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Andrew Sterling teaches Advanced Placement U.S. government and Advanced Placement U.S. history classes at a BASIS school in Tucson in 2012.

By a 2-1 margin, teachers at Tucson's acclaimed BASIS Tucson North school voted to unionize Wednesday evening, making the Northeast Side charter the first in Arizona to have staff organize. Read more»

Marisol Garcia discusses the 'Educators’ Budget' proposed by Arizona’s largest teacher’s union, the Arizona Education Association on March 22, 2023. Garcia is the union’s president.

Arizona is ranked one of the worst states for school spending, and teachers are urging lawmakers to rectify that through increased funding, unveiling a $2.2 billion “Educators’ Budget” on Wednesday. Read more»

Teachers march in front of the Arizona Capitol building on March 15, 2023, to protest a new hotline launched by the Arizona Department of Education that encourages parents to file complaints about lesson plans in Arizona classrooms.

Dozens of teachers took to the street on Wednesday afternoon to demand that Arizona Republican Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne’s newly established parental complaint hotline be dismantled. Read more»

A bill in the Arizona House would mandate that Arizona’s public middle and high schools offer training for students on properly handling firearms.

Arizona’s House of Representatives is continuing to advance a bill requiring public middle and high schools in Arizona to offer training on the proper handling of firearms. Read more»

If the measure continues to receive unanimous opposition from Democrats, it’s unlikely that Gov. Katie Hobbs will sign it, given that she’s vowed to support only bipartisan bills.

Arizona parents would be given easier access to school curriculum and teacher training materials under GOP proposals that critics say only serve to further vilify teachers and force schools to violate legal agreements. Read more»

Education advocates hold a sign during a press conference Sept. 15 as Democratic Rep. Reginald Bolding, at the podium, calls out Republicans for failing to call a special session to lift the school Aggregate Expenditure Limit.

Arizona Democrats and public education advocates are urging Gov. Ducey and his fellow Republicans in the state Legislature to keep their promise to lift the state’s annual school spending cap, allowing districts across the state to spend around $1.3 billion already allocated to them. Read more»

Schools in Arizona could lose access to more than $1 billion lawmakers gave them this school year if the state doesn't take action to lift a 40-year-old spending limit placed on school districts. Read more»

Public school districts are required to make teacher salaries publicly available and curriculum and books are accessible to interested parents, but private schools have no such requirements.

Since applications for the expanded Empowerment Scholarship Account program opened, roughly three of every four students who sought school voucher funding had never set foot in an Arizona public school - subsidizing tuition for students who already attend pricey private schools. Read more» 1

RedForEd marchers as they move toward the Capitol in April 2018 as part of a protest over low teacher pay.

A new report shows that teachers in Arizona faced a 32% wage penalty in 2021 compared to college-educated workers employed in other fields - the fourth-largest teacher pay gap in the nation, behind only Colorado, Oklahoma and Virginia. Read more» 1

Republican legislative candidate Matt Gress on July 4, 2022.

Matt Gress, a candidate for the Arizona House of Representatives, announced his “Pay Teachers First” plan on Monday, centered around an immediate and permanent $10,000 pay raise for Arizona teachers. Read more»

A group of people at the Arizona Education Association rally outside the Arizona Senate in Phoenix on June 21, 2022.

Members of the Arizona Education Association gathered at the state Capitol to again ask lawmakers to funnel a bigger chunk of the state’s $5 billion budget surplus into public schools and questioned the use of taxpayer money to expand the voucher program. Read more»

Public education advocates rally at the Arizona Capitol on Feb. 21, 2022, to call on the legislature to lift a constitutional spending cap that will force schools to cut nearly $1.2 billion before the school year ends.

With legislators still undecided on how to spend the record $5.3 billion dollar budget surplus, the Arizona Education Association, the state’s largest teacher’s union, is demanding massive increases in education funding. Read more»

To allow parents to scour lessons for elements of "critical race theory," Arizona teachers would be required to upload a list of every book and worksheet they use in their classrooms online for parental review if a Republican-backed bill becomes law. Read more»

Recent research indicates that stress, even more than low pay, is what pushes teachers out the door.

With the latest surge of the coronavirus straining an already vulnerable K-12 workforce nationwide and many school officials saying they are struggling to find enough substitutes to cover classrooms, some state officials have exercised their power to alleviate teacher labor challenges. Read more»

TaiAnna Yee (left) signs one of the three petitions that the Invest in Arizona campaign is gathering signatures for to overturn three laws Republican legislators passed to cut taxes and revenue for a voter-approved education fund on Saturday, July 14 in Tempe. The Invest in Arizona campaign must gather over 110,000 signatures by the end of September. They are facing a lawsuit to end the campaign on state constitutional grounds.

The Invest in Arizona campaign seeking to overturn three laws GOP legislators and Gov. Ducey celebrated as “the single largest tax cut in Arizona history” marked its first week of action with increased momentum around the state - and a lawsuit aimed at rendering the campaign futile. Read more»

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