• Why It Is Important
• Increase teacher base pay overall.
• Increase pay for certain groups of teachers—this might include providing incentives for teachers in high-need subjects, at high-need schools, and in leadership roles, and might include performance-based compensation.
• Involve all stakeholders in any changes to pay policy.

• Why It Is Important
• Consider the source of your recruitment challenges and, if appropriate, introduce signing bonuses, loan repayments, or housing assistance for teachers in hard-to-staff schools or in areas of shortage.

• Teachers’ compensation can improve teacher recruitment, retention, and quality in the short and long term.
• Stand-alone compensation reforms that are not aligned with professional development, teacher evaluation, or hiring practices are less likely to be as effective as more comprehensive reforms.

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Allocate resources, and negotiate with unions to ensure that teachers’ salaries are sufficient to achieve improvements in teacher recruitment, retention, and quality so that supply equals demand.

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• Weighing the financial benefits and political costs, target resources toward groups such as teachers in high-need subjects, teachers in hard-to-staff schools, and high-quality teachers, such as those certified by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.
• Focus specifically on the persistent teacher shortage areas, such as the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) subjects.
• Consider that although increasing pay may seem cost-prohibitive, high turnover rates are costly to schools and districts.
• Ensure that rewards are substantial for high to average performers in order for the system to be most effective.
• Use performance evaluation information to inform compensation decisions, aligning the two as required by HB 153 passed by the 129th Ohio General Assembly.
• Ensure that there is a fair and accurate system for measuring student performance and growth if teachers receive performance-based compensation.
• Use incentives strategically to ensure the equitable distribution of teachers across schools and classrooms.
• Ensure that professional development helps teachers move toward earning higher salaries.

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• Actively involve teachers in any compensation reform efforts.
• Ensure that the concerns of all stakeholder groups are addressed.
• Work hard to create essential broad-based community support.
• Incorporate salary changes into the union contract using interest-based rather than positional bargaining.

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• Such inducements help to fill immediate vacancies using fewer resources than those required for more long-term solutions.
• Although there is no research to support many short-term financial inducements, governments in the United States and abroad have been experimenting with them as a potential means to improve teacher recruitment.
• Targeted incentives can be used strategically to help address teacher distribution problems.

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• It is of note that the research base documents widespread use of these strategies, although the research is not well developed around the effectiveness 
  of such approaches.
• Use such incentives to encourage teachers to teach in hard-to-staff schools.
• Allow teachers to petition out of
  in-district housing requirements.

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