Superintendents expect pay raise to combat teacher shortage

Alabama K-12 teachers are getting raises.

"It’s just one tangible way to show the teachers and educators that the State of Alabama cares," Talladega City Schools Superintendent Dr. Quentin Lee said.

Wednesday, Lawmakers approved an 8.3 billion dollar education budget that would give a four to twenty-one percent pay increase to K-12 teachers.

Along with a one percent pay increase for teachers each year after working more than nine years.

The new budget is already having a major impact on more rural school districts like Walker County Schools.

Dr. Dennis Willingham is the Superintendent with the Walker County School System.

"We got to the point to where we did not have a pool of candidates to choose from and now since this package has passed we’ve already been contacted from folks who have retired who are willing to rescind their retirement and also people who are thinking about retirement who are saying they are no longer thinking about retirement," Willingham said.

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Superintendents believe the new raise will draw younger teachers back into their hometown thus making it more affordable for them to live and putting teachers closer to family and friends.

“If someone’s from an area, they wanna stay local in the area, again their pay scales just went up and so it’s gonna make that more appealing so you don’t have to move off necessarily to make a little bit more money" said Dr. Alan Cosby, Superintendent of Etowah County Schools.

The new budget goes into affect in October.