On the recordFebruary 17, 2011
today I am introducing the Incentives to Educate American Children Act of 2011--I TEACH. This bill provides important tax incentives to promote the quality of all public school teachers by encouraging them to achieve certification from the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. It provides further incentives to teachers in rural and high-poverty schools. We all know that teachers are the front line for the education of our nation's children. Still, teachers continue to earn less than other college graduates. A recent study found that teachers only earn 77 percent as much as other college graduates. It is even worse for teachers in rural schools. Rural schools struggle with many unique challenges, and one of them is how to pay competitive salaries when transportation costs are necessarily higher than for urban schools. The Department of Education has reported that rural school districts have the lowest base salaries for starting teachers. This bill helps combat this inequity by providing a tax incentive to public school teachers in rural and high-poverty schools.
