Prince William County teachers plan to attend the BOCS meeting tomorrow en mass. Prince William County teachers have not had a step increase in 3 years. They are not expected to get one until 2016. They have had a couple of very small raises. They will once again ask for the supervisors to set an advertised tax rate that sustains a teacher raise and reduced class sizes.
Teachers want the Supervisors to set a tax rate high enough to accommodate a step increase, raise, and reduction in class size. The uninformed often wonder why teachers don’t approach the PWC School Board for this raise and reduction, rather than the BOCS. They do. However, school boards, in Virginia, do not have the power to tax so they must get the funds from the governing body, in this case, the Board of County Supervisors. The BOCS sets the tax rate and so they are who the teachers must appeal to.
Past years have been lean for PWC schools. The BOCS chair pretends to be a fiscal conservative. He always low-balls it and convinces (or bullies) the others into going along with him. The lowest possible tax rate is advertised. The tax rate can always go lower but never higher. Local governments do this because often county assessments aren’t in and state budgets aren’t final. Frankly, the BOCS doesn’t budget enough money to provide adequate salaries for the school employees. Prince William County has not kept pace with other localities in Northern Virginia. Class sizes are the highest in the entire state.
How is class size reduced? Class size is reduced by hiring more teachers. Hiring more teachers costs money. In Prince William County, the school system gets 56.75% of revenue. Perhaps that isn’t enough. Either the tax rate needs to be set higher or the percent of revenue going to the school system needs to be more. The status quo can’t continue much longer. The public wants and expects more for their children. They live in the 9th richest county in the United States, yet their schools get treated like ‘poor relations.’ (southern for your poor relatives)
What then, is a step increase? The step increase is the raise in pay an employee gets for years of experience. The increase is automatic. Each year, one progresses up the steps, except in Prince William County.
A raise affects the entire school board population, from maintenance to the superintendent. A step increase doesn’t affect the entire employee population.
Tomorrow many teachers will pack the halls of the McCoart building as the BOCS meets to set a tax rate. Many will speak at Citizens’ Time. The BOCS should listen. Each member should do what is right, rather than trying to look “conservative.” No one wants higher taxes. However, at what point do we stop neglecting our teachers and schools? When teachers and schools are neglected, our school children are neglected.
Corey Stewart: I am addressing you, sir. It is time to be a leader. Set the tone. Either set the advertised tax rate high enough or increase the percent of money going to the schools in order to give the teachers a much deserved step increase and raise. Match the governor’s proposal. Make sure they have enough money to begin to reduce class size. Earmark the money if necessary. Being cheap isn’t being fiscally conservative. Real conservatives take care of what they have, rather than let it go to ruin.
An aside, regardless of what you read on other blogs, most teachers could care less about a high school with a swimming pool. Most teachers want a raise after all these years and smaller class sizes. They are just like you and me–they have bills to pay and kids to feed and educate. They like having a roof over their heads. Teachers are professionals. The average teacher pay in this county is under $60,000 per year. That is very lean.
Good for them. We need to pay teachers more than 60 grand a year. They are invaluable. Man up, Mr Stewart
In fairness, that’s the average and first and second year teachers are factored in there. But….that happens in all counties. The pay, even the average, is low. It isn’t keeping pace with other teaching salaries in Northern Virginia.
Great Post Moon!
You get what you pay for in my opinion. Somehow there is the bizarre belief that teachers are unlike any other profession and must fight tooth and nail for a pay raise every decade or so. Who would want to be teacher in this climate?
Allow me to clarify the purpose of teachers gathering together to advocate for themselves before the BOCS.
I imagine that all those people putting down the teachers professional association do not have their salary increased tied to thousand of people. I imagine, they have had pay raised based on their own personal job performance and not an arbitrary group pay raise.
Even in the military, there is a set scale to increase rank and pay. Our teachers have been STUCK at their same step for years. It isn’t about the school system wasting money, its about the BOCS not being willing to give them more money.
The Sheriff’s blog has more stupid on it than you can shake a stick at. They really don’t get the money relationship between school board and board of supervisors.
They and their master also hate unions, apparently and have tried to disparage PWEA as one.
The teachers need to encourage parents to pressure the supervisors to set the tax rate high enough to provide for a raise. This has gone on long enough. I wouldn’t blame them if they all quit.
Let me be clear, I am not advocating merit pay. I can think of no other job where so much of your performance is directly tied to so many outside variables.
I have always been a strong supporter of teachers’ salaries and classroom size. Having said that, I must also point out that of the money going to the schools, the spending side is controlled by the school board and superintendent. It isn’t totally a matter of taxing authority.
When my kids were in PWC schools, we were told to bring in copy paper etc. and then we were inundated news reports of new programs and program administrators in the central office and money was diverted from “ground zero”–the classroom.
Right now given the history AS I SAW IT, I am not convinced that the school board and superintendent can’t do a better job in spending. Until they build my trust, I am not sympathetic to the school board or superintendent. That would take programs within the budget being reduced in order to take care of job #1–adequately paying teachers for recruitment/retaining (and because they deserve it) and reducing class size. I haven’t heard of any of that.
There is no question that investments are important, but they should always be advertised with how does it improve the core missions: (1) educating (2) compensating front line workers and (3) providing an acceptable working environment. All I have heard from some initiatives is “we need this because it exists elsewhere.”
@Clinton
Many of the programs that you might think are a waste of money are mandated by the state or the feds. It might look like a waste of money. It might BE a waste of money but when dealing with unfunded mandates, there is nothing you can do.
Parents should never be asked to supply those kinds of materials. Sinclair used to be famous for gouging the parents. They would have them bring in materials to dump into a big pile in August. I told my daughter not to do it. Kids should keep their own supplies and parents should never be asked to provide teacher supplies.
One thing people don’t realize, when raises come, They aren’t just designated for teachers. All employees get the raise.
To reduce class size, more teachers need to be hired. First off, you need classrooms. Barring empty classrooms,there are stairwells, closets, and trailers. The county isn’t too willing to just roll a trailer over either. Prince William isn’t going to get first pick when hiring outside the county either because its salary scale isn’t competitive.
I hope you didn’t misunderstand me. I didn’t mean to imply it was a necessarily a waste of money, I meant to say that it not has been adequately explained by the superintendent and the school board.
Until they adequately explain why central office might take precedence over direct teaching costs rather than using some general overarching term like “necessary” or “mandated” or “prudent”, I will remain wary. Wary means that one keeps a close eye and expects a good explanation before one agrees.
New people aren’t guaranteed to make positive changes just because they “aren’t so and so predecessor”. They have to earn trust so until they earn it I would continue to answer back “necessary why?”, “mandated by whom and what?”, and “prudent in what way?”
Until the trust is earned, one must assume that it is business as usual.
Clinton,
I said mandated because that is what it is. Federal law states that you will have special ed programs for those who qualify. It isn’t a suggestion. There are lots of compliances that you and I would have no idea about because it isn’t our job to know.
When you say ‘new person’ do you mean Dr. Walts? Dr. Kelly had his issues also.
Of course, “central office” was merely an example. One can insert any nonteaching expense there.
Gotta love NCLB, talk about an unfunded mandate!
You can’t pay teachers enough. Public Safety requires a GED to be hired; and that meets the requirements for a few promotions. Schools require practically a masters. Teachers shouldn’t be paid less than Public Safety.
I could get back on my “in this country, we only value those jobs where money is generated ” soapbox but I think I’d be preaching to the choir.
I’ve found as a general rule that 1)they don’t understand much over there 2) they lost an election bid 3) they are a former employee (or spouse of an employee) that has an axe to grind but that doesn’t stop the opinions from rolling in…… 🙂 I wouldn’t pay too much attention.
From Prince William County Schools website:
In other words, the BOCS didn’t do what it said it was going to do.