Raising Starting and Early Career Teacher Pay | Eastern North Carolina Now

Press Release:

    This week Gov. McCrory, Lt. Gov. Forest, House Speaker Tillis, and I announced our plan to make North Carolina's starting teacher salaries among the highest in the Southeast.

    The new plan will increase starting and early career teacher pay by $2,200 this year and by an additional $2,000 the following year. This is the first step toward improving teacher and state employee salaries - and we intend to announce pay increases for more teachers and state employees as the revenue outlook becomes clear­er and available.

    The other state leaders and I agree, there's no greater investment we can make than in preparing our kids for the future, and there's no question that high-quality teachers lead to better student achievement. That's why we are committed to boosting starting and early career teacher pay to $35,000 over the next two years.

    Making North Carolina a regional leader and nationally competitive will help us attract the very best talent to our schools and brand our state as a teaching destina­tion, not a layover.

    And because of feedback from educators, we are extending supplemental pay for teachers with Master's degrees to anyone who has completed a course in a graduate program as of July 1, 2013. It is important to maintain supplemental pay for those who are currently pursuing their Master's degrees, and this cor­rects a poor decision we made last year.

    Thank you to all the teachers in the state of North Carolina. The work you do to educate our children is invaluable. And as stated earlier, this is only the first step in process of increasing pay for more teachers and state employees.

    President Pro Tempore Senator Phil Berger

    2007 Legislative Building
    Raleigh, N.C. 27601

    (919) 733-5708


    Contacts:

     Amy Auth, (919) 301-1737  •  Shelly Carver (919) 301-1744