JACKSON, Miss.—A surprise $6,000 teacher pay raise gained approval in the Mississippi Senate on Wednesday after the chamber amended a bill that originally dealt with the sale or lease of unused school property.
Senate Education Committee Chairman Sen. Dennis DeBar, R-Leakesville, presented an amendment to House Bill 1395 that adds language to raise salaries over the next three years by $6,000 for regular teachers, $2,000 for assistant teachers, $6,000 for licensed special education educators teaching special education classes—plus an additional $3,000 supplement—and $2,000 for college and university professors.
The Senate’s proposal comes on a deadline day less than a week after the House revived talks of a teacher pay raise by striking the existing language of Senate Bill 2103 and replacing it with the House’s pay proposals. The Senate’s amendment of H.B. 1395 on Wednesday went further by offering a teacher pay raise $1,000 higher than the House’s proposal while also giving a raise to professors.
“Today’s a good day for teachers, teacher assistants, professors and special education teachers as well,” DeBar told reporters Wednesday after the Senate passed the pay raise. “So, you know, I think it kind of shows where the House and Senate are—we’re trying to take care of our teachers, just get the details ironed out. I think this is a big step moving forward.”
Each group of teachers would get a third of their raise on July 1, 2026. Another third would be added in 2027 followed by the final third in 2028. Special education teachers would get their $6,000 on the same schedule as regular teachers along with supplements of $1,000 for the 2026-2027 school year, $2,000 for the 2027-2028 school year, and $3,000 for the 2028-2029 school year and all subsequent school years.
“I know five or 10 years from now, we’re going to be back because our competing states are going to raise their pay (to) keep up with us, but I think this is a good start, what teachers need,” DeBar told reporters.
Full-time professors, associate professors, assistant professors and course instructors at colleges and universities would receive their $2,000 after the law goes into effect on July 1, 2026, if H.B. 1395 makes it to the governor’s desk.
DeBar said that raising professor pay alongside K-12 teacher pay was important because professors’ salaries have not increased as recently as K-12 teachers’ salaries have. He noted that causes some professors to move to K-12 schools to obtain better pay, which widens the professor shortage in the state.
Lawmakers have generally agreed that some sort of teacher pay raise should be enacted, but the chambers could not agree on how big of a raise to offer. After the House and Senate killed each other’s teacher pay-raise bills earlier in the legislative session, the House revived its own teacher pay raise effort on March 6 by amending a bill that was originally about replacing federal ethics requirements with state requirements for school counselors. That pay raise is $5,000 for regular teachers, $8,000 for special-education teachers and $2,000 for assistant teachers.
The House’s 493-page amendment to Senate Bill 2103 also included adjustments to the Public Employees’ Retirement System years of service, restructuring superintendents’ salaries, pay raises for school attendance officers and new funding for the Mississippi Department of Education to allocate to D- and F-rated school districts.
DeBar told reporters that he would not concur with the House’s changes to S.B. 2103 because the Senate wanted the teacher pay raise to be in a simple, clean bill. Even though he added the raise to an unrelated bill about unused school buildings, he said that was just the vehicle the Senate had to use to get the pay raise out of the chamber at this point in the legislative session.
“This is a stand-alone bill,” DeBar told Sen. Johnny DuPree, D-Hattiesburg, when asked on the Senate floor. “That’s one thing we’ve talked about on this side of the chamber is we want to have one issue per bill. Now, unfortunately, we had to combine Sen. Blount’s bill, but we cut it short, that way it’s an up-or-down vote on teacher pay.”
The legislation mandates that school districts pay assistant teachers no less than the salary schedules outlined in the bill. If school districts violate the law, the State would reduce the district’s funding.
When speaking on the Senate floor, DeBar said he also did not approve of the House’s teacher pay raise bill because it made changes to the Public Employees’ Retirement System that the system’s actuaries did not ask for. He added that he is not a PERS expert and he wanted to leave that issue to Sen. Daniel Sparks, R-Belmont, to raise in a separate bill.
The Senate unanimously passed H.B. 1395, and senators applauded DeBar as he walked back to his desk after the vote. The legislation is now back in the hands of the House for the chamber to decide whether to concur with the Senate’s changes or invite conference to hash out a final version of the legislation.
Follow the Mississippi Free Press’ coverage of the 2026 Mississippi legislative session and read past stories here.