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Teachers are expendable, overworked, underpaid, and many times disrespected by students, parents and higher-ups. Nonetheless, these teachers still show up because there are some who are teachers indeed.

I am deeply concerned with the diminution of the teaching strength of the country as a result of the disproportionately low salaries that are paid to teachers throughout the country.

I think good teachers are underpaid.

The impending teacher shortage is the most critical education issue we will face in the next decade.

In many ways, education is a lousy business. Teachers are not normal economic actors; almost all of them work for less money than they might fetch in some other industry, given their skills and advanced degrees.

To get enough of the teachers we need, teaching has to be a great job where talented people are supported and rewarded.

Without any doubt at all, teacher quality is the fundamental differentiator. Not just, incidentally, of education, but I would argue, probably the biggest single differentiator of success for the nations of the 21st Century.

I believe there's not a harder job in the world than being a teacher, and there isn't a job with a more direct impact on the performance of our students.

Our teachers at the public school level are the most underpaid for the importance of their job in America.

As a Member of Congress from one of the fastest growing States in the country, we hire close to 2,500 new teachers a year, close to 5,000 support staff and faculty.