Memo: NSEA Supports AB175 (2017)

The Nevada State Education Association represents 40,000 teachers and education support professionals across Nevada. We believe public education is the basis for a healthy society which results from quality schools, quality educators, and quality communities. Every day, our members work with students and in communities that struggle with issues related to poverty.

Research shows that poverty is a leading indicator of preventing student opportunity and success. Many of our members go above and beyond to address impacts of poverty that our students struggle within the classroom and at the school site.

However, with students who are dealing with unstable or substandard housing, lack of access to nutritious food at home, parents working multiple jobs and not being able to provide support with schoolwork, the challenges are many. We know that the best way to level the playing field for these students is to address the root causes of poverty.

Meanwhile, NSEA remains committed to the struggle to ensure a living wage for all of our members. Most education support professionals across our state earn less than a living wage. (For example, in Clark County, the living wage has been estimated at $15.05/hour.)

NSEA members, such as bus drivers, nutrition workers, and custodians, engage with our students every day. They are the backbone of our school sites making sure that school is able to function. Unfortunately, many of these public workers face the same life issues as low-wage workers in the private sector— having to working multiple jobs or making the difficult decisions on which bills to pay.

We understand that increasing the minimum wage will have an indirect, but positive effect on members at the lowest rungs of the pay scale (in most districts under $10/hour.) We hope that the legislature acts to improve the wages for all of our lowest-wage workers, in both the private and public sectors.