Wake up, Congress, and give teachers a break

  • By Michelle Singletary
  • Saturday, August 28, 2004 9:00pm
  • Business

Let me see if I have this right: Our government can give tax breaks to revenue-rich corporations whose executives often earn more in one month than some of us do in our lifetimes, but we seem to have a hard time giving a puny $250 tax break for teachers who spend their own money to buy classroom supplies.

In 2002, Congress passed and President Bush signed a bill that gave eligible educators a $250 federal tax deduction. The tax break was available to teachers in public or private elementary and secondary schools.

So why am I using past tense in referring to the teacher tax break?

Well, Congress hasn’t yet seen fit to make it permanent. This well-deserved bit of tax relief expired at the end of 2003.

“The $250 tax deduction was not a huge amount of money but at least it was an acknowledgment that teachers are spending their own money in the classroom,” said Barbara Kerr, president of the California Teachers Association. “By allowing it to go away it just shows that teachers are not respected.”

The House has passed a bill that would make the deduction permanent and increases the amount to $400. A similar piece of legislation has been introduced in the Senate. That version increases the deduction to $500 and also makes it permanent.

“Educators are digging deep into their pockets, and they are doing it every year,” said Anjetta McQueen, spokeswoman for National Education Association (NEA), which supports the legislation.

Kerr said, based on several studies the union has done, teachers in California spend anywhere from $500 to more than $1,000 to supplement what they get for their classrooms.

Laura Lebron, who teaches English at Dana Middle School in the San Pedro section of Los Angeles, says she spends about $250 to $500 per year on school supplies and would probably spend more, but she’s got three kids of her own.

Nationally, the NEA contends, teachers spend an average $589 a year for classroom supplies not provided by their districts. New teachers shell out more than $700, says the NEA.

Claudette Edgerton-Swain, a first-grade teacher at Arlington Elementary School in Baltimore, said she has spent thousands of dollars of her own money in the 29 years she has been teaching.

“At one time I worked a second job so that I could afford to do special things for my students,” Edgerton-Swain said.

Judy Rainey, who teaches second grade at Arlington, is also spending herself crazy trying to provide for her students. “We purchase lots of outside material(s) … that represent the quality you’d expect for a good education,” she said.

At $250, the tax deduction wasn’t nearly enough. “The teacher tax credit is a modest but significant step toward recognizing the invaluable services that teachers provide each and every day to our children and to our communities,” said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who proposed the Senate bill to make the teacher tax deduction permanent. “I have visited more than a hundred schools in Maine, and everywhere I go I find teachers who are sacrificing their own money to better educate our children.”

When I think about this issue, I can’t help but think about President Bush’s education program, “No Child Left Behind.” I guess that doesn’t apply to their teachers. Clearly many are spending their behinds off trying to make sure our kids aren’t left behind.

I know the federal budget is plagued by deficit spending. I know the war in Iraq is literally and figuratively costing us an arm and a leg. But where would any of us be without teachers?

My life has been greatly affected by educators who often worked long hours in overcrowded classrooms. We think nothing of discouraging folks from going into the field of teaching because the pay isn’t great, yet parents will go broke trying to send their kids to schools with the best teachers.

Congress should give teachers a break and give them this tax break.

If you agree, write to your representatives. Support the Teacher Tax Relief Act. Go to www.house.gov/writerep to find out who represents you in the House and his or her contact information. For the Senate, go to www.senate.gov.

Washington Post Writers Group

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