The Community Schools of Frankfort Board recognized a tentative agreement with the Frankfort Education Association to address educator salaries that will be assessed for final approval on Oct. 24.
Superintendent Dr. Matt Rhoda commented that the tentative agreement is intended to address teacher concerns that were expressed during the bargaining sessions with the administration. Rhoda stated that the salary schedule had become unaligned with the experience and years of education for many educators in the corporation, which became a priority for the administration and the board to fix during this year’s sessions.
“This was a priority for both the teachers and administration,” Rhoda said. “When we get together for bargaining, we put our priorities together. Sometimes those align, and this was unanimously our number one.”
Rhoda stated that the pay raises scheduled for teachers to better align them with the salary schedule range from $1,000 to $13,000. Rhoda stated that the salary schedule realignment is intended to supplement other aspects of the agreement, such as the CTE language bargains to continue “catching teachers up” at the schools.
“We have a salary schedule, and on that salary schedule, it starts with teachers who were at zero years experience coming in at $40,250, and our top bachelor’s column tops out at $65,000, and our master’s column tops out at $72,000,” Rhoda said. “Currently, teachers are not in the right columns. They are getting underpaid according to the salary schedule, so what this does is it rights the ship, and it gets every teacher and their years experience aligned to where that needs to be on the salary schedule.”
Rhoda expressed that implementing the agreement is a pivotal part of increasing the draw for teachers and staff to join the education team in the corporation and remain as effective educators to ensure the best educational opportunities for students.
“Our pillar of community is to be able to attract and retain our teaching staff,” Rhoda said. “By doing this, this is another measure to be able to attract and retain our teaching staff.”
While most educators in the corporation will receive the pay raises contingent upon the approval of the agreement on Oct. 24, a select few teachers may not receive the raises until the next school year due to classifications of “improvement needed” by the administration team. Rhoda stated that principals at the schools conduct evaluations to assess the effectiveness of the staff, and those deemed “improvement needed” are placed on improvement plans to address where they could improve in their approach to education. Rhoda commented that he expects many of the teachers to follow the improvement plans to better educate the students as well as receive the pay raise.
“We have a few teachers–not a lot–who were improvement necessary,” Rhoda said. “Those teachers are not eligible to be able to get the pay raise. If at the end of the year they’re effective, the next school year when we start in August, they will get whatever bump that they needed to get if they have been highly effective or effective now.”
The agreement was ratified unanimously by the members of the Frankfort Education Association prior to its presentation to the school board, and Marcie Herring, Association President, expressed that the turnout of members and potential members for the vote was substantial, and she thanked the board members for their support by shaking their hands during the meeting.
“That was the first time since I’ve been here that potential members had come to a ratification meeting to be able to listen, but our members voted,” Herring said. “Both attended this ratification meeting. There were, I’m serious, joyful smiles and even teary eyes. There were a lot of teachers almost in disbelief.”
Rhoda stated that the Scott Weltz, Assistant Superintendent of Finance and Operations, has worked diligently to ensure that the pay raises included within the agreement align with the budget that was also approved by the board for 2024.
“Scott Weltz is just doing a great job of taking our new money and being able to prepare for the bargaining and finding a way to make that all happen as well as being able to prepare that new budget for 2024,” Rhoda said.
The agreement is expected to take effect on Oct. 24 pending board approval.