NEWARK – Teachers will see a slight pay increase following the negotiated agreement signed by officials this week.
On Tuesday, the Worcester County Board of Education signed new negotiated agreements with the Worcester County Teachers Association (WCTA) and the Worcester County Education Support Personnel Association (WCESPA). The agreements include a step increase and a 1.14% cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for teachers.
A handful of teachers expressed concern with the raise, which is lower than the 4% COLA initially proposed.
“In the long term, every year we get slighted on COLA is another ding to my retirement,” teacher Megan Seyler said. “In the short term, it’s a battle between low COLAs and high inflation. It’s deciding between buying a full grocery load of food or filling my car with gas. It’s relying on community donations to make my classroom and my instruction what my students deserve.”
School system officials extended negotiations with the associations after the county approved a maintenance of effort level budget for Worcester County Public Schools. Officials made clear at that time the 4% pay increase for teachers and the 4.5% pay increase for support staff could not be funded with the reduced budget.
It’s a shame the teachers/support staff have to deal with this due to the Central Office Admin not being transparent and providing the council what it requested. Painful lesson learned for sure, but I think if I was ole’ Lou, I’d have finance lay out everything by every department and start working on that now so it’s prepared ahead of time (as much as is possible).
And how many people out there in the un government backed work world get COLA raises, even 1%? And yet the teacher quoted thinks they have to lecture us about prices going up on food? Also, this doesn’t mean they won’t get merit raises and also the up to $17,000 per year in mandated incentives outlined in Blueprint for Maryland which was adopted 2022 and will be phased in fully by 2026. Estimates from accountability organizations put the price tag at $6,000 additional tax dollars needed per year per family to fund the local contribution.
3:20 – Simple. Join the Gov’ment world and never worry again!