We modeled our philosophy of pay through partnership with the North Carolina Early Childhood Compensation Collaborative. We studied the Model Salary Scale for Early Education Lead Teachers and developed our program around it.

Children’s earliest experiences are built into their bodies—shaping the brain’s architecture and creating the foundation for future learning. The interactions they have with their early childhood teachers play an essential role in determining how their brains are wired. To build strong brains and support children’s optimal development, early childhood teachers need specialized knowledge and skills.

Compensation is an integral component of attracting and retaining the high-quality early learning workforce needed to prepare children for success. A salary scale tied to education can serve as critical tool to professionalize the early childhood teaching workforce.

• There is a base pay of $11.79 for teachers and teacher assistants.

• Those on our team are then able to "stack" their pay based on level of education, certifications, trainings, years of experience, and specialized skills.

• It is possible to make up to $25 an hour while working at The Impact Academy.

• Our goal is to ensure teachers can thrive while fulfilling their passion of investing in the next generation, families, and the community.

• People who build the foundations of society shouldn't have to be impoverished to do it.

The North Carolina Early Childhood Compensation Collaborative (Collaborative) was created out of a national project to improve compensation for the early childhood workforce. The Collaborative believes that a statewide, locally-implemented salary scale for early childhood education lead teachers is an important tool to guide early childhood programs in determining fair salaries that are commensurate with education or certification, and will ultimately help professionalize the early childhood teaching workforce.

The Collaborative recognizes that early childhood teachers are the key to delivering high-quality programs and ensuring positive outcomes for young children and families. Early education teachers must have professional education, skills, and competencies to successfully fulfill their responsibilities and should be compensated for their work. However, too often teachers are woefully underpaid and not recognized as professionals for the important work they do. Consequently, North Carolina is facing a crisis in attracting and retaining qualified early childhood teachers.

The Collaborative developed the attached Model Salary Scale for Early Education Lead Teachers to help guide the early childhood field in establishing better compensation for the early childhood workforce that is tied to educational attainment. The goal was to develop a standard salary scale that was based on paying parity with entry level teachers in public schools. The scale is intended to be used as a guide and is completely voluntary. For more information on how this scale was designed, please see Attachment A. For the Model Salary Scale, see Attachment B.

The Model Salary Scale was developed by the Collaborative with input from early childhood experts, child care providers and parents. It was then pilot tested by researchers at UNC Charlotte who conducted surveys with child care programs representing different star-licenses and permit types and geographic areas of the state. In addition, the researchers followed up with interviews and focus groups with child care center directors/owners, early childhood teachers and early childhood education organizations.

The Collaborative recognizes there are important points to consider when a child care program chooses to implement the Model Salary Scale. For example, although the Model Salary Scale does not include benefits in the hourly wage calculation, we recognize the value and cost of providing benefits and do not want to see benefits dropped if a child care programs uses the salary scale to pay better wages.