Eligible teachers will see pay increases averaging $6,000
Updated: October 7, 2022
Schools Superintendent Keith Hayashi told the Board of Education Thursday that thousands of public and charter school teachers affected by salary compression — 72% of the teaching workforce — should start seeing increased pay in their Nov. 18 paychecks.
Retroactive pay for eligible educators going back to their first day of work for this school year will also be included in that Nov. 18 paycheck, the Hawaii State Department of Education confirmed to the Hawaii State Teachers Association on Friday. Retroactive pay will be credited back to the first working day of the 2022–23 school year (July 26 for 10-month teachers and July 1 for 12-month teachers).
HSTA expects that by the end of October, HIDOE’s Office of Talent Management will provide each eligible teacher a personnel action form (Form 5) notifying them of their change in salary step based on their number of years of service.
HSTA is discussing an appeals process with HIDOE in which teachers will have a number of months to request a correction should their Bargaining Unit 5 service time be inaccurate. Details on that process will be announced soon.
HSTA will reach out in the coming weeks to each charter school regarding compression fix next steps.
Every two years of service in the department and public charter schools will equate to a step increase on the salary schedule to fix the pay of teachers who have been stuck in the middle of the salary schedule, Hayashi told the BOE in a briefing about the department’s plan to address teacher salary equity and compression Thursday.
Affected teachers will receive increases from one to six steps on the salary schedule, Hayashi said.
Ten-month teachers in the lowest salary range, or those with two or three years of teaching service in Hawaii, would move one salary step and see an annual increase of $1,525 under the plan Hayashi detailed Thursday. Twelve-month teachers in the highest salary range moving five steps would get an annual increase of about $18,057, he said.
The nearly 9,200 educators eligible for repricing will see their annual pay increase by an average of $6,000, according to an HSTA analysis.
In written testimony to the board, Hawaii State Teachers Association President Osa Tui, Jr. said, “These salary corrections will be life-changing for so many.”
“The implementation plan being discussed today will ultimately benefit Hawaii’s keiki who will not be losing seasoned educators in a time of unprecedented teacher shortages throughout our country,” he wrote.
Testifying in person before the BOE’s Human Resources Committee Thursday morning, Tui said the HSTA is “so thankful to the Board of Education, leadership in the Department of Education, the Charter School Commission, our legislators who set aside this money from the House and the Senate and the governor, who authorized the funding of this, and to all of our educators and to all of the allies that we have to get this done.”
“To have so many of our teachers saying ‘You know what, I’m going to stick around, I’m going to be here for our keiki for many more years because of this. That I feel valued, that I feel respected finally, we haven’t had that for so long.’ So I just want to say thank you so much,” Tui told board members.
Funding for increased pay will remain in HIDOE’s base budget, Hayashi says
Hayashi told the BOE Human Resources Committee Thursday that, “After this board meeting, the department will begin the process to effectuate payments. It is anticipated that teachers will begin seeing the adjustments in their Nov. 18, 2022 paycheck.”
“Funding for these increases is included in the state budget passed through the 2022 legislative session and is expected to remain in the department’s base budget on a recurring basis,” Hayashi added.
“The department will assess its ability to retain teachers by utilizing metrics shared at a recent strategic plan data workshop relating to teacher positions filled and teacher retention rates,” Hayashi said.
BOE member Lynn Fallin said she hoped the impact of the measure “will make more than a dent in recruitment and retention as an issue.”
BOE Human Resources Committee Chair Kaimana Barcarse responded by saying, “Just as we have done with the (shortage) differentials, that we will be receiving information and reports from the department as this rolls out, both solid data as well as some great anecdotal data as to how this has really improved the teaching profession, so we will be looking forward to that.”
Tui says teachers at the top salary step deserve ‘special consideration’
Tui, the HSTA president, also told board members, “While this plan will address salary compression for nearly 9,200 current Hawaii public school educators, HSTA asks that in upcoming collective bargaining negotiations, special consideration is given to the over 400 educators currently at the top of the pay scale who continue to remain in our ranks, but will not benefit from any salary increases because they are already at the top of the pay scale.”
HIDOE Interim Assistant Superintendent for the Office of Talent Management Sean Bacon told BOE members, “There are about 400 or so teachers that are at the top of the salary schedule that were not able to benefit from this compression. If we were to, for example, add an additional step on the salary schedule, or whatever, that would be something that we would need to negotiate with the union at that point.”
How will teachers’ years of service be calculated?
Under the rubric to make teachers’ pay consistent with their years of service, any educator with 22 years or more of teaching service would automatically move to Step 14B, the top spot on the salary scale. HSTA’s research shows that when compression is fixed, about 2,300 veteran teachers who’ve been stuck in the middle of the salary scale or compressed for years will move to the top salary step.
Ten-month teachers will receive one year of service credit if they served on paid status from the first teacher workday to the last teacher workday of the school year. Twelve-month teachers receive one year of service credit for each year they were on paid status from July 1 to June 30, a period that will be considered their school year.
The HIDOE’s memo to address salary equity and compression includes a heat map that illustrates where teachers are on the salary schedule currently and where they will move to after the compression fix is implemented. The department’s Implementation Plan for Salary Adjustments to Address Compression in Teacher Salaries includes further details, including a chart that shows salary step adjustments expected by teachers affected by compression.
The HSTA is compiling an updated list of frequently asked compression fix questions and will publish the FAQs in the days ahead.
Plan reflects years-long effort to make pay scale fairer
The HSTA began working closely with HIDOE three years ago on a comprehensive plan to end teachers’ compressed pay while creating and increasing differentials in key shortage areas. Throughout 2019, both sides collaborated on a plan that was presented to the BOE and state lawmakers.
While the shortage differentials received BOE approval in late 2019, the compression fix required additional funding from the state Legislature in the 2020 session.
The teacher compression pay plan was first considered by the BOE Human Resources Committee in February of 2020. Legislative committees began hearing the proposal early that year, and things looked promising until COVID-19 hit, scuttling our plans and causing lawmakers to end their session after only hearing a few emergency measures as the pandemic worsened.
“Due to the uncertainty of the economy of the state, funding was not available to address compression,” Hayashi said of the 2020 efforts. “Since then, the state’s economy has rebounded.”
In the 2022 legislative session, lawmakers introduced bills to fund a compression fix and assure that veteran teachers are compensated for their years of service in the classroom. They then added funding to the state budget to cover the cost of repricing the salaries of thousands of educators. Gov. David Ige signed the state budget into law July 7, approving money to fix compression, restore paid professional development and make shortage differentials permanent. On July 25, the day before classroom teachers reported back to campuses for the new school year, State House Speaker Scott Saiki and House Finance Chair Sylvia Luke joined veteran HSTA teachers for an “unretirement party” to celebrate their plans to remain teaching instead of retiring this year.
Hayashi says the plan detailed Thursday to the BOE will fix a longstanding problem.
“The plan provides employer-initiated pay adjustments based on years of service for Bargaining Unit 5. Teacher salary compression is the result of past years when no step movements were negotiated. Without these step movements, veteran teachers did not receive salary increases to compensate for nor acknowledge the years of service in the classroom,” Hayashi said.