Ohio’s public school teachers make less than the national average and Ohio’s candidates for governor say they want to pay teachers more. 

The average public school teacher salary in Ohio is $70,586 — ranking 23rd in the nation, according to the National Education Association. The national average public school salary was $74,495 in 2024-25, according to NEA. 

The average starting teacher salary in Ohio was $42,222 — ranking 46th in the nation. The average starting teacher salary nationwide was $48,112.  

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“Ohio, based on the numbers, seems to be lagging behind in both the average teacher starting salary and just the overall teacher salary in Ohio,” said Ohio Education Association President Jeff Wensing. 

“Education needs to be a sustainable career where you can support your family and raise a family. You need to attract really talented individuals to go into the education profession. Once you attract them, you need to keep them.”

Ohio Republican candidate for governor Vivek Ramaswamy has said he wants to “pay our best teachers more by rewarding excellence and attracting top talent into the profession,” according to his campaign website.

Ramaswamy’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment. 

“I think the starting salary for teachers, especially in our public schools, needs to be higher than the $38-$40,000 a year that it is today,” Ramaswamy said in a Facebook video on Sept. 19.

Wensing pointed out that Ohio’s base salary for a new teacher with a bachelor’s degree is $35,000. 

“I would think, as a gubernatorial candidate, you would know what the minimum teacher salary is in your state,” Wensing said. 

OEA endorsed Ohio Democratic candidate for governor Dr. Amy Acton, who is advocating for raising teacher pay across the board.

“Dr. Acton, who is married to a 44-year public school teacher, credits public schools with saving her life as a kid,” said Virginia Schaus, spokeswoman for the Acton campaign. 

“Dr. Acton will fight to fully fund public schools to give local school districts the resources they need to raise teacher pay and attract and retain our teachers.” 

An Ohio bill would raise Ohio’s base salary for all teachers to $50,000. 

Ohio Democratic state Reps. Joe Miller and Michele Grim introduced Ohio House Bill 191 last year and it has received one committee hearing. 

Any bill that does not pass before Ohio’s two-year General Assembly ends in December would have to be reintroduced. 

In 2025, 1 in 8 teaching positions were either vacant or filled by an under-qualified educator. 

“Educators are leaving the profession to find some careers that can help their families out better and make their ends meet a little bit better,” Wensing said. 

Ohio is one of 32 states that offers no additional pay to attract or keep teachers in hard-to-staff schools or subjects, according to a new report from the National Council on Teacher Quality, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization. 

The report defines hard-to-staff subjects as subjects with persistent vacancies year-after-year. 

“Those include shortage subjects like teachers who teach students with disabilities or special education teachers, teachers who teach English as a second language and math and science teachers at the high school level,” NCTQ President Heather Peske said. 

Hard-to-staff schools are schools that have had persistent shortage. 

“Oftentimes, those schools are associated with serving students who come from higher poverty backgrounds, and sometimes schools that are in more rural areas of the state, where they just have fewer people to draw from to be able to hire and fill those vacancies,” Peske said. 

The National Council on Teacher Quality recommends states pay more for hard-to-staff schools and subjects by guaranteeing teachers in the highest-need placements at least a 7.5% salary supplement. 

“We see that when states are offering differentiated pay — either based on shortages and vacancies in subjects, or based on differentiation by performance — we see that the first impact is higher retention of teachers,” Peske said. 

NCTQ also suggests giving high-performing teachers the chance to earn more based on evaluation criteria. 

Ohio spent an estimated $7 billion on teacher salaries for the 2024-25 school year, according to NCTQ. 

Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Megan Henry on X or on Bluesky.

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