Provide Incentives for Inner-City Teachers

“Lack of Qualified Teachers Undermines State Reforms” (Dec. 12) highlights the quandary facing education reformers in attracting excellent educators to poorer-performing schools. It is important to realize that today teachers in Watts are paid no more than those in wealthy schools, even though they face more day-to-day challenges, such as fewer resources and ailing, overcrowded classrooms. We must rely on more than just the goodwill of teachers who choose to work in the inner city because it is a socially responsible act. Rather, we must provide real financial incentives to attract the best and the brightest where they are needed most urgently.

Benjamin Gafni

Los Angeles

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Your article did not mention low pay for the teachers as one of the reasons for the shortage. If I had to study for four years, plus a couple more for the credential program, I’d get a master’s in computer science or engineering or go to nursing school or pharmacist school, any of which would pay more than double a teacher’s salary.

I’d love to teach. I think it would be a rewarding job, and I might be good at it, but I couldn’t raise my family on a teacher’s salary. If they paid me the same for teaching as they do for my engineering job, I would teach.

I think lots of capable people are shut out of a teaching career because of low pay. California really has to think about paying respect to the teachers by paying them a respectable salary.

Danny Lee

Diamond Bar

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The teacher shortage does not stop in California’s elementary schools. The California State University system, which trains the majority of elementary school teachers in the state, has its own shortage of experienced teachers due to a rapidly increasing student population, faculty retirements, noncompetitive salaries and heavy workloads. Over half the faculty in the CSU are part-time or temporary employees. Overreliance on an exploited, itinerant labor force threatens the integrity of both the undergraduate and credential preparation of California’s schoolteachers.

Diana Wright Guerin PhD

Professor, Child and Adolescent

Studies, Cal State Fullerton