Pay for classroom teachers in the Tooele County School District is at the bottom of the bottom.
Pay for the average teacher in Utah was $45,848 in 2015, according to statistics from the National Education Association. That places Utah 45th out of 51 states plus the District of Columbia, according to NEA data.
But total salary and benefits for classroom teachers in Tooele County rank at the bottom of Utah’s 41 school districts, according to a 2015 State Superintendent’s Annual Report.
Benefits included in the report are: employer’s portion of social security, retirement contributions, and health, dental, life, unemployment, long-term disability, and industrial insurances.
The average teacher in the Tooele County School District made $44,246 in salary and received a benefit package totaling $23,286 for a grand total of $67,532 in salary and benefits for 2015, according to compensation estimates in the state superintendent’s report.
The state average for teacher salary and benefits is $76,664, making the average total teacher compensation in Tooele County 88 percent of the state average.
But different definitions used by different school districts to calculate the average teacher benefits may lead to inconsistent reporting of teacher benefits by school districts, according to Lark Reynolds, Tooele County School District business administrator.
Tooele County School District reported an estimated annual expense of $8,745 in health benefits for the average teacher while the Park City School District reported spending $20,022 in health benefits for the average teacher.
Looking just at teacher salary, which was collected using statewide personnel information software, should be more consistent from district to district, according to Reynolds.
Sorted by salary alone, the pay for the average Tooele County School District teacher rises from the bottom to 35 out of 41 school districts.
At $44,246, the average salary for Tooele County School District teachers is in the bottom quartile. It is 95 percent of the state average of $46,689.
The state report uses a slightly different statistical method to determine the average salary than the NEA study did. That’s why the NEA and the state averages are different.
The state uses an annualized trimmed mean, which eliminates outlying high and low values before calculating the average value.
The annual average teacher salary in the state ranges from $61,486 in Park City School District to $41,657 in the Uintah School District in Vernal.
Nationally, average teacher pay in 2015 ranged from $77,628 in New York State to $40,934 in South Dakota. The national median for teacher pay was $51,155, according to the NEA report.
Reynolds was not surprised at the low ranking for Tooele County teacher pay.
“Pay for Tooele County teachers has been low for some time,” Reynolds said. “Superintendent Rogers and the board are dedicated to committing resources to improve teacher compensation.”
However, coming up with funds to increase teacher pay is difficult in a school district that has one of the lowest rates of assessed property value per student, according to Reynolds.
The low assessed value means the district already carries a higher than average property tax rate to generate the average amount of local revenue, Reynolds said.
Park City School District has the highest teacher pay in Utah. It also has the highest property assessed property value per student, Reynolds noted.
He also pointed out that the average pay for teachers in Box Elder School District is only $43 more than the average teacher pay in the Tooele County School District.
Box Elder County is often used as a comparable school district for Tooele County School District because Box Elder is close to Tooele County School District in enrollment. It also has a similar distribution of revenue from local, state and federal sources, and other demographics are similar, according to Reynolds.
Other demographic factors at play in reporting average teacher salary include additional funds allocated by the state for small rural schools.
Called the Necessary Existent Small School Program, the state allocates additional funds to schools in small rural areas.
Reynolds suggested that those additional funds available to smaller schools could be used to increase teacher salaries to attract and hold teachers in smaller school districts.
The Tooele County School District did give teachers a 1 percent cost-of-living adjustment for the 2016 year. For the average Tooele County teacher, a 1 percent increase in salary meant an increase, before taxes, of $18.43 per paycheck.
The district also fully funded the salary chart for teachers in 2016 that offers increases for steps. Those steps are based on years of experience teaching and lanes, which are based on additional education, Reynolds said.
The district would like to boost teacher pay, but Reynolds estimated that it would take an additional $2 million in revenue to raise teacher pay in Tooele County to the state average.
“That would be difficult to do without more state support,” Reynolds said.