Teachers in California are struggling with the high cost of living, rent increases and over-work and are increasingly leaving the profession, especially in the wake of a pandemic that has worsened those factors, a new study has revealed.
Teachers have also faced state-imposed testing and performance metrics, school privatization and defunding, all of which have contributed to teacher shortages, even as a new school year is beginning across the US.
A new report from United Teachers Los Angeles surveyed more than 13,000 educators in the city and found nearly 70% of teachers have seriously considered leaving the profession and 28% of educators worked a second job to make ends meet.
Nearly 60% of educators with 20 or more years of experience reported not being able to afford to live in the communities where they teach.
Gina Gray, a high school English teacher in Los Angeles, had to work a second job as an Instacart shopper when she started teaching several years ago.
“It was so stressful, but necessary in order to be able to cover the pay gap. The compensation was just a lot lower than expected,” said Gray. “In Los Angeles county, especially in LA, the costs are enormous. Most teachers can’t even afford rent, let alone to purchase property with just a teacher’s salary.”
In the first half of 2022, the Los Angeles area had the highest rental prices in the US, at a median price of $4,664 a month for a single family home. Between 2018 and 2021, the cost of basic necessities in LA increased by more than 20%.
According to the report, the number of teachers quitting in 2020-21 increased 38% from the previous year and retirements rose 12%, with public education employment in Los Angeles still facing a deficit of about 15,800 workers compared with February 2020.
A report by the Economic Policy Institute released this month found the teacher pay penalty – the wage gap between teachers and other professionals with similar education experience – hit a new high, reaching 23.5% in 2021.
“We’re at a critical crisis right now where you have educators bearing the brunt in this profession of not being treated as professionals,” said Cecily Myart-Cruz, the president of United Teachers Los Angeles. “The wages are just not livable.”
Public education funding is significantly inadequate for school districts with high and medium poverty level rates, with public school funding heavily reliant on local and state funds, creating funding inequities across towns and states.
The US spends 11.6% of public funding on education, short of the Unesco benchmark of 15%.
A 2020 study by the Century Foundation found the US is underfunding K-12 public schools by $150bn annually, with districts that have high concentrations of Black and Latinx students facing a $5,000 per pupil average deficit in funding.
Around the US, there are about 300,000 fewer workers in public education in June 2022 than in February 2020. A survey by the National Education Association revealed around 55% of educators are considering leaving the profession earlier than they originally planned.
Teachers have also faced increasing scrutiny as laws targeting teachers with censorship legislation have been passed or introduced in states around the country.
Nicole Fefferman worked in the Los Angeles Unified School District as a high school social studies and history teacher for 15 years before she decided to step away from the profession after the 2021-2022 school year due to the working conditions and lack of support and resources for teachers. She is also a parent of two children in the district that she grew up in.
She said it was disheartening to get lip service from administrators about resources available for teachers and students returning to school and through the pandemic that never adequately materialized. She said teachers still faced large classroom sizes, a lack of support staff and deteriorating school infrastructure.
“Even before the pandemic, I was wondering if I should take a break. The pandemic exposed the issues plaguing the American education system in the most public way and exacerbated problems,” said Fefferman.
