HD70 - Public School Teacher Compensation


Executive Summary:
The 1987 Session- of the General Assembly amended Section 22.1-289.1of the Code of Virginia to require a biennial review of the salaries paid to public school teachers in the Commonwealth. A preliminary report was prepared in December, 1987 and the first biennial report was published as House Document Number 4 in June, 1989.

The legislation states that the review of teachers' salaries shall be reported to the Governor, the General Assembly, and the Board of Education by June 1 of each odd-numbered year. The legislation specifies that: "It is the goal of the Commonwealth that its public school teachers be compensated at a rate that is competitive in order to attract and keep competent teachers."

In order to comply with the legislative requirement, two indicators of competitiveness were reviewed:

• comparison of Virginia teachers' entry-level salaries with those of jobs in private industry and state government that have similar qualification requirements; and

• turnover and recruitment of Virginia teachers

In the 1994-95 school year, teachers' entry-level salaries are 2.4% below entry-level private salaries and exceed entry-level salaries of Virginia state employees by 3.0% The 1993 report revealed that teachers' entry-level salaries were below those of private industry by 1.8%, but were above entry-level salaries of Virginia state employees by 5.8%.

Localities reported that most teachers who left did so because of other than competitive reasons, such as retirement, family responsibilities, medical, and relocation. A significant turnover and recruitment problem noted by the localities is for special education teachers, which has been a continuing problem since the original report in 1987.