POLK COUNTY, Fla. — When it comes to teacher salaries, Florida ranks among the bottom: It is No. 46th for average teacher salary, coming in at about $12,000 under the national average.
Polk County teachers are among the lowest paid in the Tampa Bay area, making an average of about $47,000 a year.
Many of them traveled to Tallahassee earlier this month to advocate for higher pay and more school resources. On Tuesday, teachers are showing up in mass to the Polk County School Board meeting to advocate again.
The county expected hundreds of teachers and parents to show up, which is why they moved the meeting to Bartow High School to accommodate this much larger audience.
Bruce Sabin is one of the hundreds of teachers who planned to attend the school board meeting.
“Nobody came into teaching because they thought they were going to get rich. We teach because we love it, we want to make a difference in students' lives, but it does make living and supporting a family difficult," Sabin said.
He’s receiving additional support from the state, but he’d rather see that support in his paycheck than through subsidized healthcare.
"I have a doctorate and 18 years of teaching experience, and my family qualified for WIC at one point. My kids are now a little older than that so we don’t qualify for WIC for that reason," Sabin said. "My kids are on Healthy Kids, the state insurance program because we are considered a low-income family.”
He says over his time teaching, Polk County has become more expensive.
“There has definitely been a change. Teacher pay has not kept up with inflation and cost of living in Polk County, especially here in Lakeland, has gone up significantly," Sabin said.
Arguing a pay increase means more than just teachers taking more larger salaries.
“We want them to know that it’s much larger than teacher pay, or even just teachers in general," Sabin said.
Teachers will be standing up at Tuesday's school board meeting, asking for higher salaries and more school support.
The president of the Polk Education Association said teachers and the union will also specifically be asking for a millage increase to be put on the referendum this year. That money would go specifically toward teachers' salaries and student programming.
A 1 millage increase would mean an increase in property taxes that would collectively result in $40 to $50 million.
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