Lawmakers will consider bills to fix salary compression, end salary class cap

With Hawaii expecting an improved economic outlook, leaders at the state Legislature plan on introducing proposals aimed at finally paying teachers for their years of experience.

House Education Committee Vice Chair Rep. Jeanne Kapela (D, Naalehu, Capt. Cook, Kailua-Kona) plans to introduce two bills — one addressing what’s referred to as salary compression in which teachers are not paid according to years of experience and a second that would remove the cap on salary classes so teachers have more of an incentive to seek professional development.

“We are heading into session with a billion-dollar surplus, which makes a lot of us hopeful that we can pass legislation that supports teachers and our working families,” Kapela told Honolulu Civil Beat. “We can absolutely afford to pay teachers more. We need to pay them what they’re worth.”

A step increase has been negotiated every other year in the collective bargaining agreements going back to 2013. When this new contract began on July 1, 2021, the employer did not agree to any step movement through to the expiration of the contract on June 30, 2023.

Based on data provided by the department in late 2021 and with the expectation that a step should be earned after every two full years of service, approximately 8,700 teachers, counselors, librarians and registrars in Hawaii who are not at the top of the salary schedule are underpaid based on years of experience. Their pay gaps range from $7,700 to $26,000, according to the proposed bill.

Unlike other school districts across the country, Hawaii does not pay teachers based on years of experience but according to classifications based on education. All other pay raises are negotiated. As a result, a teacher with decades of experience sometimes makes little to no more than a teacher with significantly fewer years of experience.

Sylvia Luke: ‘We are in a position we haven’t been in in a long time’

In an interview with Honolulu Civil Beat, House Finance Chair Sylvia Luke (D, Makiki, Punchbowl, Nuuanu, Pauoa) supports increasing teacher pay, citing the state’s “issues with recruitment and retention,” and said building low-rent teacher housing on available land, such as on the Leeward coast, could help keep teachers in rural areas.

“I think we’re able to do some of these things because we have revenues and we are in a position we haven’t been in in a long time,” Luke said of the proposals. “The missing piece in the past … was really about money.”

With a first-year, certified teacher’s salary starting at roughly $50,000 a year, Hawaii’s educators are among the lowest paid in the country factoring in Hawaii’s high cost of living. As a result, the state deals with a constant recruitment and retention problem, with Hawaii’s Department of Education (HIDOE) reporting 886 teacher vacancies, 230 of those open spots in special education.

Veteran teacher says ‘people behind me are in worse shape’

Kaimuki High registrar Tom Schemel, a member of the Hawaii State Teachers Association’s Negotiations Committee, is in his 32nd year with the Hawaii State Department of Education.

“It’s taken me 31 years to get to step 14. It’s taken forever,” Schemel said, referring to HSTA’s 12-step salary schedule that starts on step 5 and goes through step 14B.

He could get a nearly $10,000 raise if he moves up two more steps to the top step.

“We’ve had two or three economic downturns when we weren’t able to get steps. Any time there’s a chance we’d get some catch-up steps before COVID-19, the rug was pulled out from under us. A decade ago, we had furloughs and pay cuts. Every teacher has experienced the same thing,” Schemel said.

“Those people behind me are in worse shape because it’s going to take them forever to get to a higher pay level unless we do some major catch up,” he added.

“If you get step movements, you are going to keep teachers here, instead of seeing more of them move to the continental United States or to local private schools. They can go to Seattle or Nevada and the cost of living is lower, yet the pay is often better and they have guaranteed raises with step increases, unlike Hawaii,” Schemel said.

Schemel’s colleague at Kaimuki High, MJ Matsushita, a 19-year veteran teacher who’s also been affected by salary compression, reacted positively when she learned a legislative solution to the problem could result in a raise of at least $7,700 and possibly more.

“I could definitely handle that,” Matsushita said with a laugh.

The learning center coordinator for the Kaimuki High School Performing Arts Center, Matsushita plans to retire in four years but says the increased pay could entice her to remain teaching several years more than that.

“A bump in pay would definitely make all the challenges we have to deal with manageable, and folks like me who are ready to retire in a couple of years will think twice about that and could afford to stay longer,” Matsushita added.

HSTA President Osa Tui, Jr. said, “With the pandemic affecting Hawaii public schools now for a third school year, we must also make sure we can retain educators we already have who know our students best. Compression on the teacher salary schedule is a wrong that needs to be rectified if we are to stave off a mass exodus from the profession.”

Initial figures HSTA has received show 238 Hawaii teachers resigned or retired last month, more than twice as many as in December 2020, when 110 separated from HIDOE. This comes on top of the 2020–21 school year that saw a triple-digit increase in retirements from the 2019–20 school year.

The last time a teacher compression bill was introduced was in January 2020, but those efforts stalled with the start of the COVID-19 pandemic shortly after the legislative session began.

Lawmakers convene their annual session on Jan. 19. Educators are more hopeful this session, in contrast to last year when the Legislature worked to prevent school job cuts or furloughs because of tax shortfalls during the pandemic.

State’s economic picture improves as lawmakers convene

Earlier this month, the state Council on Revenues more than doubled its forecast for Hawaii’s general fund tax revenue to increase by 15% in the fiscal year that ends in June.
Gov. David Ige proposed restoring $100 million to the HIDOE’s base budget and adding $32.5 million to continue shortage differentials to help recruit geographically hard-to-staff, special education, and Hawaiian language immersion teaching positions in his proposed supplemental budget.

The differentials started in January 2020 and pay educators annual differentials ranging from $3,000 to $10,000 and more if they qualify under multiple criteria. Former Superintendent Christina Kishimoto tried to end the differentials during the pandemic, but the Board of Education directed her to continue them.

Besides advocating for higher teacher pay to help recruit and retain educators, the HSTA’s legislative priorities include expanding funding for public preschools, improving access to mental health services for students, offering free menstrual products in schools, upgrading technology services for students, and providing schools better and faster access to COVID-19 tests.