‘Teach for Terrebonne’ begins: District hires 20-plus certified teachers at mid-term

Now that the dust has settled following the school district’s campaign for the passage of a half-cent sales tax with proceeds earmarked for Terrebonne Parish public school teachers and support staff, it is now tasked with campaign No. 2.

That goal will be attracting certified teachers to the Good Earth Parish and fulfilling the aspiration of having 100 percent certified teachers by the time kids head to school in August.

“I’m optimistic,” Terrebonne Parish Superintendent of Schools Philip Martin said when asked if he’s confident 100 percent certified teachers by the next school year can be a reality. “We’ve known some of that is going to be more difficult with math, science [teachers]. For years that’s been a challenge, but our goal is to be 100 percent certified.”

The reason for his optimism – the school district is already on well its way.

After having as many as 82 uncertified teachers at the start of the 2014 fall semester, more than 20 certified teachers jumped ship to Terrebonne Parish for the start of the 2015 spring semester, according to school district officials.

Nice start, indeed.

Now, in order to attract certified teachers to fill the remaining spots currently held by uncertified teachers, the school district will begin an advertising campaign entitled “Teach for Terrebonne” and use a bump in pay to entice some educations and local intangibles to entice others.

“Will [our teacher salaries] be the highest in the state? No. But will it be competitive? Yes it will, and those that we don’t compete with financially, I think we will out compete in terms of Terrebonne Parish is a good place to teach, a good place to live, a good place to raise families,” he said. “We have some other things that could trump some of that.”

Previously, Terrebonne Parish ranked 49th out of 74 Louisiana school districts in teacher pay. With the bump, it will jump up into the top third and even boast a higher starting teacher salary that Lafourche Parish at $42,000, according to Assistant Superintendent of Schools Carol Davis, although she acknowledges that the earning potential is still greater to the north and east because Lafourche offers about $3,500 more than Terrebonne for teachers with master’s degrees.

“That is something that someday we will look at, how much more if you have your masters degree how much more are you going to make. That’s the part we need to investigate for the future,” she said.

For the current uncertified teachers working in Terrebonne Parish, Martin said any time a certified teacher comes knocking on the door and says, the uncertified teacher is always vulnerable.

“In the past that hasn’t been the problem because there hasn’t been certified people knocking on the door, but what we look at it and see if they’re doing a good job and what they’re doing to get certified. If we get a yes and they’re working at it, we want to keep them,” the superintendent said.

The half-cent sales tax figures to raise about $12 million per year based on current projections, according to Martin, however the sales tax roll was down six percent from November 2013 to November 2014.

“We are not insulated from the economy. A sales tax is directly linked and tied to the economy so when we start seeing economic trends, we have to monitor that,” he said.

Regardless of the actual money raised by the tax, however, Martin said nothing will stop the salaries of all teachers going up by $4,000 annually and support staff going up by $2,000 annually at the start of the 2015-16 school year.

“Our school system is very proud of is the public has endorsed a half-cent sales tax that next year is going to begin paying our teachers a little bit more money and will impact the school system for generations, so we’re very, very pleased with that,” Martin said.