The Sept. 5 article, “State Supreme Court to hear progress on McCleary case,” states that the state Supreme Court will convene a hearing to “ensure public schools are amply funded by 2018”; “paying teachers a competitive salary … staff and classrooms … all day kindergarten and smaller class sizes through third grade” and “with dependable and regular revenue sources.” The phrases “amply funded,” “enough staff,” “smaller class sizes,” and “dependable and regular revenue” are all slippery general terms for which five qualified people could well give five different answers if asked to define.
Chief Justice Madsen writes that “What remains to be done to achieve compliance is undeniably huge, but it is not undefinable.” If that is the case, why then has not the court defined what the objective should be? It seem to me a committee of intelligent citizens could discuss for hours what any one of these terms might mean.
Our state must be doing pretty well compared with the other 47 of the lower 48 since only 15 states have higher beginning salaries for high school teachers than our $36,300 and only five have higher average salaries than our $52,200. Further, these are just the bare salaries, ignoring bonuses, 401(k), and any other additional compensation. This information is from the internet, which cites the National Education Association. Further, there can be substantial variation from one city to another; consider the city of Everett (not the wealthiest city) starts high school teachers at $48,600.
Bob McCoy
Everett
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