H.R. 2021 — American Teacher Act

This section states congressional findings on the critical role of teachers, nationwide teacher shortages and their impacts on schools and students, the teacher wage penalty reaching 23.5% in 2021, financial instability among teachers (particularly teachers of color in high-poverty areas), a 2022 White House fact sheet on strengthening teacher pipelines, and the need for competitive compensation to improve recruitment, retention, and educational equity.

This section establishes a four-year grant program administered by the Secretary of Education to award funds to state educational agencies (SEAs) for subawarding to local educational agencies (LEAs), with the purpose of ensuring that full-time teachers employed at qualifying schools earn an annual minimum salary of $60,000 (adjusted annually thereafter by the CPI-U for All Urban Consumers) beginning in school year 2026-2027. SEAs must apply with (1) a sustainability plan to maintain the minimum salary post-grant and (2) assurances to enact legislation if needed, apply the minimum salary pro rata to part-time teachers, prioritize subgrants to LEAs serving greater numbers or percentages of title I schools or serving only rural areas (locale codes 41-43), and demonstrate compliance upon request; SEAs must use at least 85% of funds for subgrants. Grant funds must supplement, not supplant, other federal, state, or local funds for teacher salaries, and neither SEAs nor LEAs may reduce teacher pay or state teacher loan forgiveness due to this program.

This section establishes a grant program under which the Secretary of Education awards funds to eligible state educational agencies to provide cost-of-living adjustments—equal to the annual percentage increase in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers for the most recent calendar year—to the state's annual base teacher salary and to the annual salaries of full-time teachers employed at qualifying schools in the state. To qualify, a state must have an annual base salary of at least $60,000 for such teachers and demonstrate in its application that inflation prevents the state from making these adjustments.

This section authorizes the Secretary to reserve not more than 4% of funds appropriated under section 8 to carry out a national campaign (1) to increase awareness about the importance of teachers and the value of the teaching profession, (2) to encourage secondary school and college students to consider teaching as a professional career, and (3) to diversify the pool of individuals who enter the teaching profession.

This section provides a rule of construction stating that nothing in the Act alters or affects the rights, remedies, and procedures available to school or local educational agency employees under federal, state, or local laws (including regulations, court orders, or good-faith negotiation requirements) or under collective bargaining agreements, memoranda of understanding, or other agreements.

This section establishes definitions for terms used in the Act, including (1) incorporating the meanings of elementary school, local educational agency, secondary school, Secretary, State, and State educational agency from section 8101 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 7801); (2) defining qualifying school as a public elementary school or public secondary school for any school year; (3) defining teacher as an individual who is a teacher of record providing direct classroom teaching (or equivalent) in a qualifying school for at least the normal full-time or part-time hours over a complete school year (as determined by the state), meets applicable state certification or licensure requirements in the relevant subject area, and possesses skills for effective classroom practice including improving student learning; and (4) defining teacher of record as a teacher assigned responsibility for specified pupils' learning (as reflected in official attendance records), with extensive teaching and classroom management skills, and the ability to instruct diverse students and assess learning.