Head Start Teachers Could Get A Wage Boost Under Biden Plan. Public Comment Is Open

Head Start teachers in California and across the country could get a pay increase under a new plan by the Biden administration.

In California, the average salary for a Headstart teacher is $43,618, according to the National Institute for Early Education Research. The Biden administration hopes to increase that by about $10,000.

Head Start is the federal program that offers early childhood education and wrap-around services for children under 5 from low-income families. But Melanee Cottrill, the executive director of Head Start California, says staffing shortages have made it hard to serve the number of eligible kids for the program.

“What happens is, we have a classroom, we have the funding to put a teacher in that classroom, but we can't find a teacher, and a large part of that is because the wages are lower,” she said.

The administration’s proposed rule is an effort to bring up wages to better match those of teachers in the public school system. In California, the typical salary for transitional kindergarten teachers, or those who teach 4-year-olds, was $84,700, according to UC Berkeley’s Center for the Study of Child Care Employment.

Cottrill said she’s also heard anecdotally of Head Start teachers whose children have qualified for the program's services themselves because their wages were below the federal poverty line. And many early childhood educators have been leaving the field.

“There's a lot of concern right now with healthcare getting a $25 minimum wage, with fast food getting a $20 minimum wage, while the median wage for Head Start teachers nationally is $19 an hour — that that will exacerbate this problem, particularly in California,” she said.

Staff turnover doubled to 22% over the last decade, according to the Biden administration.