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Date: 11/21/2022
AMHERST – The Amherst-Pelham Education Association (APEA), which represents teachers and other school faculty in Amherst Regional schools, currently seeks increased compensation in their contract negotiation process with the Amherst Regional Public Schools (ARPS) Committee. A group of APEA members and supporters demonstrated for their cause at the Nov. 7 Amherst Town Council meeting by holding signs in the Town Room and voicing their perspectives during the public comment section, though the council could not take action as that is the jurisdiction of the school committee.
Claire Cocco, a teacher at Amherst Regional Middle School (ARMS) has been organizing the APEA’s public campaign to raise awareness and support for educators within ARPS. She explained that the districts paraeducators, who work with students with disabilities and learning challenges, are severely underpaid, often not earning a living wage through their ARPS employment, being forced to get second and third jobs to survive. This has been compounded by record-high inflation during the coronavirus pandemic; however, Cocco said that this issue has been brewing for years for teachers and clerical staff as well.
“In the past few years we were getting a 1 percent cost of living [salary] increase before [COVID-19]. That was still not keeping up with inflation. For several years we’ve been not keeping up with cost of living, so it’s really imperative that to be able to meet the needs of school employees that the school committee understands that they’re able to balance their budget and even have a surplus because we [employees] have been struggling.”
Teachers and clerical staff were sympathetic to the plight of paraeducators, and in the early stages of negotiations proposed to the committee a lower cost of living increase for themselves, going from 1 percent to 0.6 percent, under the condition that paraeducators be given a $1 raise on their hourly wage. The committee declined this proposition, and after negotiations were moved from open to mediated, also lowered their original 2.5 percent overall salary increase offer to 2 percent. With inflation currently hovering around 8 percent nationwide, APEA members believe this offer is insufficient according to a press release Cocco sent.
“We’ve been negotiating the contract since January 2022, which means that we are [currently] working under an expired contract. For a while there, we had open negotiations, which means that our negotiating team was working face to face with the School Committee. Because it’s all held on Zoom, we could have silent representatives there, which is an important part of negotiations being ‘open.’ It’s a little more public, more transparent. At the time, the school committee was actually offering a 2.5 percent increase, and then a couple months after that they said ‘We’re stalemated, we’re going to go to mediation.’ That meant there was a mediator, our side didn’t meet directly with the School Committee and they actually went down on their previous offer. So it sort of seems in bad faith where they had offered 2.5 percent which we were still discussing but then gone back on that. That brought us to June. We made an overture in the summer to meet again and said ‘Okay we can resolve our differences if we can meet in person with you in open negotiations.’ But they have not taken us up on that, so that has brought us pretty much to where we are,” the release said.
The APEA’s current request calls for a 3.25 percent salary increase for all staff members over the first year of the 3-year contract. During the second year, teachers and clerical staff would be granted a 4 percent increase, and a 5 percent increase over the third. Paraeducators would receive a 6 percent increase over the second and third years.
This demand has sparked some dissent with school committee members who believe the district cannot financially accommodate the APEA’s proposition. In a press release following the APEA demonstration at the Nov. 7 Town Council meeting, the APEA clarified this confusion.
“After the combined Amherst School Committee and Town Council meeting on November 7, School Committee member Allison McDonald grossly mischaracterized the APEA demand for compensation as totaling over $15 million per year. In fact, this is not what APEA communicated in June when our union attempted in good faith to reopen face to face negotiations. It represents how out of touch the School Committee is with the real numbers…[The APEA’s proposed salary increase] would total an increase of $1.2 million, much less than what SC is claiming APEA has demanded. The school budget currently has a surplus that could easily fund the APEA’s proposed contract increases.”
This issue is impacting staff retention at a higher rate than other districts.
“While the finances of Amherst seem to be thriving, it comes at the expense of its educators and students, and its unionized employees…According to DESE in February of 2022, Amherst staff retention rate of 77 perecent lagged in comparison to the state average of 86 perecent. Local districts like Belchertown and Northampton are also seeing better retention rates, at 94 percent and 88.5 percent respectively,” the release said.
Cocco said that the increase in compensation is necessary considering how much strain ARPS employees are under, a strain which has been increasing with time, potentially reaching a breaking point.
“On an average day a decade ago, We would have a list of reliable substitute teachers, that we could go to everyday. Now, we’re scrambling everyday. Our teachers are not just teaching their own kids but also subbing for other teachers, if we’re lucky. Our paraeducators work with our most vulnerable students…teachers can’t do their job without paras, and we don’t have enough paras…We are definitely understaffed…Teachers don’t go into [their profession] for the money, they go into it to support kids’ futures. But when teachers get second and third jobs, and they’re dealing with paying the bills, you can only get stretched so far. So I can’t really say right now if this correlates to graduation rates and test scores, there’s so many other factors, but we know just common sense-wise you can only stretch people so far before they break.”
Still, Cocco remained optimistic about resolving the conflict and improving Amherst for all.
“Amherst has prided itself on valuing education and having schools with high standards. It has a good reputation and Amherst as a town has prided itself on being progressive. We just hope that we can see those values applied in this situation. We believe it can. We believe we can work together to make Amherst schools and the Amherst town an appealing, attractive place to send your kids to school in and to live in.”