By Jennifer Eisenbart
Editor
Using the 2012-13 salary schedule as a base, the Burlington Area School District and the Burlington Education Association – the teacher’s union – exchanged opening proposals Wednesday night to open wage negotiations for the current school year.
As has been the case in recent years, the school district is looking for a flat-rate raise across all steps and lanes of the salary schedule, while the teacher’s union is looking to compensate the various cells in a slightly different manner.
The BEA wants to see an increase of 2.07 percent – using the 2012-13 salary schedule in the district’s employee handbook – for the steps that include teachers with a bachelor of the arts degree, BA plus 15 credits, a master’s degree, master’s plus 12 credits, master’s plus 24 credits and master’s plus 36 credits.
For the 2013-14 school year, the proposal suggests that teachers who qualify for lane movement will get the salary amount for the lane movement with the exception of the steps mentioned explicitly.
In the next years, teachers would receive a step increase with no lane change. In the 2014-15 school year, step 12 – the master’s degree plus 36 credits – will receive a 1.46 percent increase, and the BEA proposes leaving all other cells unchanged. From there, lane and step movement would alternate on a yearly basis.
The only cell that would change would be the master’s plus 36 cell, which the BEA proposes to increase by the Consumer Price Index as certified by the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission.
The proposal coming from the district is much simpler – revise the duration of the contract to become effective July 1 of 2013 and run through June 30 of 2014, and then a 1.2 percent increase to the base wage.
The contract proposals are for the 2013-14 school year. Because of a large difference in the two sides after negotiations for the 2012-13 salary schedule, a mediator was called in and reached a settlement last fall.
The BEA then had to work through a recertification vote, and the two sides have been working on the negotiation process since.
However, the different levels of compensation as opposed to an overall increase in the base wage has been something the two sides have been working toward.
BEA president Bill Berkholtz said last fall the union had accepted that the district had budgeted just a certain amount for raises, but wanted to see more experienced staff compensated more to reflect additional credits and certifications.
At that time, Berkholtz had said that experienced staff did produce results.
“We’ve demonstrated that we’ve been able to help kids achieve,” Berkholtz said.
-
-
-
-
-
Mr Berkholtz please show me the demonstrated student achievement from the MA36 teachers. I feel you need to come to the curriculum committee meetings to get another slant on what the student achievement at BASD is like compared to the neighboring school districts.
Phil Ketterhagen
Phil you have demonstrated over and over with your comments (many of which have been published in this newspaper) that you are probably one of the last people to give advice on just about anything.
Voice of Reason
Phil, I’m ashamed to say I voted for you. You have continually proven that you are not fit to do this job. Your insensitive, and uninformed comments have become an all too common. It seems like almost every school board meeting you make some comment that embarrasses not only yourself but those who voted for you. Your latest attempt to engage Mr. Berkholtz through a message board is just another example. The use of this message board is highly unprofessional and something I would not expect from a school board member. Please stop embarrassing yourself and those who voted for you.
Cathy
So you get a wage increases, not a merit increases based on how educated you are, not on how you perform at your job. So very different from the private sector.
Exactly, that is one of many problems.
Astounding that a school board member would engage an education leader through a message board. Still, I guess it’s better than the two by four comment directed at teachers previously that made national headlines.