부산대학교 도서관

Low teacher salaries have been prevalent since the mid-1900s, and teacher strikes, like the one that occurred in Chicago in 2019, have resulted in attempts to raise these salaries. This study analyzes whether raising teacher salaries could have benefits to other groups besides teachers themselves. Through a correlational analysis, the relationship between average teacher salaries and student performance on standardized tests (measured with SAT scores, math proficiency rates, and ELA proficiency rates) was examined among thirty randomly selected high schools in eight northern New Jersey counties. The findings show that average teacher salaries were positively correlated with all three metrics, but only those with SAT scores and ELA proficiency rates were significant correlations. These results do not suggest that raising teacher salaries will increase these metrics of student performance; they are solely an acknowledgment that such causation should be explored in order to properly inform policy on this issue.