Juab school teachers among the lowest paid, adding pressure to student outcomes

Students work in an art class at Wasatch Junior High School in Salt Lake City on Tuesday, March 12, 2024. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch)

Teachers in the Juab School District, a small district with five schools in rural Juab County, experienced big turnover, heavy workloads and some of the lowest salaries among their peers, a legislative audit found.

Because of those factors, auditors said, the district teachers’ overall years of experience are now below average compared to nearby, also rural, districts — such as Carbon, Millard and North Sanpete. That has had a negative impact on their workload and student outcomes.

The district experienced one of the largest learning losses in the state during the COVID-19 pandemic, a report that triggered the audit.

Though the district was preparing for the retirement of some of its veteran teachers with mentorship programs for new staff, the pandemic disrupted that process. 

“In the midst of that, COVID hit and we actually saw some of those teachers that we knew were going to retire, tap in and retire a little bit earlier,” Linda Hanks, Juab School District Board president, told the Legislative Audit Subcommittee on Tuesday. “So we’re seeing that ramification.” 

Hillary Galvin, the lead auditor, said that these challenges could be an issue for an innovative district, such as Juab, which is among the few that implement competency-based grading — a personalized system that assesses individual needs and skills.

“Some staff members expressed frustration with this way of grading. One suggested that effort may be swaying some grading practices instead of learning outcomes,” the audit reads. “Additionally, inconsistencies were observed in the terminologies used to discuss competency-based grading. Some inconsistencies may be due to the high number of new staff in the district.” 

Juab also has the lowest starting salary if compared with its neighboring districts, with first-year teachers making $50,000. 

“A neighboring school district, located just 30 minutes away from Nephi (where the Juab School District offices are located), offers teachers a starting salary of approximately $7,000 higher,” the audit reads. “This salary discrepancy persists throughout a teacher’s career, further exacerbating retention issues.”

According to the audit, teachers with eight years of experience make a little over $55,000, whereas the Nebo School District offers about $65,000 for the same years of experience.

That disparity has led to teachers being lured away from the school district, Galvin said.

“We’ve been really aggressive at trying to keep up with salaries and we’re still at the bottom. And, in fact, if it wasn’t for the actions of the legislature a year ago, which helped with the legislative add on, we wouldn’t even be at 50,” said Hanks, from the school district board.

Juab School District Deputy Superintendent Royd Darrington added that the district is also recovering from an $800,000 centrally assessed tax payback in 2021. 

“We had no increases for staff members because of that hit,” Darrington said. “Instead of doing rifs (reductions in force) and layoffs, we chose to weather that storm and that affects your bottom line there.” 

In addition to that, one of the most common concerns among teachers was a heavy workload, which led to burnout, according to a district-wide survey the auditors conducted. 

“We believe it’s important that the district continue to seek teacher buy-in,” Galvin said, “and one way to accomplish that is to ensure that they’re establishing metrics to ensure that these initiatives are successful, and continue to evaluate the implementation of initiatives to determine if they are in fact adding value.”

Despite those challenges, the district graduates had the second-highest average college GPA of their peer group in 2022. 

Though the students’ American College Testing (ACT) scores fell in the years following the pandemic, especially in the reading category, since 2021 the scores have recovered to nearly match pre-pandemic levels. 

“While test scores have increased, Juab remains in the middle of peer districts for ACT scores,” according to the audit.

However, Juab Junior High School students — the sole junior high school in the district — continue to score below their peers on their Readiness Improvement Success Empowerment (RISE) tests. The audit found that staff turnover could be a contributing factor in those scores. Since 2019, the school has lost 19 teachers and has had two different principals over three years.

“Because of this, the district had to hire many new teachers,” according to the audit. “The district reports having limited candidates to choose from given their rural location and their inability to offer wages that are competitive with a nearby district.”

The audit also found that hundreds of international students living in Utah, especially from a private school, are enrolled at a Statewide Online Education Program with Arizona State University and the Juab School District, which offers prep courses hybrid models.

According to Utah code, students can only be eligible for these programs if their parent or legal guardian is a state resident. The self-paced model for all students is also inconsistent with Utah statute, the audit found. 

In the auditors’ opinion, the Legislature should assure that the law covers the program. And, if lawmakers feel like the model is beneficial, Galvin said, the state should look for ways to expand it so more students have access to it.

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