Louisiana is raising teacher pay again. Will it help keep experienced teachers?
William Taylor Potter, Lafayette Daily Advertiser
5 min read
Louisiana teachers are set to get a $1,500 raise, thanks to the budget passed by the legislature and signed by Gov. John Bel Edwards, but the state's average pay for teachers will likely remain below the regional average.
The latest increase is the fifth that K-12 teachers have received over the last several years and the largest of Edwards' time as governor. Edwards initially sought to give teachers a $2,000 raise this year, but legislators lowered it to $1,500 for teachers. Support staff members will receive a $750 raise.
Louisiana has struggled to recruit and retain high-performing teachers, and the Louisiana Legislative Auditor detailed the impacts of that struggle in a report released in May. The audit outlined how teacher pay and qualifications affect student outcomes in the state.
Louisiana State Superintendent of Education Cade Brumley wrote in his response to the audit that the pay increase represents a renewed commitment to teachers in Louisiana.
"In the State of Louisiana, and across our country, we must elevate the teaching profession," Brumley wrote. "We must consider policy and practice adjustments to recruit talent, retain educators, and reconsider staffing and compensation models for the twenty-first century. Teachers are valuable professionals."
Higher pay can help the state keep experienced teachers
According to the audit, higher pay would make teachers more likely to stay in the state, which would help the state develop and retain experienced teachers.
"We found that teachers with more years of experience tended to be more effective, and that improvements in their effectiveness generally occurred during the first five years of teaching," Louisiana Legislative Auditor Michael Waguespack wrote in the audit.
The audit also identified several factors, including pay, that can lead to higher retention. Across the state, the average teacher rate is around 90%, but the audit says the rate increases by 0.4 percentage points for every $1,000 added to the salary. Female teachers are 2.7 points more likely to stay, and a teacher with five years of experience is 3 percentage points more likely to stay than a first-year teacher.
Some factors — like high housing costs, having a graduate or doctorate degree, being close to retirement or high expulsion rates — can lower the retention rate.
During the 2019-2020 academic year, Louisiana teachers had an average salary of around $51,566, which ranked 12th of the 16 Southern Regional Education Board states. The average of the SREB states was $55,205, about 6.6% higher than Louisiana's average pay during that year. The national average is around $64,100.
"Salary plays a key role in recruiting and retaining teachers because it impacts teachers’ decisions about where to work by increasing or decreasing the desirability of a particular position," the audit said. "As a result, schools and districts that have higher salaries may be able to hire more highly qualified and experienced teachers than those that offer lower salaries."
How much does experience matter?
The legislative auditor's office found that more than half of teachers with four years of experience or more are rated as effective-proficient or highly effective. The percentage dropped around 10 percentage points for teachers with one or two years of experience.
Teachers that are rated effective-proficient or highly effective rank in the top 50% of teachers' scores on the state's Value-Added Model, which measures teacher performance.
The audit cited a report from the U.S. Department of Education that said Louisiana had the fourth-highest rate of teachers in their first or second year of teaching in the U.S. during the 2017-2018 academic year, with more than 16% of teachers being in their first or second year.
Certified teachers — which generally imeans that a teacher has demonstrated they meet the minimum requirements for the job — are also more proficient, the audit shows.
For the 2018-2019 year, 7.9% of traditional public school teachers were uncertified. That same year, only 43.4% of uncertified teachers were rated as effective-proficient or highly effective. Around 51.3% of certified teachers met the effective-proficient mark or higher.
Generally speaking, teacher experience and certification is higher in schools with higher School Performance Scores. Teachers in schools given an A, for example, have an average of 13.7 years of experience and only 5.7% of teachers are uncertified. Around 57.5% of teachers at A-rated schools were considered to be effective-proficient or highly effective.
At F-schools, the average experience is around 11.4 years, and 23.8% of teachers at these schools are not certified. Less than half of the teachers attained at least effective-proficient status.
Louisiana also faces a significant teacher shortage. Brumley wrote in his response to the audit that Louisiana needs 2,000 more teachers across the state.
"Students, in a state with long-standing educational challenges recently exacerbated by a pandemic and storms, deserve a high-quality teacher in every classroom," Brumley wrote. "We exist to educate students but we cannot exist without teachers. Sadly, over several decades, we have too frequently left our teachers behind. We must all do better together. For them. For our students."
Which schools have experienced teachers?
There's a wide discrepancy when it comes to teacher experience and pay at schools with a more affluent student population, the audit found. There was also a wide gap in pay between A-graded schools and F-rated schools.
At schools where 20% or less of the students are economically disadvantaged, the average pay for teachers is $59,283. For schools where 80% or more of the students are economically disadvantaged, the average salary drops 15.6% to $51,262.
