Texas Taxpayers Pay Teach For America $22M from 2018 – 2021, None of Which Is for TFA Teacher Salaries
On May 11, 2019, Teach for America (TFA) alum and New York math teacher, Gary Rubinstein, posted a piece about the money Texas taxpayers spend to keep TFA in their state. Rubinstein entitled his post, “Texas Pays TFA $5.5 Million a Year for 400 Recruits.”
Included in Rubinstein’s post is this Texas Education Agency (TEA) FY2020 and 2021 Proposed Budget, which denotes TEA’s $11M, biennial request for funding TFA statewide. The $11M is to come from “funds appropriated for Educator Quality and Leadership.”
It seems that paying multiple millions to ensure a revolving door of seat-of-pants-trained, temp teachers sorely misses “educator quality and leadership,” but let’s continue.
TEA wanted another $1.1M for TFA for FY2020 and 2021 (which would have increased TFA biennial funding to $12.1M for FY2020 and 2021), but TEA chose to adhere to $11M, the same amount provided for FY2018 and 2019. (According to the FY2020 and 2021 budget approved by the Texas legislature, it seems that the $11M was approved.)
Thus, from 2018 to 2021, Texas taxpayers will have paid TFA $22M for temp teachers. That’s the beauty of the multi-million-dollar pricetag for TFA: A market that is perpetuated by the transience of its recruits.
According to the TEA proposed budget document, TFA’s next $11M comes with CONTINUE READING: Texas Taxpayers Pay Teach For America $22M from 2018 – 2021, None of Which Is for TFA Teacher Salaries | deutsch29
