The El Dorado School Board this month approved a new salary schedule for the 2023/2024 school year, putting it in compliance with new statewide teacher pay requirements.
The LEARNS Act, signed into law by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders on March 8, calls for a starting salary of $50,000 for all certified teachers in Arkansas, along with $2,000 raises for teachers already making $48,000.01 or more.
"The salary schedule basically follows the new Arkansas LEARNS Act," Superintendent Jim Tucker told board members during their regular meeting on April 10. "It basically says that any teacher making $48,000 and below will be brought up to $50,000, and any teacher making $48,000.01 and above will get a $2,000 pay increase, and that follows the law that was provided."
Board member Todd Whatley asked whether the district had been provided with state funding to cover the raises.
"The state is providing funds," Tucker said. "They gave us almost enough, and there are some other rules, procedures in the law – but I mean, really, they gave us almost right at it to make it happen."
Shelley Pruitt, the district's chief financial officer, said in a follow up email that the district has calculated that it will cost $2,126,291.06 to provide the raises the LEARNS Act calls for. The state, she said, has provided $2,090,538.
"Keep in mind that every number... is preliminary in nature," she said in the email. "There are still questions that linger about applying the $2,000 increase to staff already making over $48,000, and we will not have answers until they develop the rules and regulations (procedures) that go along with the Act."
Tucker said the state had promised to provide all the funding the district will need to provide the LEARNS Act raises.
"They did (promise), and they better, that's all I'll say," he said. "At this moment, they're not putting us in a bind. I think we do a pretty good job with our budget, the El Dorado School District... and I think we're sitting in a good place right now in regards to budget, even with the Arkansas LEARNS Act."
Stepless schedule
The ESD's current salary schedule for the 2022/2023 school year looks a lot different than the upcoming school year's will.
This year's salary schedule includes 21 steps, ranging from a starting salary of $40,000 for first year teachers without advanced degrees to a high of $54,175 for veteran teachers with advanced degrees.
Tucker and Pruitt were working Friday on finalizing the salary schedule for the 2023/2024 school year, he said, and hope to have it completed by next Thursday. The schedule won't include steps for experience or further education like the current schedule does, however.
School Board member Wayne Gibson said that he thinks the stepless salary schedule proposed at the meeting is unfair to veteran teachers with more experience than newcomers.
"I think – and this is my opinion – that Governor Sarah and her crew just came in and kind of blitzkreiged through, pushed this bill through, I think, without really giving a lot of consideration to educators on how it best fits them," he said. "I am all for doing all we can for teachers, but my concern is, with someone that's at $48,000 and you can only give them a $2,000 bump, and then someone that comes in as a new teacher, you take them up to the same number – something's just not right about that."
Tucker said he'd heard similar feelings from teachers.
"I think your sentiment is felt by most veteran teachers in our district," Tucker said. "We will do everything we can to provide a salary schedule that has some steps in the future. We're going to work hard to do that. It's a priority for us."
Whatley said he's seen similar issues with pay crop up in the private sector as well, and Board Vice President Vicki Dobson said she's seen it as a state employee as well.
"At LANXESS, El Dorado Chemical, Delek, all of them, it's pretty much the same thing. I've been with LANXESS for 37 years and there's kids that come in that's been there two years that's making the same thing I am now, because that's what they want to do, they want to retain people," Whatley said.
The El Dorado School Board will next meet on Monday, May 8, at 6 p.m. at the district administration office.