Locals negotiate improvements in salaries, professionalism

Several AFT locals have reached contract agreements in recent months. Some of these, like those in Boston and Cincinnati, were settled after weeks of tough, often contentious, negotiations with school district officials. Others, like the settlement negotiated by the Pittsburgh Federation of Teachers, benefited from a close working relationship between the union and the district.

Better pay, a uniform student discipline code and additional professional development opportunities are some of the highlights of a new four-year contract ratified overwhelmingly last month by Philadelphia Federation of Teachers members.

Just hours before PFT members were slated to launch an Oct. 30 districtwide work stoppage, negotiators for the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers and the school district reached agreement on a new four-year contract--a deal that not only ended the treat of a job action but also killed the district's attempts to unilaterally impose work terms and conditions on educators. PFT president Ted Kirsch praised members' wall-to-wall resolve at the Nov. 2 contract ratification vote, where the new pact was approved by a 6Ð1 margin.

"We succeeded in achieving a contract and strengthening our union because of you," Kirsch told union members.

All school employees will receive a $1,000 bonus this year and pay increases totaling 14.7 percent over four years. The PFT successfully defeated district efforts to give smaller pay raises to non-instructional staff. The 21,000-member local also won strong language requiring administrators to adopt a uniform disciplinary code that is consistently enforced and provides teachers with additional help in maintaining classroom discipline. The union also negotiated a compromise that makes participating in a new performance-based pay plan optional for most district teachers.

State certification requirements also will be easier to meet under the new contract, which adds two new professional development days to the school calendar. The additional time for professional development means that staff in many schools will be able to meet state certification requirements without suffering hefty out-of-pocket expenses and time burdens associated with attending programs outside the district.

PFT also fought back a district attack on seniority rights, and the new contract maintains substantially the same seniority system in terms of transfers and assignments.

The new contract is "a fair agreement that moves education forward without pushing school employees backward," Kirsch said.

Major salary increases and smaller class sizes at all grade levels were among the victories the Boston Teachers Union (BTU) bargaining team won under a last-minute contract agreement ratified by BTU members in early October. In an overwhelming voice vote, some 4,500 of the local's 6,000 members approved the three-year pact. More than 70 percent of Boston teachers will receive salary increases in excess of 17 percent over the life of the contract, which includes a new step and additional lane that will help keep the most senior teachers in the system by making pay competitive with surrounding districts.

Paraprofessionals and substitute teachers represented by the BTU will receive a 4 percent pay increase each contract year, as well as $250 each year on the career award, a longevity step beginning at the 10th year and every five years after. Also negotiated for paraprofessionals was a 30-minute, duty-free lunch, improvements in health and welfare, sick leave and increased funding for training.

Although the district initially had offered class-size reductions only at the elementary level, BTU won a key victory on class-size reduction for middle and high schools as well. The pact also guarantees new alternative placement locations for the most disruptive students. In September, BTU members had set Oct. 11 as the deadline for a strike vote if a new contract could not be ratified.

"The city narrowly averted a strike by finally agreeing to settle on the four key issues--class size, wages, maintenance of assignment rights for veteran teachers, and dealing with the most severe discipline problems in the school system," says BTU president and AFT vice president Edward Doherty.

In Ohio, members of the Cincinnati Federation of Teachers (CFT) and the Cleveland Teachers Union (CTU) have new contracts. The 3,100-member CFT ratified a Teacher Quality Agreement that includes a new teacher evaluation system and compensation plan that ties pay to evaluation results. The contract also makes two other teacher quality programs permanent--the Career Ladder and the Peer Assistance and Evaluation Program.

"The plan is not about paying teachers differently, but about teachers being accountable to meet high levels of professional practice," CFT president Rick Beck says. "We know what good teaching looks like--we now have agreed to be measured against that standard. We are willing to be accountable as professionals for knowing and doing what is best for the achievement of our students."

Beck thinks the new compensation system is likely to attract new teachers to the district, "because they can move through the pay system based on performance. They can advance more quickly." The new evaluation and compensation systems are careful not to use student test scores to determine a teacher's competence.

In Cleveland, CTU and the district agreed to a new contract that raises teacher pay 5 percent annually for the next three years and beefs up teachers' ability to maintain order in the classroom. Months of bargaining paid off as negotiators and a federal mediator completed their work less than two hours before the previous contract was set to expire.

Classroom discipline was the top bargaining priority for CTU, says union president Richard DeColibus, and the local came away with "really solid language" that establishes a "right of removal" policy for teachers when chronically disruptive students interfere with classroom learning.

The pay hike of more than 15 percent over the life of the contract will "move us a long way toward making salaries more competitive," DeColibus says, noting that average salaries currently rank 30 out of 31 in the county. The new pact also provides for the return to work of some 125 paraprofessionals laid off in early August.

Competitive pay in St. Louis

Teachers in St. Louis will receive an average salary increase of close to $10,000 over the life of the new three-year contract negotiated by the St. Louis Teachers and School-Related Personnel Union. In fact, some teachers in the Missouri school district will receive raises of as much as $15,000 during that period. "It was critical that salaries here in St. Louis were raised to a level that would make them competitive with those in surrounding counties," explains Sheryl Davenport, president of the St. Louis Teachers Union.

The city's school district has been losing teachers to suburban counties because of the higher pay there. That's one of the reasons the union also pushed hard for a significant increase in starting salaries, Davenport says. Starting pay for teachers in St. Louis will move from a previous high of $26,501 to $31,500 by the last year of the agreement. "In the past, new teachers would compare our starting salary with that of nearby school districts and say "no way'" to coming to work in St. Louis, Davenport says. "We expect the higher salaries will make it easier for the district to both recruit and retain teachers."

The union was disappointed, however, that the district did not embrace its proposal to fund a peer assistance program for new teachers. "We wanted release time for experienced teachers so that they could mentor and coach new teachers," Davenport says. "We believe this kind of one-on-one mentoring is something that most new teachers need and want during their first year on the job."

Davenport hopes further discussion between the union and the district will yield an agreement on a peer assistance program.

Negotiators for the St. Louis union were successful in getting the district to drop a proposal that would have forced its members to renew their membership and payroll deduction every year.

The Pittsburgh Federation of Teachers and the city's school district reached an early settlement on a contract that runs from Jan. 1, 2001, through June 30, 2003. The district faced huge increases in group health care coverage premiums ($20 million over three years), and the local and district worked together to consider switching health insurance carriers. The insurance crisis was the catalyst for an early agreement in which the union and the district were able to make some coverage changes, keep the same carrier and significantly reduce the gap (from $20 million to $5 million), reports PFT president and AFT vice president Al Fondy.

Other contract provisions include salary increases for beginning teachers, career teachers and those at the top step of the schedule. In educational and professional areas, the two sides agreed to revised procedures for selecting teaching staff at schools, including a pilot program that will involve teachers working with principals to interview transfer applicants. In addition, the salary differential for teachers with National Board for Professional Teaching Standards certification was raised to $2,600.

Salaries for some Rochester, N.Y., teachers will climb over the next two years by as much as 19.4 percent, under a new contract ratified by the district and members of the Rochester Teachers Association/AFT. The new pact, which expires in 2002, makes salaries more competitive with those offered by other districts in the area and guarantees salary advancement if a successor agreement isn't reached before the new contract expires. It also features a district-paid tuition reimbursement for master's degree studies, eliminates mandatory citywide meetings, increases time for instruction and boosts activity compensation pay.

American Federation of Teachers, AFL•CIO - 555 New Jersey Avenue, NW - Washington, DC 20001