Cynthia
Johnson
Igniting Hope for
Georgia State House District 148
Georgia State House District 148
EDUCATION & JOB TRAINING
Strong Schools Are the Backbone of Every Community — And Georgia Has Been Breaking Its Promise
I am a retired Master Teacher. I spent my career in Georgia's public schools — in the classroom, in leadership, and in the communities those schools serve. I know what it looks like when students have everything they need to succeed. And I know what it looks like when they don't.
Education is personal for me. It is also practical. A district that cannot retain good teachers, cannot fund its schools adequately, and cannot connect its young people to real career pathways is a district that loses its future one family at a time. I am running to stop that from happening in HD-148.
The Funding Promise Georgia Keeps Breaking
Georgia has a school funding formula called the Quality Basic Education formula — the QBE. It is the legal mechanism by which the state is obligated to fund public schools based on enrollment and student need. For most of the last twenty years, the Georgia General Assembly has funded QBE below its own formula — undercutting it by hundreds of millions of dollars in lean years and never fully making up the difference in good ones.
Here is the part that should make every Georgia family angry: the state is currently sitting on a $16 billion budget surplus. The answer to how we fund education in Georgia is not to invent a new program or find new money. It is to fully fund the obligation Georgia already made to its children and has been quietly breaking for two decades. That is where I start.
Teacher Pay: Stop Losing Ground
Georgia teachers have received $9,500 in cumulative raises since 2020. Inflation has consumed nearly every dollar of it. A teacher earning the base salary today has less real buying power than a teacher in 2007. Georgia ranks 39th in the nation for starting teacher pay. In a district like HD-148, that ranking is not a statistic — it is the reason experienced teachers leave for higher-paying districts and new graduates never arrive in the first place.
I will co-sponsor HB 333, which requires the state teacher salary schedule to adjust automatically for inflation every year. This is not a raise — it is a floor that prevents salaries from losing value while legislators negotiate. No more one-time bonuses. No more starting from zero every budget cycle. I will also advocate for the Georgia Department of Education's stated goal of a $10,000 cumulative base salary increase to help Georgia compete for the educators our students deserve.
I will fight to extend the teacher salary step-increase schedule beyond its current 21-year cutoff — right now the state stops rewarding experience at year 21, which means the teachers who have given the most to a district get the least incentive to stay. That policy is exactly backwards.
What teachers also need:
Recruiting and Keeping Qualified Teachers
As a retired educator, I believe the state must maintain its standard of hiring highly qualified teachers who have graduated from accredited colleges and universities. I understand the nationwide teacher shortage has led to relaxed hiring practices in some places — but compromising that standard puts students at a disadvantage on state-mandated exams like the Georgia Milestones and widens the educational gap we are trying to close.
Retention is equally important. Georgia should offer continuous professional development, meaningful advancement opportunities, and real respect for the profession. Teachers who stay are teachers who build relationships — and relationships are what move students.
Pre-K: Close the Gap Before It Opens
In Wilcox and Pulaski counties, Pre-K waitlists are real. Families who want to give their children an early start are being turned away not because the program doesn't exist, but because there are not enough seats or trained providers to meet the need. I will push for expanded Pre-K funding and provider capacity in both counties, because the achievement gap is far easier to prevent than to close — and it begins before a child ever steps into a kindergarten classroom.
Literacy: Screening Is Not Enough
HB 538 established a universal literacy screening program for K-3 students. That is the right foundation. But identifying a child who is struggling to read and providing no intervention is just delivering bad news without delivering help. I will push to require that intervention funding travel with the screener program — not as a separate budget ask but as a legislative mandate — so that every child identified gets the support they need, not just the diagnosis.
School Safety: Every School, Every Student
School safety is a moral imperative, not a political one. I will support legislation requiring:
And I will champion common-sense gun legislation — universal background checks, red flag laws, and raising the purchase age for semi-automatic rifles — because the most effective school safety measure is preventing dangerous weapons from being accessible in the first place.
Workforce and Technical Training: Building the Pipeline
Education does not end at graduation — and for many adults in our district, formal education was interrupted before it should have been. SB 193, passed in 2025, authorizes the Technical College System of Georgia to establish a workforce diploma program for adults aged 21 to 40. This is a critical tool for a district with significant numbers of adults who need a new start.
I will push for South Georgia Technical College to actively recruit in Cordele, Hawkinsville, and Abbeville — and to build a direct training pipeline connected to data center construction, operations, and maintenance jobs. If our community is hosting one of the largest data center projects in the country, local residents should be first in line for every job it creates.
I will also advocate for registered apprenticeship programs tied to the construction trades and to agricultural technology — because Crisp and Wilcox counties are farming communities, and agritech is an emerging sector our workforce is currently being left out of.
No Public Dollars for Private School Vouchers
SB 233, Georgia's private school voucher law, is projected to divert up to $150 million annually from public school funding. In a district where the nearest private school may be thirty miles away, that diversion does not create educational choice for most families — it creates a budget cut for the public schools that serve them, with no corresponding benefit to the children those schools educate.
I oppose any expansion of that program and I will make the rural-specific argument for why it is uniquely damaging to communities like ours. Public education funding belongs in public schools — fully, and without diversion.
Every student can learn — if they are given the tools to do so. A robust, equitable, and fully funded public education system is the bedrock of a thriving community and a prosperous state. I have seen what is possible when we invest not just in classrooms, but in the support systems around them. That is what I am committed to building — for every child in HD-148.
I am a retired Master Teacher. I spent my career in Georgia's public schools — in the classroom, in leadership, and in the communities those schools serve. I know what it looks like when students have everything they need to succeed. And I know what it looks like when they don't.
Education is personal for me. It is also practical. A district that cannot retain good teachers, cannot fund its schools adequately, and cannot connect its young people to real career pathways is a district that loses its future one family at a time. I am running to stop that from happening in HD-148.
The Funding Promise Georgia Keeps Breaking
Georgia has a school funding formula called the Quality Basic Education formula — the QBE. It is the legal mechanism by which the state is obligated to fund public schools based on enrollment and student need. For most of the last twenty years, the Georgia General Assembly has funded QBE below its own formula — undercutting it by hundreds of millions of dollars in lean years and never fully making up the difference in good ones.
Here is the part that should make every Georgia family angry: the state is currently sitting on a $16 billion budget surplus. The answer to how we fund education in Georgia is not to invent a new program or find new money. It is to fully fund the obligation Georgia already made to its children and has been quietly breaking for two decades. That is where I start.
Teacher Pay: Stop Losing Ground
Georgia teachers have received $9,500 in cumulative raises since 2020. Inflation has consumed nearly every dollar of it. A teacher earning the base salary today has less real buying power than a teacher in 2007. Georgia ranks 39th in the nation for starting teacher pay. In a district like HD-148, that ranking is not a statistic — it is the reason experienced teachers leave for higher-paying districts and new graduates never arrive in the first place.
I will co-sponsor HB 333, which requires the state teacher salary schedule to adjust automatically for inflation every year. This is not a raise — it is a floor that prevents salaries from losing value while legislators negotiate. No more one-time bonuses. No more starting from zero every budget cycle. I will also advocate for the Georgia Department of Education's stated goal of a $10,000 cumulative base salary increase to help Georgia compete for the educators our students deserve.
I will fight to extend the teacher salary step-increase schedule beyond its current 21-year cutoff — right now the state stops rewarding experience at year 21, which means the teachers who have given the most to a district get the least incentive to stay. That policy is exactly backwards.
What teachers also need:
- Protected planning periods — so the work stays at school, not at home
- Continuous professional development and real pathways to leadership roles with corresponding pay
- The security of knowing their profession is valued at the state level, not just at election time
Recruiting and Keeping Qualified Teachers
As a retired educator, I believe the state must maintain its standard of hiring highly qualified teachers who have graduated from accredited colleges and universities. I understand the nationwide teacher shortage has led to relaxed hiring practices in some places — but compromising that standard puts students at a disadvantage on state-mandated exams like the Georgia Milestones and widens the educational gap we are trying to close.
Retention is equally important. Georgia should offer continuous professional development, meaningful advancement opportunities, and real respect for the profession. Teachers who stay are teachers who build relationships — and relationships are what move students.
Pre-K: Close the Gap Before It Opens
In Wilcox and Pulaski counties, Pre-K waitlists are real. Families who want to give their children an early start are being turned away not because the program doesn't exist, but because there are not enough seats or trained providers to meet the need. I will push for expanded Pre-K funding and provider capacity in both counties, because the achievement gap is far easier to prevent than to close — and it begins before a child ever steps into a kindergarten classroom.
Literacy: Screening Is Not Enough
HB 538 established a universal literacy screening program for K-3 students. That is the right foundation. But identifying a child who is struggling to read and providing no intervention is just delivering bad news without delivering help. I will push to require that intervention funding travel with the screener program — not as a separate budget ask but as a legislative mandate — so that every child identified gets the support they need, not just the diagnosis.
School Safety: Every School, Every Student
School safety is a moral imperative, not a political one. I will support legislation requiring:
- Mandatory, state-funded metal detectors at all Pre-K through 12 public school entrances, with full staff training
- Next-generation secure access systems — high-security locks, scanned access codes for staff, and monitored vestibules at main entrances
- Comprehensive surveillance and monitoring linked to both school administration and local law enforcement for immediate response
- Expansion of school-based mental health services — licensed counselors, psychologists, and social workers at every campus, at professional ratios
And I will champion common-sense gun legislation — universal background checks, red flag laws, and raising the purchase age for semi-automatic rifles — because the most effective school safety measure is preventing dangerous weapons from being accessible in the first place.
Workforce and Technical Training: Building the Pipeline
Education does not end at graduation — and for many adults in our district, formal education was interrupted before it should have been. SB 193, passed in 2025, authorizes the Technical College System of Georgia to establish a workforce diploma program for adults aged 21 to 40. This is a critical tool for a district with significant numbers of adults who need a new start.
I will push for South Georgia Technical College to actively recruit in Cordele, Hawkinsville, and Abbeville — and to build a direct training pipeline connected to data center construction, operations, and maintenance jobs. If our community is hosting one of the largest data center projects in the country, local residents should be first in line for every job it creates.
I will also advocate for registered apprenticeship programs tied to the construction trades and to agricultural technology — because Crisp and Wilcox counties are farming communities, and agritech is an emerging sector our workforce is currently being left out of.
No Public Dollars for Private School Vouchers
SB 233, Georgia's private school voucher law, is projected to divert up to $150 million annually from public school funding. In a district where the nearest private school may be thirty miles away, that diversion does not create educational choice for most families — it creates a budget cut for the public schools that serve them, with no corresponding benefit to the children those schools educate.
I oppose any expansion of that program and I will make the rural-specific argument for why it is uniquely damaging to communities like ours. Public education funding belongs in public schools — fully, and without diversion.
Every student can learn — if they are given the tools to do so. A robust, equitable, and fully funded public education system is the bedrock of a thriving community and a prosperous state. I have seen what is possible when we invest not just in classrooms, but in the support systems around them. That is what I am committed to building — for every child in HD-148.
PRIVACY POLICY | TERMS & CONDITIONS
PAID FOR BY CYNTHIA JOHNSON FOR GEORGIA
P.O. Box 42 Cordele, GA 31010 | (229) 805-0094
copyright 2026 Cynthia Johnson for Georgia
PAID FOR BY CYNTHIA JOHNSON FOR GEORGIA
P.O. Box 42 Cordele, GA 31010 | (229) 805-0094
copyright 2026 Cynthia Johnson for Georgia