Language key in push for K-12 tax
Before teachers hit the streets to circulate petitions for the Invest in Education Act initiative, they should carefully consider the potentially monumental consequences of the way it redefines “teacher” for purposes of earmarked compensation to include virtually any professional working in a school.
The initiative redefines “teacher” to mean “any non-administrative personnel who teaches students or supports student academic achievement ... including, but not limited to nurses, counselors, social workers, psychologists, speech pathologists, librarians and academic interventionists.”
This is contrasted with “student support services personnel,” defined as “any non-administrative school personnel who provide student support and instructional support services ... including, but not limited to student food service, student transportation, and school site plant operations.”
Basically, the initiative divides school workers into white-collar and blue-collar categories. The white-collar workers share one compensation pot. The blue-collar workers share another.
According to Arizona Department of Education data, there are roughly 49,000 actual teachers in the state.
In the initiative, the decision of whether employees other than actual teachers are put in the white-collar or the blue-collar pot is ostensibly left up to the district governing board or charter operator. But the language in the initiative would give any quasi-professional class of workers grounds to chal- lenge the decision in court if placed in the less lucrative blue-collar pot.
In addition to actual teachers, there are roughly 21,000 other professional or quasi-professional workers in Arizona schools who would have a claim to be in the white-collar pot.
For earmarked compensation, the initiative expands the definition of “teacher” not only for the new money its sky-high income tax is purported to yield, but also for the money teachers are already receiving from Proposition 301’s six-tenths of 1 percent sales tax.
This year, that existing tax is projected to produce $345 million in earmarked compensation for teachers defined as, well, teachers.
With the expanded definition under the initiative, 30 percent of that, or more than $100 million, could instead go to school professionals and quasi-professionals other than actual teachers.
If the initiative did produce the $690 million in new revenue supporters are claiming, actual teachers would make up that loss. The initiative earmarks 60 percent of the new revenue for compensation for the expanded definition of “teacher.”
However, due to the loss of earmarked compensation from the existing sales tax for actual teachers, nearly half of the new money earmarked for “teacher” compensation under the initiative might end up going to people who are not actually teachers.
Now, I’m against earmarking education funding, for teacher salaries or anything else. Schools should get the same amount per student and then compete for funding based on their ability to attract students. Those who run the schools should be free to spend the money they receive in the way they believe maximizes their educational performance.
And I understand that there is solidarity within the teacher movement. Teachers want salary increases not only for themselves, but also for others who work at their schools.
Nonetheless, as a matter of law, do they — and we — really want to completely eradicate the distinction between actual teachers and other professionals and quasi-professionals who work in the schools?
What nurses, counselors and librarians do in schools is valuable and should be valued. But what actual teachers do is the whole of the enterprise. Their classrooms are where the learning occurs. Everything else is a support function.
Our schools are under-resourced. I think giving Arizona one of the highest marginal income-tax rates in the country is a self-destructive way to remedy that.
But even those who think sticking it to the rich is the cat’s meow should question eliminating the distinction between actual teachers and other school professionals if there is to be earmarked compensation. Or giving half of a tax hike justified principally by the need to improve teacher pay to people who aren’t actually teachers.
At a minimum, English teachers should balk at circulating a petition that states that there is no difference between the words “nurse” and “teacher.”