The deadline to file taxes is April 15. Procrastinating teachers may find themselves in a mad dash to search for receipts from 2023 that provide proof of out-of-pocket spending on classroom-related items that count toward the Internal Revenue Service’s educator expense deduction.
The deduction, at $300, seems fairly stingy. And it hasn’t budged since 2022 when, for the first time since its inception 20 years earlier, the lnternal Revenue Service raised it $50—up from $250.
To put that amount in perspective, most teachers report spending their own money on classroom supplies each year, and analyses suggest they spend anywhere from $500 to more than $800 annually on them—more than double the IRS’s educator expense deduction. Further, average annual public school K-12 teacher salaries have actually dropped by more than 6 percent from a decade ago when adjusted for inflation.
As teachers try to do as much (or more) for their students with less, Education Week’s updated annual expense deduction calculator could come in handy this tax season.
See below to calculate out-of-pocket spending on classroom supplies.
