Energized Arizona teachers turn attention to tax proposal
PHOENIX (AP) - On a hot Arizona evening under a park pavilion, math teacher Heather LaBelle handed out petitions for a ballot initiative that would increase taxes on wealthy residents to get funding for schools. Later that night, her school board voted to give her and her fellow teachers an average raise of 15.5 percent.
LaBelle, like many in Arizona's #RedforEd movement that triggered a six-day teacher walkout, says improving teacher pay is just one step toward better schools.
"The longer we wait, the longer we have a generation and two generations of kids that don't have the tools they need," she said.
Arizona was a key state in a spring that saw teachers around the U.S. mobilize to demand better education funding. They wound up netting hundreds of millions of new dollars in the state budget - much of it going to teacher pay raises - after their historic walkout shuttered most of Arizona's schools.
Read more: http://www.msnewsnow.com/story/38378157/energized-arizona-teachers-turn-attention-to-tax-proposal