hypothetical Arizona elementary school and analyzes an ideal school structure to combat the teacher shortage.

The study proposes targeting financial barriers for early-career teachers by paying step-by-step salary increases the first few years, followed by a “rapid acceleration” in wages in years three through seven. This would incentivize early-career teachers to stick with the profession longer, says the report, “Strengthening and Supporting the Teaching Job in Arizona.”

Teachers have a lot stacked against them in Arizona, making teaching positions more difficult to fill, says the report, a partnership between the Arizona Community Foundation and the Steele Foundation.

The average Arizona district has a starting salary of $37,000 and an average salary of $49,500, maxing out at $63,000, it finds.

According to the report, Arizona has the second-highest student-teacher ratio in the United States and the lowest average per-pupil spending.

For example, the U.S. Department of Education reports that in school year 2019-20, Arizona’s public schools spent an average of $11,400 per pupil. The same school year, the U.S. average was $17,000.

Those figures include funds spent on instructional staff.

The study suggests cost-of-living adjustments for teachers and creating structures conducive to flexible staffing and team-oriented teaching. Financial incentives for strong teacher-leaders are also recommended.

Student aides could also be offered stipends, reducing teachers’ burden of less-skilled work tasks, it says.

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The study suggests districts utilize distance-learning technology more effectively. That includes offering paraprofessionals pay to monitor virtual courses, which, according to the report, would reduce the average class size by 0.8 students.

These courses would be offered among all district schools, not just within individual campuses.

The report’s main tenets for improving teaching as a career path in Arizona are making the work dynamic, rewarding, collaborative, sustainable and diverse.

“We cannot begin to move forward without recognizing the challenges our K-12 education system faces, particularly our state’s decades-long legacy of underinvestment in public education,” said Anna Maria Chávez, Arizona Community Foundation president and CEO, in a news release.

However, Arizona state policy can be reformed, Chavez said, which “offers an opportunity to redesign the teaching profession in a way that makes it more attractive and sustainable for current and future educators.”

The report’s action plan includes methods tested and piloted within Arizona, as well as in states with economic, political and educational systems similar to Arizona’s, it says.

The report was conducted for the Arizona Community and the Steele Foundation by the nonprofit organization Education Resource Strategies. It is an update of a 2018 study, “Arizona State Funding Project: Addressing the Teacher Labor Market Challenge.”