A report to the Idaho state legislature paints a bleak picture for teacher morale (full report).
“We could see an undercurrent of despair among teachers,” Lance McCleve with Idaho’s Office of Performance Evaluations says. “And this isn’t to say all teachers are having a really hard time but we did see a large proportion and responses and results from our surveys that show a large proportion of teacher that seem to perceive that there’s a climate that disparages their effort and belittles their contribution.”
The report shows the vast majority of principals and superintendents say their biggest obstacle to recruiting teachers is compensation. The average teacher salary in Idaho is $43,000 a year. That’s lower than five of Idaho’s six neighboring states and it takes on average more than ten years teaching to reach that level.
This is really the issue for policy makers. Compensation should be discussed in terms of new teacher salaries and not just average salaries.