Colorado § 22-55.5-101 Legislative declaration

Colorado Statutes

§ 22-55.5-101 — Legislative declaration

Colorado § 22-55.5-101

Title 22Education

Art.Educator Pay Raise Funding

This text of Colorado § 22-55.5-101 (Legislative declaration) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Colorado primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook

Colo. Rev. Stat. § 22-55.5-101 (2026).

Text

(1)The general assembly finds that:

(a)Research demonstrates that, when considering the elements of the education system within public schools, the classroom teacher has the most significant effect on a student's learning and academic growth;

(b)Each adult working within a school and interacting with students has the potential to positively influence the students within the school and increase learning and academic growth;

(c)For the 2019-20 school year, the department of education reported that Colorado had an average teacher salary of about fifty-seven thousand seven hundred dollars;

(d)In 2020-21, school districts and charter schools in Colorado paid a minimum teacher salary that ranged from a low of about twenty-five thousand dollars to a high of about fifty-three thou

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(1) The general assembly finds that:

(a) Research demonstrates that, when considering the elements of the
education system within public schools, the classroom teacher has the most
significant effect on a student's learning and academic growth;

(b) Each adult working within a school and interacting with students has the
potential to positively influence the students within the school and increase
learning and academic growth;

(c) For the 2019-20 school year, the department of education reported that
Colorado had an average teacher salary of about fifty-seven thousand seven
hundred dollars;

(d) In 2020-21, school districts and charter schools in Colorado paid a
minimum teacher salary that ranged from a low of about twenty-five thousand
dollars to a high of about fifty-three thousand dollars;

(e) For the 2020-21 school year, of the one hundred seventy-eight school
districts in the state, all but thirty reported a minimum teacher salary of less than
forty thousand dollars;

(f) Many of these school districts are rural school districts with low assessed
property value and therefore limited ability to raise local property tax revenue; and

(g) The total program amount calculated for each school district pursuant to
section 22-54-104, which represents the financial base of support for each school
district, has been reduced for most school districts by the budget stabilization
factor each budget year since the 2010-11 budget year, further restricting the ability
of some school districts to increase their teacher salaries and the hourly wage for
other employees.

(2) It is therefore the intent of the general assembly to establish a fund to
assist school districts and charter schools in increasing the salary paid to teachers
and the hourly wage paid to nonlicensed employees. It is further the intent of the
general assembly that a school district or charter school that receives money from
the fund must use the money received to supplement, not supplant, the amount
that the school district or charter school would otherwise budget for educator
salaries and wages.