Kaitlin Klasen, SLU/YouGov research assistant, provides analysis on raising teachers' salaries following the release of the February 2023 SLU/Gov Poll results.
Missouri has the second lowest average starting teacher salary in the nation at $33,324, and Missouri’s average teacher salary in 2020 was $51,557, ranking 47th nationally. When asked by the SLU Poll/YouGov in July 2020, Missouri voters’ average guess for the average salary of a public school teacher in Missouri was $45,341. Even with this high salary figure, 74% of Missouri voters told the poll that public school teacher salaries should be increased. Missouri’s low pay makes hiring and retaining teachers difficult. The state government has made addressing teacher salaries a priority. At the beginning of this legislative session, House Minority Leader Crystal Quade said, “We’re going to be working with everything we have to make sure that our teachers are paid what they deserve.”
As a temporary fix in 2022, Governor Mike Parson signed into law a bill that granted $21.8 million to raise the teacher salary from a base level of $25,000 to $38,000. The funds came from extra federal pandemic aid. That state budget did not change the legal minimum salary but created an optional Teacher Baseline Salary Grant program for districts. School districts could apply to have the state cover 70% of the cost to increase teachers’ base salary to $38,000 if the district covered the other 30%. Over the last year, over 6,000 teachers and 356 districts participated in the grant program.
The Teacher Baseline Salary Grant program, however, only lasts one year. The Missouri State Legislature must now decide whether it will provide the funding to increase teacher pay for the fiscal year 2024. The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education estimated that changing the minimum teacher salary to $38,000 would cost approximately $29.5 million per year. Rep. Ed Lewis, a Republican from Moberly, believes moving immediately to $38,000 might be unachievable for certain districts. Lewis then proposed HB 189 that would make a base pay of $34,000 in the 2024-25 school year and then increase to $38,000 by the 2026-27 school year. The bill would also incrementally increase the base salary for teachers with ten years of experience and a master’s degree from $33,000 to $46,000 by the 2026-27 school year. After 2026-27, teachers’ base salaries would be adjusted for inflation.
The fate of Lewis’s bill is still unknown, but the public supports making the state assistance to increase teachers’ salaries permanent. On the August 2022 SLU Poll, 71% of Missourians indicated they would support such a law. The support is bipartisan with 85% of Democrats and 65% of Republicans indicating support. And legislators on both sides indicate support for increasing teachers’ salary. In his 2023 State of the State address, Governor Parson said, “Clearly this program is making a difference, and we are committed to continuing it”.
