On Monday, Senate and House Republicans announced their plan to pay teachers more, with an average pay raise of 7%. They say their “Teacher Pay Fund” plan, will increase pay without raising taxes.
Last session, Republican state lawmakers proposed legislation that would have increased teacher pay but the teacher’s union opposed the bill and got it killed. This new Republican plan is to get around Democrat and union opposition and give the decision directly to the voters.
The “Teacher Pay Fund” plan will put the question of teacher raises on the November 2024 ballot through a revision of Prop 123. The money generated through Prop 123, unlike in the past, will be dedicated solely to teacher pay raises, beginning in the summer of 2025.
While details are currently being hammered out, the end result should be an increase of approximately $4000 per Arizona K-12 public school teachers — without allowing for school boards or administrators to redirect the money away from teachers and towards administrative costs instead.
“This initiative will allow Arizona to be more competitive in teacher salaries, boosting teacher pay in Arizona above the national average, and making a big increase to starting teacher pay,” said Senate President Warren Petersen. “We believe we can continue this dedicated funding source long-term because the fund has already grown exponentially over the last eight years, even during tumultuous economic times.”
“Republicans have led the charge in dedicating billions of new dollars to K-12 education, on top of Prop 123 funds and inflationary increases, but unfortunately not enough of those dollars are getting into our classrooms or to our teachers,” said Senator Ken Bennett. “Arizona teachers right now make about $56,700, on average. This proposal will increase teacher pay to an average of over $60,000. We can — and we should — do better. This is a responsible proposal that won’t create a new tax burden for our citizens.”
“Unfortunately, too many school boards and district administrators continue to divert valuable funds out of the classroom, effectively starving teachers and students of critically needed resources, which is why we’ll incorporate safeguards into the plan guaranteeing these dollars go directly into the wallets of teachers,” said Senator Jake Hoffman.
A number of prominent lawmakers joined in the press conference, including House Speaker Ben Toma and State Representatives David Cook, Quang Nguyen, Matt Gress, Justin Wilmeth, and Travis Grantham.