Gwinnett County school board members voted Thursday in favor of a new teacher compensation plan they hope will keep more teachers in the district, attract new ones and reward its best educators.
The first phase of the plan is scheduled to begin in August. Annual performance, evaluated by the teacher’s administrators, will determine whether that teacher will move to the next pay grade, or what Gwinnett officials called “step.” The new schedule will recognize the employee’s current education level and advanced degrees as they are earned.
No teacher will lose base pay when the district transitions to the new schedule, officials said.
School board member Carole Boyce called the plan a “positive step.”
“It recognizes what teachers are doing every day,” she said.
The second phase of the plan, scheduled to begin at the start of the 2018-19 school year, will offer “Performance-Based Awards” to teachers based on criteria such as professional growth, evaluation, student growth and a local school assessment. The maximum award would be 10 percent of the average Gwinnett teacher’s salary, which is currently about $58,500.
Gwinnett started working seriously on changes to its compensation plan in 2015.
Teacher retention is one of the biggest challenges for educators statewide, as many educators leave the profession within the first five years on the job because of salary complaints. Georgia's top school leader, Richard Woods, has called it a "growing crisis."
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