An earlier version of this story was originally published in The Pitch, the student newspaper of Archie Williams High School in Anselmo, CA.
Buying a house at the median price in Marin County, California will run you a cool $1.7 million.
At several times the national median home cost, which was $403,200 in the first quarter of this year, the county — and much of the rest of the notoriously expensive Bay Area — is a tough place for teachers to live. The average teacher salary in Marin is $63,344, around two-thirds of the county’s overall average and well below what is needed to afford most homes there.
This disparity has created a housing affordability crisis for teachers at Archie Williams High School and other nearby schools, with many staff forced to live farther from their workplaces, adversely affecting their mental health and increasing turnover in their positions. Until teacher salaries catch up to the local housing market, the question for many educators isn’t if they will have to leave, but when.
Housing affordability issues for teachers at schools in the San Francisco Unified High School District have caused a high rate of staff turnover, according to Sarita Lavin, an ethnic studies and Black studies teacher at George Washington High School. “Most people in SFUSD last only five years,” she said. The threshold to be considered low-income in San Francisco is $108,300, but Lavin said most school workers don’t even reach an $83,000 a year salary “until over 10 years of service.” She added, “Over 50 percent of student teachers quit before year three because they literally can’t afford not to.”
Turnover is also a risk for some teachers at Archie Williams High School, because of long commute times tied to affordability. A 2024 study from Sage Journals found that teachers who commute over 45 minutes have a predicted transfer probability of 21%. The Pitch surveyed 77 Archie Williams teachers and staff, and found that half live outside of the cities associated with the Tamalpais Union High School District, of which Archie Williams is a member. Fifteen Archie Williams faculty members who participated in the survey have a daytime commute of 45 to 60 minutes, meaning at least a few staff members face an increased likelihood of leaving.
Campus Supervisor Makena Guasco actually came to Archie Williams last year to reduce her commute time, since she’s able to live nearby with her parents. At her previous job in the East Bay, Guasco commuted around an hour each way, which eventually led her to quit. The strain of that commute on her sleep schedule and overall well-being made commuting time a major factor in deciding where to work next. “I was like, ‘I’m not working a 5:30 a.m. shift anymore.’ When you come to work, and you’re not exhausted, it’s so much nicer. My productivity is definitely higher. I’m happier,” she added.
Guasco’s short commute from her parents’ house just a few minutes away makes her an outlier in the Pitch’s survey on staff commuting. “The cost of living in Marin is significantly outside my budget if I were attempting to live alone and with the same amenities I have. It also shows the reality that unless there’s a change, Marin will price out locals quickly,” she said.
Teachers play a central role in student learning and development, with their morale a key driver of student success, according to the Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium. But for many, having a long commute to work while balancing student demands and family priorities can be emotionally exhausting.
Jose Anchordoqui, who has taught Spanish at Archie Williams for 11 years, commutes an hour each way from Petaluma, where the median housing price is $904,667, just over half of Marin’s median housing price. Anchordoqui is well known for his passion for teaching at Archie Williams; yet he has struggled to balance work and family responsibilities with his commute.
“There were years where there was a dark cloud,” he said. “Like, ‘Oh, my goodness, I have to do this again.’ I have three kids. I gotta help them get ready for school. [Commuting] just affects my quality of life.” It means, he went on, that “I have to take time out of my personal life to create a lesson plan and to grade. The turnaround is quick. It does cut away on [my personal time].”
Lavin at George Washington High School, while having an unusually short commute herself, said that the long commutes affecting many of her coworkers also strains their quality of life. Commuting more than a half hour every day extends their “work time and leads to less time with family or doing human things that we deserve to do,” she said.
Living far from campus also prevents school workers from participating in school-run events such as sports events and student concerts, as one of The Pitch’s anonymous survey responders attested. “The commute definitely impacts my participation in after-school activities adversely. In my time working here, I have seen less and less new staff participate in evening activities due to their longer commute times,” they wrote.
In February, teachers in the SFUSD went on strike for higher salaries to help them keep up with rising living costs in the area, with 20,000 staff and students participating in the four-day walkout. All SFUSD schools closed during the strike, including George Washington High School. Lavin participated in the teacher strike because she believes that a salary increase would shorten staff commute times, increase morale, and decrease turnover.
The SFUSD teachers ultimately secured 4% raises over two years, and three additional pay days which amounted to around a 5% total raise. Non-educator staff will receive an 8.5% raise over two years.
While Lavin views the SFUSD Teacher Strike as a step toward broader change, she believes that sustained action is necessary.
She said, “Higher salaries would allow SF teachers to live where they work, leading to more connection to the community, an easier commute, better retention of staff, [and] more stability at schools.”
