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When Nicole Wright, a special education teacher at Corte Madera School, heard her young daughter tell her that she also wanted to become a teacher, her response was: “No, you can’t be a teacher.”
Wright is one out of several teachers in Portola Valley who are calling for the Portola Valley School District to give educators higher salaries and better benefits. During a school board meeting on May 16, Tim Sato, president of the Portola Valley Teachers Association spoke to the school board, asking it to consider a 6% salary increase.
“We have an opportunity here in Portola Valley to be leaders in this area and to do the things we need to do to make this a profession that is sustainable and that people will want to enter,” said Sato during the meeting.
The median income in San Mateo County is $186,600, according to the California Department of Housing and Community Development. Sato points out that none of the teachers in Portola Valley make that much money. For the 2023-24 school year, base salaries start at $82,130 and go up to $153,886.
Teachers in Portola Valley are working second jobs and living paycheck to paycheck, according to Sato.
When Wright recounted her interaction with her daughter during public comment, she told the board that she had to explain to her child that being a teacher is not a “financially secure position” and she wanted her to have a job where she could be independent.
“At this time I’m hopeful that the path for educators will allow for that at some point, but I don’t see enough change in the time it would take for her to become a teacher for that to be a viable career option,” Wright said.
In February 2023, the district and union reached a contract agreement to increase pay by 20%. The contract states that “parties may reopen Article 13 (Compensation) plus two additional articles of each party’s selection for the 2024-25 school year.”
PVTA’s most recent proposal for a 6% salary increase amounts to about $500,000 per year, according to Sato. At the start of the year, the district moved $1.5 million into a deferred maintenance fund, $500,000 more than the initial budget. Sato suggests that the district use that $500,000 and put it towards educator salaries.
“We need to keep pace with inflation, we need to outpace the cost of health care,” said Sato.
Sato states that the district’s projected revenue is increasing and reserves are steadily growing, but teachers are still struggling to keep up with the increasing costs of living in the Bay Area.
“PVSD must spend today’s dollars on today’s children. We are seeking pay and benefits increases that are fiscally sound and are also essential to ensuring PVSD educators can continue to provide for themselves and their families,” said Sato in a statement to The Almanac.
Teachers in Portola Valley are pushing for the district to invest more in their teachers as they struggle to afford rent, care for their families and to live on their own. Daphna Woolfe, a retiring third grade teacher at Ormondale School, highlighted that as a career that is known to pay less, teaching is also stereotypically seen as a job for women.
“Let’s break out of the mold of paying women’s jobs less because it values them less,” said Woolfe. “We’re all very valuable here. We deserve to be paid for the amount of education we get.”
In a statement to The Almanac, PVSD Superintendent Roberta Zarea said the district “recognizes the invaluable contributions of our teachers, who are the heart of our educational program” and are proud to be paying its teachers one of the highest salaries among neighboring districts.
“We are dedicated to collaborating and finding common ground at the negotiation table — the legally prescribed forum for this process — in the best interest of our students while being fiscally responsible in order to preserve the long-term stability of the district for the benefit of the students, staff, and community we serve,” Zarea said.
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