THIS IS ABOUT ALL OF US.

Teachers are one very visible part of a school, but the greater education system functions only with a dedicated army of other educators: ESPs (Education Support Professionals), custodians, nutrition services, transportation, maintenance, counselors, office assistants and countless others come together for our students.

Living Wage Still Eludes School Support Professionals | NEAWhen adjusted for inflation, the salary for ESPs continues to decline.

At a glance...

On average, these educators make $2,361 less than they did 10 years ago, adjusted for inflation: 40% of full-time ESPs earn less than $25,000 per year, and 11.7% earn less than $15,000.
26% depend on assistance programs, such as Medicaid, meal programs, student loan relief, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP.
See just how much the lack of collective bargaining costs ESPs in the graph below.

Around $6,200 per year is how much more ESPs make in states that allow them to unionize and collectively bargain the terms of their contracts.

NC schools still have an acute bus driver shortage. Who's going to fix it?Many North Carolina schools are still dealing with a critical bus driver shortage months into the school year. Some days it reaches the worst-case scenario, and districts have to outright cancel bus service on some routes.

At a glance...

Durham Public Schools are currently operating at nearly a 100 driver reduction of what their workforce was before the pandemic.
Smaller school districts are pinched for driver pay because they tend to have smaller local salary supplements.* And large, urban school districts are pinched because they need higher pay to compete with other employers — like city buses, Amazon, and Uber.

*Public school pay in North Carolina is structured as a base salary provided by the state and supplemental pay provided locally.

Page updated

Google Sites

Report abuse