Lee County School District attempts to retain teachers

Author: Jillian Haggerty Writer: Nicholas Karsen
Published: Updated:

The Lee County School District has had the persistent issue of maintaining teachers due to several conflicts.

The top three complaints from employee feedback are competitive pay with market peers, adjusting compensation for cost of living, and aligning pay within the district according to job functions.

All three issues have the same commonality—money.

As the school year is in full swing, the Lee County School District is considering solutions to maintain its teaching staff.

During the Wednesday school board meeting, members heard from Evergreen Solutions, a K-12 consultation firm whose job is to create surveys and figure out the most prominent issues regarding the low retention rate with Lee County teachers.

Some of the research findings suggested that “74% of the participants felt that the raises and services and pay grade assignments weren’t fair and weren’t equally distributed among employees, and a lot of that has to do with understanding how it works, and employees felt the salaries were not keeping up with the local cost of living.”

WINK News spoke with Kevin Daly, the President of the Teachers Association in Lee County, who mentioned that Collier and Charlotte Counties have yet to meet with a consultation firm but figured that the findings would not be surprising.

“Quiet honestly, the district should know it too; they should know their employees are underpaid compared to other districts and other states across the nation, and it doesn’t bind them to allocate additional resources,” said Daly.

WINK News reached out to the school district regarding the vacant positions.

Rob Spicker, the Lee County School District’s public information officer, started bringing in Kelly Services to help fill the vacant positions for the 2024-2025 school year.

Originally, they had 186 vacant spots, with 99.4% of those positions filled by substitutes.

The school district mentioned that the most experienced teachers have received salary increases in the last two years, and further negotiations with the teachers union will begin in 2025.

Copyright ©2024 Fort Myers Broadcasting. All rights reserved.

This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without prior written consent.