Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/801759
SPRING 2017 | ADVOCATE 9 at the capitol Education Advocates Urge Governor, Legislators to Make Teachers' Pay Raises a Priority By Lisa Irish, AZEdNews T wo Arizona Teachers of the Year presented Gov. Doug Ducey with a letter on January 23, 2017, from public education advocates asking him and legislators to put all new K-12 investments into teacher salaries to help relieve the teacher shortage. Arizona business leaders are concerned about the teacher shortage, which they believe is made significantly worse by Arizona's low teacher pay compared to the rest of the country, said Dick Foreman, president and chief executive officer of Arizona Business & Education Coalition. "I can't imagine any business CEO would think that a salary raise of $185 a year would change the teacher shortage in any meaningful way," said Dana Wolfe Naimark, president and chief executive officer of Children's Action Alliance. "We believe Arizona will make more progress by investing all the identified funds in teacher salaries, plus taking a pause in our 25+ straight years of tax cuts. It's time to make teachers a top priority so that they can help students succeed." The letter from AZ Schools Now that Christine Porter Marsh and Michelle Doherty hand-delivered to the governor asks for $134 million to be invested in permanent teacher salary increases. That includes the $95 million in the Governor's new K-12 funding budget proposal, $24 million set aside two years ago for achievement districts, $12 million from freezing corporate private school tax credits and $3 million from delaying this year's tax cut. "The corporate private school tax credit, ironically, has been growing at a rate of 20 percent per year, even as public school inflation adjustments have not even reached the voter approved 2 percent level in several years," Foreman said. "The very modest corporate tax cuts, as well, are off the business radar as meaningful Arizona Teachers of the Year Michelle Doherty, center, and Christine Porter Marsh, right, deliver a letter from AZ Schools Now to Daniel Scarpinato, left, with the Office of the Arizona Governor that asks Gov. Doug Ducey legislators to put all new K-12 investments into teacher salaries to help relieve the teacher shortage. Arizona Teachers of the Year Michelle Doherty, 2017, left, and Christine Porter Marsh, 2016, right at the Office of the Arizona Governor. Photos courtesy of Julie Erfle/AZ Schools Now Teacher Shortage Infographic by Lisa Irish/AZEdNews