Abby Siegel, an MSU alumna currently in her fifth year education internship, leads Brain Gym exercises with students in Lynn Bishop’s first grade class Tuesday at William Donley Elementary School, 2961 E. Lake Lansing Road. Siegel said the job market will determine whether she stays in the state after her internship.
Bills introduced in the Michigan House and Senate could open up thousands of teaching positions to recent graduates and young teachers.
A plan, originally proposed by Gov. Jennifer Granholm earlier this year, would encourage about 39,000 eligible public school employees to retire and open these positions to recent graduates and new teachers, said state Sen. Jud Gilbert, R-Algonac.
“The savings were the fact that you would have retirements of high-paid employees and then replace with younger people at a lower end of the pay scale,” Gilbert said.
The savings are estimated with the assumption that of those eligible to retire, 29,000 actually retire and that 90 percent of the retirees are replaced with new lower-cost employees, according to the Michigan Office of the State Budget.
The savings created with the early retirement plan could aid the state’s projected $1.7 billion deficit for next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1.
Because not all teachers who retire will be replaced, the benefits for MSU graduates could be limited, said Sharif Shakrani, co-director of MSU’s Education Policy Center.
“When they do this reduction in force, they (would) not replace all of the positions that were reduced,” he said. “They may replace one in two now at the school level. If 50 percent are replaced, then the school districts will seek recent graduates who will receive a significantly lesser starting salary.”
The plan would offer retirement incentives such as a multiplier increase from 1.5 to 1.6 percent for employees who retire between July 1 and Sept. 1 this year.
The multiplier determines monthly pension with a combination of salary and time employed.
“I don’t think this is encouragement,” said state Sen. John Gleason, D-Flushing.
“If they can afford to retire, do (retire). Demanding it and punishing them if they don’t. It’s unfair.”
Abby Siegel is an MSU graduate completing her student teaching at Donley Elementary School, 2961 E. Lake Lansing Road.
Although Siegel would like to teach in Michigan public schools, she said it’s unfair to ask teachers to retire before they are ready.
“I don’t want teachers to feel pressured to retire because of the incentives they are offering,” she said. “But if they don’t retire, Michigan could lose a lot of good young teachers to other states.”
The reforms also would create savings by eliminating the subsidy for retiree vision and dental insurance and by reinstating a 3 percent employee contribution toward pension.
Both the Senate and the House will work to revise early retirement bills throughout their two-week spring break, which ends April 13, Gilbert said.
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