Despite record-breaking funding levels, many Ohio districts are worried about a looming budget crunch. News reports from Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, and elsewhere have detailed efforts to slim down budgets—belt tightening that is necessary as federal Covid-relief dollars have dried up and state and local funds aren’t likely to be as copious as in recent years.
As schools head into more uncertain fiscal times, school officials should look to stretch the school dollar in ways that keep student achievement heading in the right direction. In districts shedding enrollment, one possibility is to close underutilized schools—a money saver that can also benefit students if they transfer to a higher-performing school. Other options include sharing services or even hiring high school students for custodial or food service jobs. (For more ideas, Texas has an inventory of 101 commonsense ways to reduce expenses.)
Trimming here and there can certainly help, but it doesn’t tackle the largest educational expense of all: teacher compensation. Here, there is much school districts could do to address costs, all while putting the teacher-pay portion of the budget to better use. One strategy, which doesn’t entail workforce reductions or jeopardizing achievement, is to tackle the pay premiums that teachers automatically receive just for having a master’s degree.
Now, to some, paying extra for a graduate degree doesn’t sound so bad. And it wouldn’t be such a terrible idea if the credential were a proxy for classroom effectiveness. But research has found no link between effectiveness and a master’s degree. In other words, teachers with master’s degrees are no more likely to improve student achievement than those with a bachelor’s. Moreover, as a recent study from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) reminds us, these pay bumps are expensive. Based on an analysis of 135 U.S. districts, NCTQ estimates that they spend almost a half-billion dollars extra each year for teachers with master’s degrees. This doesn’t even count the tuition costs that educators bear to obtain these degrees (or in some cases, that districts reimburse).
And yet Ohio districts—following a mandate in state law—continue to pay more for master’s degrees. Here’s what it looks like in Columbus City Schools. As the table below indicates, seniority automatically generates a higher salary. But then, moving to the degree columns, we also notice that teachers with a master’s degree receive significantly higher pay. For instance, a teacher with ten years of service and a master’s degree receives $80,940, while her bachelor’s degree counterpart receives just $72,990. Despite their likelihood of being equally effective, Columbus pays master’s degree teachers 10.9 percent more at the various seniority levels.
Table 1: Columbus City Schools’ teacher salary schedule
Ohio should put a fork in the ineffective and costly practice of paying teachers more for master’s degrees. It does absolutely nothing to advance student learning. It encourages teachers to sit through even more coursework, likely taking night classes or clicking through online modules, all while paying tuition or accumulating student debt. This approach is expensive for districts and taxpayers, as 62 percent of Ohio teachers (following the salary incentive) do indeed possess a master’s degree. And it soaks up money that could be directed to more productive ends, such as providing extra pay to teachers who are doing the most for students.
State lawmakers should do their part to discontinue this practice by repealing the requirement that districts adopt salary schedules based on seniority and degrees earned. They could even take it a step further, as North Carolina has done, and expressly prohibit districts from paying extra for master’s degrees. Enterprising district leaders need not wait for legislative action, either, as they can work to minimize the impact of the state regulation by reducing their pay premiums.[1] For instance, rather than giving master’s degrees a 10.9 percent bump, Columbus could reduce it to 2 percent. To avoid substantial near-term pay cuts, such a reduction may need to be phased in over time. But it would allow a district to transition from a credentials-based system to one that compensates teachers more strategically.
The way that Ohio school districts pay teachers—and the state laws that institutionalize these practices—urgently needs reform. These archaic compensation systems reward seniority and credentials, things that have not been proven to move the achievement needle. To drive higher student outcomes, particularly at a time of tightening budgets, schools will need compensation systems with a laser focus on teacher excellence. By prizing educator talent, skill, and accomplishment—not paper credentials and seniority—merit-based pay systems will help more Ohio students achieve their potential.
[1] There is no prescription on what the master’s premium over a bachelor’s salary must be, so long as the master’s degree salaries remain above the statewide minimum salary schedule.
