In a recent post, I highlighted that the difference between the Wyoming Board of Education starting salary proposal and the Wyoming Teacher’s request was about $1.59 a day. The chart above puts that more into perspective when compared to starting salaries across Hamilton County. Data for this chart was obtained from the Wyoming School Board.
The school districts are listed from top to bottom according to their ranking in the most recent state assessment. That puts Wyoming at the top and Cincinnati at the bottom. The length of the bars represents the starting annual salary with the scale ranging from $30,000/yr to $42,000/yr (although Indian Hill’s $39,588 is the highest starting salary in the county).
The blue vertical line represents Wyoming’s current starting salary – $36,101/yr. The red vertical line represents the Wyoming Board offer – $36,823/yr. The green vertical line represents the Wyoming Teachers’ request – $37,112/yr…$289/yr above the Board offer.
I used the vertical lines to visualize where the current, offer, and requested salaries fit when viewed in light of starting salaries throughout the county. Today, our teachers are on par with Reading, the Board proposal puts them on par with Oak Hills (Delhi), and the Teachers are requesting parity with Deer Park.
As the Board has so often said, times are tough and it’s rough on everyone. I agree but we seem to have forgotten that the “everyone” in that includes teachers. So many of our teachers have so much Wyoming Pride that they’ll bleed blue if you cut them. The Board’s strategy is betting that they probably won’t leave over a couple hundred a year (and those that do leave can be easily replaced by someone else, probably cheaper).
But what about the college grad who may know nothing more about Wyoming than the quality of its most recent state ranking. They don’t bleed blue yet. If they have an option to come to Wyoming, they probably also have the option to go to Sycamore, Princeton, Finneytown, and Deer Park. As the relationship between the administration continues to deteriorate daily, at what point will those grads start thinking – “Why choose Wyoming when I can make the same money and be more appreciated at Deer Park?”.
Good question – and one we as a community need to contend with before top college teaching grads start voting with their feet for greener pastures.