As School Year Starts, Teachers Deserve Our Thanks

August 22, 2025 As the school year kicks off, it’s a good time to tell Nebraska’s teachers thank you. They are difference makers, and the men and women who lead our classrooms are some of the biggest mentors and role models our kids will have in their lives. 
My wife of 46 years, Suzanne, worked as a teacher in elementary schools – and, as First Lady, continues to travel the state to spend time in classrooms engaging with kids and reading books with grade schoolers. Teachers – especially the one I married – have played an outsized role in my life.

I want Nebraska’s students to have the same experience that I had: to be inspired, challenged, and empowered. My administration has made kids a priority – at the end of the day, everything we do is about our kids and their role in the future of our great state.

Whether it’s mastering the basics – reading, writing, math, science – or developing practical skills in PE or a shop class, education is about building blocks. One lesson leads to a new skill – and those help shape a student for a lifetime and one might spark the life-long pursuit of a dream. 
Since becoming Governor, here’s some of the work we’ve been doing to help Nebraska’s teachers serve our kids:

We’re taking cell phones out of classrooms – bell-to-bell. 
After listening to feedback from students, teachers, and other local leaders, it’s abundantly clear that cell screens are a major point of distraction and contention. They only take away from the learning environment and dissuade kids from focusing on the work in front of them and can lead to isolation. More and more data show us we need to keep raising awareness about how detrimental phones and screens can be to our kids. It’s time we set both our students and teachers up for success. 
I’m grateful to have worked with Sen. Rita Sanders last session – and an overwhelming, bipartisan majority of senators – to get this common-sense legislation signed into law.

We’re giving teachers a raise.
 As a result of LB 645, which was introduced by Sen. Beau Ballard at my request, teachers will bring home an additional $1,000 per year in take-home pay, on average, as we rebalance (and gradually reduce) the required contribution rates to the school employee’s retirement system.

Saying thank you makes a difference, but this is about bigger investments in our classroom leaders too.
 
We’re prioritizing our need to make sure that those nearest our students have the biggest influence.
As the size and scope of the U.S. Department of Education is under review, there's big opportunity to return powers and decisions to the states, restoring local control. This is a pro-kid, pro-parent, pro-teacher position. Our community’s schools know the needs of individual students and are best set to serve Nebraska’s families. 

The right thing to do is to always pursue better outcomes for our students. We all agree that our school system isn’t for funding controversy or division. We can’t let distractions – whether on a phone screen or injected by partisan politics – distract from the purpose and mission of our classrooms. That’s what this work is about. 

Teachers, please know how much your passion and dedication is appreciated. Your efforts are an important part of every family’s responsibility to educate and invest in the future of our kids.

We’ll keep doing our part to make our schools a productive and conducive environment for learning by putting Nebraska’s kids first – and that starts by saying thanks and celebrating the good work of our teachers and schools.