Education department data shows pay gap for teachers at predominantly minority schools
The U.S. Department of Education has released data showing that teachers at schools with larger African American and Latino student populations make less money than their peers at other schools. A survey of more than 7,000 school districts found that educators in 59 percent of the districts that served predominantly African American or Latino students earned substantially less money than their counterparts at schools with fewer minority pupils.
“America has been battling inequity in education for decades but these data show that we cannot let up,” said U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan in a press release. “Children who need the most too often get the least. It’s a civil rights issue, an economic security issue and a moral issue.”
On average, educators with higher minority student populations earned $2,500 less than teachers in schools with fewer students of color. The data comes from the largest survey of school districts ever conducted by the department’s Civil Rights Data Collection.
“The analysis of teacher pay (one of several new data categories in the 2009-2010 survey) comes from results reported from 2,217 diverse districts — those with greater than 20 percent and less than 80 percent Latino and African American enrollment,” explains an announcement by the Department of Education.
Education officials say the additional information provided by the newly expanded survey will help shed light on the causes of, and possible solutions for resolving, the inequality in pay.
“To repair our education system requires that we be able to identify where problems exist,” said Russlynn Ali, assistant secretary for civil rights at the Department of Education. “Collecting these data and making them widely accessible is a powerful way to make the case for action.”
