Budget proposal would increase teacher pay by $250M, keep college tuition steady for 5th year
By Seanna Adcox
SCDailyGazette.com
COLUMBIA — Gov. Henry McMaster’s budget recommendations would pay K-12 teachers more over their entire career, keep college tuition steady for South Carolina students, and put more money into scholarships toward both degrees and certifications.
But he also wants a wide-ranging study on the future of higher education in South Carolina, which may eventually lead to debate over closing and merging public campuses — something former Gov. Mark Sanford advocated unsuccessfully for years.
Education is a big beneficiary of increased tax revenue in McMaster’s budget proposal, with K-12 and colleges collectively receiving more than 40% of the additional $1.6 billion available to spend in 2024-25.
Changes he seeks in return include revamping the way K-12 teachers have been paid for nearly 50 years.
His proposal would put $250 million into increasing teachers’ salaries, which would boost the salary floor for teachers to $45,000, up from $42,500. That would represent a $10,000 jump over five years in the base pay for first-year teachers with a bachelor’s degree.
But McMaster’s plan would not provide every teacher a $2,500 boost over their current salaries.
It largely follows recommendations released last May by a task force studying how to stem the state’s ever-growing teacher shortage crisis.
That includes collapsing the state salary schedule, which since 1977 has paid teachers based solely on their level of college degree and years of experience in the classroom. Instead of receiving yearly, often-insignificant adjustments for those so-called steps, teachers would jump to the next level every few years.
And those jumps would continue until their 27th year in the classroom. Currently, the state provides teachers no additional money for experience past 23 years. Teacher advocacy groups have for years asked legislators to extend the salary schedule to compensate the state’s most veteran teachers.
“I think it is a pro-teacher budget,” said Patrick Kelly, a lobbyist for the state’s largest, the Palmetto State Teachers Association.
While McMaster’s plan doesn’t entirely match the teacher salary recommendations Kelly helped craft, it would result in teachers earning tens of thousands of dollars more over their career compared to the traditional method of annual, incremental raises, according to Kelly’s calculations.
He applauded the governor for staying on track toward his pledge of raising first-year teachers’ salaries to $50,000 by 2026 while advancing the report’s suggestions.
Cleary, he said, continuing to increase teachers’ pay the normal way is doing nothing to dent the teacher shortage. It’s only gotten larger in the last five years.
This school year started with more than 1,600 vacancies, a 9% increase from the year before, according to the state Center for Education Recruitment, Retention and Advancement’s annual report.
“He’s very much in the spirit of the task force report,” said Kelly, who’s also a Richland Two high school history teacher.
“Somebody’s got to start the conversation. We can’t keep doing what we’ve been doing,” he continued. “We’ve got to think creatively outside the box.”
Like the report, McMaster’s plan would also provide ways for teachers to earn bigger boosts, often for things they already do without any monetary recognition. For example, veteran teachers could get more money by mentoring young teachers. McMaster suggests putting $10 million toward what’s dubbed a career ladder.
Kelly hopes the Legislature puts more into that initiative.
McMaster’s recommendations are just that. They’re recommendations to legislators on how to spend state tax dollars. The governor has no control over the state’s purse strings, though McMaster has had considerably more success in getting his suggestions passed than his predecessors, largely because he’s consulted with the Legislature’s budget writers ahead of releasing his proposals.
That includes providing public colleges money in return for their promises not to raise tuition on in-state students. McMaster’s budget would continue that for a fifth year.
But he suggests putting $3 million into a study of the state’s 33 public two- and four-year colleges. Evaluations should include the sustainability, accessibility and affordability of campuses, along with potentially consolidating space, certificates and degrees, he wrote in his budget message to legislators.
Lower birth rates, overall declining enrollment and public distrust in higher education are leading to an “enrollment cliff” that will most affect the state’s four-year campuses, he wrote.
But the University of South Carolina graduate told reporters he has no pre-conceived thoughts on what might need to consolidate or close.
“We want to see if we’re doing the best we can with the assets and the people that we have,” McMaster told reporters. “We want to be sure that we are providing the right instruction for the students and we’re not overlapping, we’re not wasting our time or money.”
Changing the teacher salary schedule
K-12 public school teachers are paid according to their years in the classroom and their level of college degree. The state sets the minimum that districts must pay teachers, though most pay more by supplementing state taxes with local property taxes.
For decades, the state salary schedule has required pay to rise with each additional year of experience, through 23 years, and when teachers earn a higher degree. There are five degree steps: Bachelor’s, bachelor’s plus 18 hours of credit, master’s, master’s plus 18, and doctorate’s.
McMaster’s proposal would shrink the salary schedule in two ways.
Instead of yearly incremental raises for experience, salaries would jump every three years. And degrees would fall into two categories instead of five: bachelor’s and graduate level.
His plan also extends how long the state increases pay for experience. Instead of stopping at year 23, the jumps would continue to year 27. The above shows the minimum pay for teachers in 2024-25 under McMaster’s proposed revisions.
It would raise the minimum pay for most teachers, with a notable exception: Doctorate-degree teachers. About 1,300 of the state’s more than 55,000 K-12 teachers hold such an advanced degree.
The current state salary schedule requires that group to be paid at least $75,500 at year 23 and beyond. The above would mean substantially less. However, the governor’s plan includes a “hold harmless” provision that ensures no teacher would see a drop in their paycheck due to the conversion.
On the other hand, veteran teachers with a bachelor’s degree would see a substantial increase. Currently, the state-funded minimum for bachelor’s degree teachers at 23 years’ experience and beyond is $56,600. The governor’s office says teachers shouldn’t have to spend the time and money to get an advanced college degree in order to notice a boost in their paycheck.
S.C. Daily Gazette reporter Skylar Laird contributed to this report.
Seanna Adcox is a South Carolina native with three decades of reporting experience. She joined States Newsroom in September 2023 after covering the S.C. Legislature and state politics for 18 years. Her previous employers include The Post and Courier and The Associated Press.
