Retirement planning for California teachers, built around a CalSTRS pension.
Teachers, principals and district staff face a set of questions no one else does: a pension with a formula, a district vendor list, and paperwork that has to be filed just so.
The three parts
A California educator’s retirement has three moving parts.
Only one of them arrives on its own. The other two depend on choices you make, and most of those choices have a deadline attached to them.
One
The CalSTRS or CalPERS pension
It runs on a formula: your years of service credit, your age when you retire, and your final compensation. You do not have to manage it. You do have to know what it will actually pay, because that number is the floor everything else gets built on top of.
Two
Your 403(b), 457(b) or IRA
These are the accounts you control. Nothing happens inside them unless you set them up, choose where the money goes, and keep contributing. For most educators this is the part that gets the least attention and makes the largest difference.
Three
Social Security
Most California educators do not pay into Social Security for their district work. What you can collect from other jobs, or through a spouse, changed in January 2025 when two long-standing reduction rules were repealed.
Where the questions start
The four questions California educators bring us first.
Each one has a full answer waiting in the guides below. This is the short version.
Will the pension be enough on its own?
A CalSTRS pension is designed to replace a portion of what you earned, not all of it. The formula is specific: service credit, multiplied by an age factor, multiplied by final compensation. The difference between that figure and what you actually spend each month is the gap your own accounts exist to close.
How service credit, age factor and final compensation combine
Why the year you retire can change the factor permanently
What the 2% at 60 and 2% at 62 structures mean for you
Both are salary deferral plans offered through districts, and many California educators are eligible for both in the same year. The limits are set separately, so one does not use up the other. What separates them is how withdrawals are treated if you leave before standard retirement age, and that is usually the deciding factor.
How money moves from your paycheck into the plan
The withdrawal rules that actually separate the two
California districts do not let salary deferrals go just anywhere. Each district maintains a list of approved 403(b) vendors, and your choices inside the plan are limited to what is on it. The list is not a recommendation and it is not ranked, which is exactly why it confuses people.
Who decides what goes on the list
What to look at before choosing from it
What happens to the account if you change districts
Can I collect Social Security as a California teacher?
More often than people expect, and for more than before. Two rules that reduced or eliminated Social Security benefits for certain public employees, the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset, were repealed in January 2025. Anyone who never filed because a benefit looked pointless has reason to look again.
What the repeal changed, and who it reached
Why spousal and survivor benefits saw the largest change
Why filing matters even if you were once told not to bother
Not on day one, and no rule forces you to move it the moment you stop working. Once you leave the district you stop contributing, and the account keeps whatever terms it already had, including its fees and its available options. That is precisely the reason to look at it. The plan was built for the years you were paying into it, not for the years you will be drawing from it, and the choices available to you generally widen once you separate from service. Reviewing what you hold before you move anything is the useful order to do this in.
Many California educators can. The two plans carry separate annual limits set by the IRS, so participating in one does not use up your room in the other, and a number of districts offer both. The limits are adjusted most years, so check the current figures rather than a number you remember from a while back. The bigger difference between the two plans is not the limit at all, it is what happens if you need to reach the money before standard retirement age. The withdrawal rules are not the same, and that is usually what decides which plan someone leans on. The full comparison is here.
It is designed to replace a portion of what you earned, not all of it, and the portion depends on how long you taught, the age you retire and your final compensation. CalSTRS also applies an annual benefit adjustment of 2 percent that is simple rather than compounding, along with a separate purchasing power protection benefit, so the pension does not keep pace with rising costs the way people often assume it will. The practical step is to find out what your own figure will be, then measure it against what you actually spend in a month. The distance between those two numbers is the part your own accounts are there to cover.
The account stays yours. You stop contributing through the old district, and your new district may use a different approved vendor list, which can mean the plan you were paying into is no longer available to you going forward. Nothing is lost in that process, but it is how people end up holding two or three separate accounts across a career and eventually lose track of one of them. Whether to bring them together is a separate question with real trade-offs, and the answer depends on the terms of the accounts you already hold.
Let’s Make Sure We’re a Good Fit
Answer a few quick questions so we can better understand your retirement goals and how we may be able to help.
Question 1 of 5
Which retirement accounts do you have?
Select every one that applies. Many people have more than one.
Question 2 of 5
When do you plan to retire?
There’s no wrong answer. It only changes what’s most useful to discuss.
Question 3 of 5
Roughly what have your supplemental accounts grown to?
Your 403(b), 457(b), 401(k) and IRA balances added up, and a ballpark is fine. Not including your pension.
Question 4 of 5
What brings you here now?
Question 5 of 5
Would you like an overall review of your retirement accounts?
Last one.
Your Situation May Benefit From a Personal Review
Based on what you’ve shared, a conversation may be more helpful than continuing to research on your own.
Robby reviews your accounts personally
Pick a time that works, and bring a recent statement if you have one
No cost, and no obligation to change anything afterward
Good instinct to be looking into this now. The clearest way to get your bearings is to read through a few of the basics at your own pace, and there’s no rush at all.
How a 403(b), a 457(b) and a 401(k) actually differ
Where a CalSTRS or CalPERS pension stops and your own savings start
What to ask about any retirement plan you’re offered
