State board of education member right to push for teacher raises

Published October 8, 2013

Editorial by Winston-Salem Journal, October 8, 2013.

With more than 30 years logged as a commercial banker, John Tate knows much about the economy and how to attract good employees. He knows that North Carolina’s current teacher pay schedule won’t help grow the state’s economy or in the recruitment and retention of good teachers.

The veteran State Board of Education member sprung a surprise on his colleagues last week. Calling current teacher pay “flat pathetic,” he proposed a resolution calling upon the legislature to raise state teacher pay to the national average, the News & Observer of Raleigh reported.

Board Chairman Bill Cobey ruled the resolution out of order, saying it could be considered at a future board meeting. We encourage the board to pass the resolution and let the legislature know that teachers need much higher salaries.

Tate, an appointee of former Gov. Mike Easley, joins Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Forest in calling for higher teacher pay. But, unlike Forest, Tate’s proposal is reasonable and attainable.

Forest suggested several weeks ago, in off-the-cuff remarks, that the state have the highest paid teachers in the nation, a task that would cost at least $2.6 billion if other states froze their teacher pay and much more if they did not.

North Carolina teachers now rank 46th in salaries, according to the National Education Association. They have had one raise -- of just 1.2 percent -- in the last five years. The Republican-led legislature has not budgeted a raise for next school year, and plans to install a performance-based pay scale that will inadequately boost salaries for what amounts to an insufficient number of teachers.

North Carolina paid its teachers at the national average in the late 1990s, and was as high as 25th in the nation as recently as 2008. Some legislators justify our low teacher salaries on the grounds that the cost-of-living here is low compared to the national average. But that’s not the case in Forsyth and other urban counties in what is becoming an increasingly urban state.

Teachers need a big raise, and the state board should tell that to the legislature.