Appealing to Teachers for Public Schools

On March 31st, the Legislature gave final approval to a bill by State Rep. Alan Baker (R- Brewton) that will improve retirement benefits for newly-hired educators.

As you know, education has been one of my highest priorities since entering public service, and I have had countless conversations with educators and administrators on the struggles our teachers face - and to get the best for our children, we must be competitive in recruiting talented teachers to our public school systems.

While the Legislature had originally tightened retirement benefits for educators hired after 2012 - this was done in an effort to assist with lagging finances in the Teachers’ Retirement System - it came to show that recruiting new teachers in recent years was becoming more and more difficult.

So, rather than requiring reachers hired under the Tier II retirement plan to work until 62 before collecting any retirement benefits, Baker’s bill allows the teacher to retire at any age as long as they have a minimum of 30 years of creditable service.

This bill also falls in with the previously passed law that allows Tier II educators to bank sick leave and apply that time towards retirement.

While this doesn’t solve everything, I want to recognize ‘wins’ whenever we can. And this is a step in the right direction. Our teachers sacrifice so much of their own lives for our children, and we can’t just assume that they will always be able to step up and just make it happen. Alabama is just one of many states across the country  suffering from teacher shortages in public school classrooms. This is a great step towards making our public school systems attractive in our recruitment of talented teachers.

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