Wyoming teachers could lose raises approved in the 2015 legislative session if changes are not made to the current budget.
The Legislature approved additional state funds so schools could provide raises to their teachers during the 2015 legislative session. The funds were approved through an external cost adjustment, which was set to expire because the Select Committee on School Finance Recalibration would soon reevaluate the funding model for Wyoming’s schools.
Kari Eakins, communications director for the Wyoming Department of Education, said the recalibration committee chose to make no changes to the funding model, which caused problems for the approved teacher raises.
“Because the teacher raises were done through an external cost adjustment, that means that the model [the recalibration committee] voted to propose to the legislature did not include the additional state funds for teacher raises,” said Eakins.
Eakins says the lack of proposed funding for teacher raises does not appear to be intentional, though.
“Now, it sounds like from what we’ve heard from members of the committee, including Senator Jeff Wasserburger, that that was simply an oversight,” said Eakins “When they were voting to continue the model, they thought it was to continue with the additional state funds for those teacher salaries.”
Even though the current biennium budget does not include the additional funds for teacher salaries, the Governor’s budget did include those funds.
“We don’t think they are going to just leave it as a non-issue. We think they are at least going to discuss it and have a vote on it, but our impression is it was an oversight and the recalibration committee has every intention of wanting to continue those additional state funds for teacher salaries,” said Eakins.
Upcoming meetings may shed more light on the issue. As it stands, action needs to be taken to change the budget for teachers to get the raises. Otherwise, wages will drop to what they received in the 2013-2014 school year.