To the editor:

Gov. DeSantis announced on June 10 that he was committed to approving a teacher salary increase of $1.25 billion for the 24-25 Fiscal Budget. This is in addition to the “impressive” job of increasing starting teacher pay by a little over $8,000 in 2019.

Florida has a debit of 9,000 teachers statewide. These are the new teachers who will benefit from an increased starting salary. Just how much will they make? The average starting salary, according to DeSantis’ website, is $48,000. If he adds $10,000, as he says, the new teachers, making $58,000, will be making more than the average teacher state teacher salary of $54,000! Where does this leave the current teachers? Front-loading of salaries for new teachers is a time-honored tradition in school systems. As a 36-year retired teaching veteran of a Maryland county, this was met with derision by teachers in the system who were in an already “compressed” salary system (meaning they did not receive an increase for several years in a row) and did not receive a salary increase without pushback from the teacher’s union for some form of increase. DeSantis’ salary increases for starting teachers may attract new teachers, but it will not retain existing teachers if they do not receive an equally exceptional raise.

I suggest they go to Maryland. Their starting salary could be as high as $59,640 with a first year Bachelor’s degree and $116,807 with a Master’s degree in Montgomery County. And they would be appreciated for their work. However, they’d miss the wonderful Florida weather.

Cindy Perouty

Fort Myers