Keeping Veteran Teachers

Being a teacher is not an easy job. The demands on an educator's time and talents can be taxing, but also very rewarding. But some veteran teachers are finding the rewards are not enough to keep them in the profession. We must do everything we can to keep quality veteran teachers in our Florida schools. A good teacher can move a student up at least four percentiles in one year. And just one percentage point higher growth will lead to 64-percent higher income over a lifetime.

So all of our futures depend on quality, experienced teachers!

Some of the reasons veteran teachers are leaving include:

• Low salaries and benefits
• Little control over their own work
• Not enough time to teach, too much paperwork and mandates
• School administrators not including them in decision making or communicating effectively
• Not having adequate resources to properly educate students, including up-to-date textbooks

Veteran teachers are vital to the quality of our public schools. Not only do students reap the rewards from learning from these experienced educators, but so do novice teachers who look to them for guidance and mentoring.

We need to help state lawmakers and education officials understand how lack of school funding, inadequate resources and mandated paperwork are forcing many experienced teachers to walk out the door. Losing their skills directly impacts the quality of our schools in Florida.

We must treat teachers professionally by making class sizes smaller, reducing paperwork and providing the resources necessary for success in the classroom.

We need to make retaining quality teachers in our public schools a priority!