Volusia School Board unanimously approves teachers union agreement, raises base salary

Teachers in the Volusia County School District will earn a minimum annual salary of $47,500 after the school board unanimously approved a bargaining agreement with the teachers union Tuesday night.

The agreement also reserves teacher planning time and limits the number of meetings teachers and support staff are required to attend, according to Volusia United Educators President Elizabeth Albert.

“All of this is for the purpose of making sure that they have the time that they need to plan and prepare to teach the kids,” Albert said. “We know that our students have learning gaps because … it’s the third year with a worldwide pandemic we're trying to deal with. We believe that there's nothing more important than teacher planning time.”

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Superintendent Scott Fritz recommended the board approve the agreement.

“I just want everyone to know how appreciative and happy I am to have gotten to this point," Fritz said.

Last year, Gov. Ron DeSantis set aside $500 million to increase teacher pay. Volusia received $10.4 million and used 80% for teachers making less than $47,500; the remaining 20% went to veteran teachers.

Previous union agreements

In December 2020, the school board and teachers union agreed that the district's lowest-paid teachers would receive a $4,700 salary bump, bringing their salary up to $44,335. All teachers would receive at least a 2.5% increase, and anyone making less than $44,335 would be brought up to that level.

The district could not provide the full increase in 2020 because too many teachers made less than $47,500. Previously, Volusia County's starting salary was $39,609 and the median salary in 2019 was $43,333, suggesting that more than half of teachers in the district made less than $47,500.

But even after increasing the base pay to $47,500 Tuesday, there’s still more work to be done, according to Albert. While the agreement raises the starting pay for teachers and support staff, it doesn’t do much for veteran teachers.

“What we're trying to do with salaries is we're trying to reduce the compression that is occurring between our brand new folks or early career educators and … our veteran teachers,” Albert said.

Which Albert said is problematic for the district, since in most other professions the more time you put in, the higher your salary.

“The more time you spend in that profession and the more masterful you become in your trade or craft, you generally are compensated at a greater rate,” Albert said. “Well, not in Florida, and not with public school teachers.”

Shane Story, an ESE support facilitation teacher at David C. Hinson Sr. Middle School in Ormond Beach, said while the agreement is a step in the right direction, it’s still not enough.

“The little we have done to respect veteran teachers has pushed them out of the field,” Story said. “We’re increasing the workload for teachers. Why stay if the workload is going up but your pay isn’t going up?”

At the moment, new teachers are getting the additional $3,000 salary increase through their salaries, but veteran teachers are getting some in salary and the rest in bonuses, according to Albert.

“Which is problematic, because bonus money doesn't count toward a pension,” Albert said. “And that's one of the big things that our veteran teachers are really looking at is their pension.”

School Board Member Linda Cuthbert implored the public in attendance Tuesday night to write to their legislators to help raise the salary for veteran teachers.

“Our salaries we pay comes from our general fund, 80% goes toward salaries. We run on 20% of our general fund,” Cuthbert said. “We need the general public to advocate with us. It’s not just Volusia, it’s all counties in the state; we’re all in this together.”

Editor's note: A previous version of this story said support staff would be included in the salary increase. The agreement only affects district teachers.

Nikki Ross covers K-12 education, health and COVID-19 for the Daytona Beach News-Journal. She can be reached at nikki.ross@news-jrnl.com or follow her on Twitter @nikkiinreallife.

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Volusia County School District increases base salary to $47,500