The Herricks Board of Education voted Tuesday to approve a four-year contract with the Herricks Teachers Association that calls for a wage freeze for 97 percent of the district’s 346 teachers in the 2014-15 school year and increases of 1 percent in each of the three successive years.
The teachers will also receive state-mandated “step” increases based on years of service in the first two years of the contract with the first increase going into effect in February 2015. Teachers who have not received step increases for the past five years – representing 3 percent of the teachers – will also receive “step” increases in the first year of the contract.
“The past few years have been difficult ones for Herricks, and the relationship with the community and the Herricks Teachers Association has been contentious at times,” Herricks school board President Jim Gounaris said in a statement read during Tuesday’s board meeting . “It is a testament to the commitment of the district and the union’s new leadership that we were able to reach agreement within a reasonable time frame.”
Herricks Teachers Association President Nidya Degliomini said district teachers ratified the agreement at a meeting last Friday.
“We worked together with honesty and integrity. We were aware of the constraints the district was under with the 2 percent cap and the state mandates,” Degliomini said. “We wanted to maintain the wonderful school district we have.”
Degliomini, who succeeded Jane Morales as Herricks Teachers Association president last year, described the negotiations as a “long and arduous task” with “a lot of give and take” – an assessment that Gournaris seconded.
Gounaris said terms of the new contract were hammered out in a marathon nine-hour bargaining session on June 19 that ended at 2:30 a.m. the following morning.
“This was grueling,” Gounaris said.
He added that the two sides had “some brutally honest conversations” to reach “what we believe to be a fair contract.”
The school board and the teachers union had unsuccessfully attempted during sometimes acrimonious discussions to negotiate a modification of the teachers’ contract over the past three years as the district contemplated layoffs under the pressure of the state-mandated tax cap.
During that time, the Herricks board eliminated 63 teaching jobs in the district.
The teachers’s previous contract, a five-year deal expired on June 30, included salary increases of 2 percent, 2.5 percent, and 2.75 percent in the first three years and 3 percent increases in the final two years.
The new contract also calls for increases in teachers’ contributions to health insurance coverage.
In the first year, teachers would pay 20 percent of either individual or family coverage. The teachers’ contributions would rise to 21.5 percent in the second year, 23 percent in the third year and 25 percent in the fourth year. Retired teachers would have to pay the same percentage as active teachers.
The contract terms also include a $2,000 reduction in the starting salary for newly hired teachers in the district.
Degliomini said that means a new teacher with a bachelors degree who would have been paid an annual salary of $60,400 will now be paid $58,400.
Teachers’ compensation as faculty advisors for extracurricular activities will be frozen for the duration of the four-year deal.
The contract gives teachers two additional days each year for professional development outside of school for a total of four days. The contract also requires no make up days for teachers for the first five days district schools are closed for emergencies, such as snow days, provided the district still has at least 180 classroom days scheduled as required by state law.
Teacher will also be permitted to take four days of leave for the death of grandparents or in-laws.
With the teachers contract settled, the school board and the teachers association will now try to reach an agreement on the contract for 62 teachers assistants in the district which also expired on June 30. At the board’s last meeting in June, Gounaris said talks on the teachers assistant contract reached an impasse and a mediator would be brought in. On Thursday night, he and board Trustee Christine Turner planned to discuss the teachers assistants contract with Degliomini and her negotiating team “as soon as we can.”
“We’ve decided to leave that door open to talk,” Degliomini said.
In other developments:
• Gounaris was re-elected by the board as its president in a reorganization meeting preceding the regular board meeting on Thursday. Nancy Feinstein was re-elected as board vice president. Gounaris and Turner, who won re-election to the board in the May school district election, were sworn in for their new three-year terms.
• The board accepted the donation of a new Yamaha B3 piano to the high school music department from the Herricks Music Boosters Association and a $15,000 donation from the Searingtown School PTS for the purchase and installment of playground equipment at the school.
• The board renewed its contract with The Reading and Writing Project Network for $68,000. The network, administered by Columbia University, provides teachers with professional guidance in literacy and writing for students in grades K through 8.
• The board approved a deal with Educere for a trial of online summer classes starting June 23 through June 30, 2014. The cost per course of $195 will be paid by the parents of students taking the courses.
• Herricks Assistant Superintendent for Instruction Deirdre Hayes announced five projects produced by 10 Herricks High School students were included in this year’s National History Day competition. A documentary project by seniors Angel Ding, Ravina Jain and Sachit Singal about the plight of women in Iran under the Ayatollah Khomeini placed ninth in its category. An individual documentary produced by sophomore Justin Senzer about the after effects of an industrial disaster in Bhopal, India placed ninth in its category in the national competition.
