The Oklahoma Senate passed a $630 million education package Thursday, amending two Oklahoma House bills despite threats from the House speaker.
The Senate amended House Bill 1935 to include $100 million to support school vouchers. The amendment also would increase the private school tax credit from $5,500 to $7,500, and reduce the homeschool tax credit from $2,500 to $1,000. The Senate also added an income cap of $250,000 for tax credits to the bill.
House Bill 2775 would allocate $500 million to the Oklahoma State Board of Education for teacher pay raises. The bill also would appropriate $30 million for schools to give their own qualitative pay raises for teachers.
Rep. Charles McCall (R-Atoka), speaker of the Oklahoma House of Representatives, proposed an across-the-board $2,500 pay raise for all teachers. However, the Senate opted a pay raise structure similar to Senate Bill 482.
Through the Senate's amendments, teacher pay raises would include $3,000 for those with 0-4 years of experience, $4,000 for those with 5-9 years of experience, $5,000 for those with 10-14 years of experience and $6,000 for those with over 15 years of experience.
HB 1935 and HB 2775 were referred back to the House for engrossment.
According to The Oklahoman, McCall threatened against any changes to the House’s education plan in early March or else all Senate education priorities are "dead on arrival" in his chamber.
Sen. Mary Boren (D-Norman) said this was part of a plan to privatize schools in Oklahoma, adding that aspects of the bill, like teacher pay raises, were “hush money” to go along with HB 1935.
“It is clear that Oklahoma is governed by political powers that are not invested in fully integrated, fully funded public schools,” Boren said. “They are very determined to shift as many taxpayer dollars over into a private system as they can get away with.”
Boren said aspects of the bill would not do enough to keep teachers in Oklahoma. She said HB 1935 acts against teacher retention in Norman.
Sen. Greg Treat (R-Oklahoma City) wrote in a press release that this proposal would provide improvements to Oklahoma’s education system while rewarding teachers and giving power to parents.
“Today is a great day for education in Oklahoma,” Treat wrote. “My Senate colleagues and I passed measures that, when signed into law will make drastic improvements to public education, reward our teaches, empower parents to make the best choice for their kids and fund students, not systems.”
The Senate’s education plan outlines a number of additional education-related measures like eight weeks of paid maternity leave for teachers and on-site childcare to specific districts, though didn’t specify which districts this would apply to.
Boren said she suspects the bills will meet delays and a possible need for a special session in the House. Boren’s belief is the bills and proposal were not created with teachers in mind.
“(The bill) wasn’t designed to keep teachers in Oklahoma,” Boren said. “It was designed to manage appearances and image.”
This story was edited by Alexia Aston and Karoline Leonard. Ansley Chambers copy edited this story.
