How much NC Pre-K teachers make is not one statewide number: the program's requirements define two pay tracks.
Teachers at public-school NC Pre-K sites are paid on the NC Public School Salary Schedule for certified staff, with State Health Plan and retirement benefits, while licensed teachers at nonpublic child care sites must receive at least the minimum compensation package the program defines.
Here is how both tracks work, and where the current dollar amounts are — and are not — published.
The current salary scale
The program's pay rules run on two tracks, both written into the NC Pre-K Program Requirements and Guidance document posted by the NC DHHS Division of Child Development and Early Education (DCDEE).
At public-school sites, teachers receive salaries based on the NC Public School Salary Schedule for Certified Staff, and the package comes with State Health Plan and retirement benefits.
At nonpublic sites — child care programs — licensed teachers must receive at least the minimum compensation package set out in the program's requirements (its Table 3).
The structure matters as much as the amounts.
A school site does not price the classroom; the state salary schedule does, and benefits travel with it.
A child care site starts from a program-defined floor instead, and can pay above it — but the requirements set the floor, not the going rate.
Now the gap you will hit if you go looking for the numbers: the requirements document posted on the DCDEE site is the edition effective state fiscal year 2012-13, and the dollar minimums printed in its compensation tables are 2012-era — they do not describe what NC Pre-K teachers are paid today.
Our research found no current dollar table for either track, so this page describes the pay rules and leaves the amounts to be confirmed with DCDEE, which posts the requirements, or with the hiring district.
The posted dollar minimums are out of date
Lead vs assistant pay
The requirements treat lead teacher and teacher assistant as the classroom's two instructional roles, and they hold both to the same schedule: instructional staff — teacher and teacher assistant — must work in direct contact with NC Pre-K children for at least 32.5 hours per week, with the rest of a 40-hour week left for planning.
On this schedule, both roles are built around a 40-hour week.
On pay, the requirements are written for the teacher role: the school salary schedule at public-school sites and the minimum compensation package at nonpublic sites are both framed around teachers.
The materials our research retrieved publish no current NC Pre-K assistant-teacher pay figure — no rate, no schedule, no dollar minimum we could quote.
That is a gap in the public record we could verify, not a sign the role is unpaid or unregulated.
Until you have a current figure, confirm an assistant's rate with the job posting and the hiring employer.
The questions worth asking are the ones that locate the job on a schedule: who employs this assistant, and what does the pay scale look like after the first year?
How credentials and years change pay
Credentials gate the classroom first and price it second.
Under the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction's teacher-requirements guidance, the minimum credential for NC Pre-K teachers is the NC Early Childhood Credential, and the "enhanced" requirements are an associate of applied science in early childhood education or higher, a Preschool Add-On license, or the Birth through Kindergarten (B-K) license — a professional educator's license North Carolina issues specifically for this age band.
At public-school sites, pay runs on the salary schedule for certified staff, with the State Health Plan and retirement benefits attached.
At nonpublic sites, the requirements set a floor: what a program pays above its minimum package is not written into the posted requirements.
And on top of wages, North Carolina has an education-based supplement: Child Care WAGE$, run by Early Years (formerly Child Care Services Association), pays salary supplements to teachers, directors and family child care providers working with children birth to 5 in participating counties.
WAGE$ eligibility is narrow enough to check before you count on it: you must work in a participating county, earn at or below the local income cap — $19, $23 or $25 an hour, chosen by the local Smart Start partnership and fixed until June 2027 — work at least 10 hours a week, and hold an education level on the WAGE$ scale.
Payments arrive after each completed six-month commitment period at the same program, so a teacher eligible all 12 months collects twice a year; anyone averaging under 30 hours a week gets a prorated amount.
Early Years reports an average six-month supplement of $1,285.
The dollar amount at each education level on the current scale was not published in the materials our research read — Early Years' own program pages are the place to check the level you would land on.
Years of experience are the part of this picture the public documents we retrieved do not price.
The school salary track is where a step for experience would live, but the schedule's current step amounts were not part of our research, and at nonpublic sites the posted requirements set a floor rather than a ladder.
Ask each employer where experience moves you.
Check WAGE$ before you accept a child care site
School-site vs private-site pay
Same program, two payrolls.
At a public-school NC Pre-K site, your salary is based on the NC Public School Salary Schedule for Certified Staff, and the requirements attach the State Health Plan and retirement benefits to it.
At a nonpublic (child care) site, you are the program's employee, and the requirement the program must meet is the minimum compensation package for licensed teachers, not the school schedule.
The floor-versus-schedule distinction is what to carry into an offer comparison.
The school track replaces site-level pay-setting with a state schedule and adds the state benefits package; the child care track guarantees a program minimum and leaves everything above it to the program.
Because the current dollar value of both the schedule placement and the minimum package is missing from the posted requirements, the current places to confirm either number are the employer and the office behind the program — our research found no current figure for either in the documents we read.
NC Pre-K's school-site track is one version of a broader idea — a state tying pre-K classrooms to school-scale pay.
Georgia took a related step: DECAL reports Georgia Pre-K's lead teachers moved onto the K-12 salary scale in state fiscal year 2025, a 16% raise.
The broader picture of pre-K pay parity, including Head Start's parity rule now proposed for repeal, is on its own page.
And if you want the occupation-wide benchmark — the BLS median wage for preschool teachers in North Carolina — it lives on our pre-K salary in North Carolina data page, a different wage series from program pay rates and not a substitute for the NC Pre-K terms above.
How to find these jobs
Search for postings that say "NC Pre-K" at school districts and at child care programs, not just the generic pre-K title — NC Pre-K is the program's own name, and a posting that carries it tells you which pay rules you are reading about.
Once you have an interview, the questions that matter are the ones this page has answered in structure if not in dollars: Is this a public-school site or a nonpublic child care site?
Which track does it pay on — the salary schedule or the program's package?
What benefits come with it?
Where does my credential place me?
Is the county in WAGE$?
If you are still working toward the credential, the minimum is the NC Early Childhood Credential, with the enhanced route through an AAS in ECE or higher, a Preschool Add-On license, or the B-K license.
The pre-K teacher career guide covers the role itself — duties, settings and how pre-K differs from preschool and infant-toddler classrooms.
When you are ready to apply, browse open pre-K teacher jobs and filter for North Carolina.
Career information, not licensing or legal advice. NC Pre-K pay terms are set by the program's requirements — start with the NC DHHS Division of Child Development and Early Education, which posts the NC Pre-K requirements, and confirm current salary terms with the division or the hiring employer.