Florida’s Marion County school district drew national headlines last summer when it announced that it was switching to a four-day school week as a way to save money.
Other school officials took a more conventional route by laying off teachers and cutting student programs, all the while blaming Gov. Rick Scott for underfunding Florida’s public schools.
Now comes a report that finds 946 school employees in the Sunshine State earned at least $100,000 in 2010. That’s up 818 percent from 2005, according to the Foundation for Government Accountability.
The foundation also finds the percentage of non-school employees who earn at least six-figures has increased by only 7 percent during that same period.
“You don’t have to be great in math to figure out that something is wrong with these school salaries,” Tarren Bragdon, Foundation for Government Accountability CEO, told the Sunshine State News.
“During these five years, you have flat student enrollment, the biggest recession since the Great Depression and skyrocketing six-figure salaries – that adds up to a raw deal for Florida parents and taxpayers,” Bragdon said.
The average salary for a Florida teacher is about $47,000, which means administrators and superintendents receive the majority of those hefty paydays.
Tea Party leader Patricia Sullivan summed it up best: “It appears the servant is now the master, and the children get the crumbs.”
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