Teachers Manny Del Rosario, left, and Robyn McIntosh placed their votes into the ballot box yesterday at McKinley High School as teachers voted on a new contract.
Teachers approve contract
Union members ratify a pact
with the DOE that gives them
raises of 4 to 11 percent
Hawaii's public school teachers overwhelmingly approved a new contract yesterday that will give them raises ranging from 4 percent to 11 percent over the next school year, depending on their level of experience.
"I don't want to go on strike again," Linda Iwamoto, a teacher at Fern Elementary School, said after casting her ballot in favor of the contract. "Given the money situation, whatever we can get is fine."
Under the $29.6 million package, starting teachers will receive $2,200 more a year, for a salary of $36,486. Teachers at the top of the scale will be paid an extra $2,500, for a salary of $66,203. Most teachers will receive a 7 percent raise in the next year.
The vote was 81 percent in favor, according to the Hawaii State Teachers Association, which represents more than 13,000 public school teachers statewide. About half of those eligible cast ballots yesterday.
"We're very pleased," said Joan Husted, executive director and chief negotiator for the union. "Teachers want to keep working to help Hawaii's kids learn, and this salary increase helps us make up some of the tremendous pay lag that exists for Hawaii's public school teachers."
The new contract frustrated some teachers with advanced degrees who lost a pay differential they had won for the 2001-2003 contract, which amounted to 3 percent for those with master's degrees and 6 percent for those with doctorates. The raise for top-scale teachers in the new agreement is also smaller proportionately than what lower-ranked teachers won.
"I'm kind of disappointed there's no movement for people at the top of the scale," said Sandy Pak, a librarian at McKinley High School with 30 years of experience, who voted against the contract. "If you're saying that you want to retain teachers, how are you going to do that if you keep on shafting teachers at the top?"
The new contract includes "step increases" that move teachers up the pay scale based on seniority. This fall, lower-ranked teachers will move up one step, a salary increase of 3.14 percent, while top-paid teachers will get a 3 percent raise.
Midway through the school year, all teachers except those on the top rung would move up another step, for a second 3.14 percent increase, and all teachers will also get a 1 percent raise.
Husted said the negotiating team decided early on to focus on raising the base salary rather than trying to extend the differential, which was strongly opposed by the state and would have cost $18 million a year by itself.
"You have to make some hard decisions about how you're going to spend your money," she said.
"The differential only applies to 7,000 people, but a pay raise affects all 13,000 members."
Judine Wing, who teaches at Likelike Elementary School, called the contract "pretty equitable" and voted with the majority in favor. "Still to me," she said, "it's not enough for the work that has to be done as a teacher."
In 2001, teachers went on strike and shut down Hawaii's public schools for three weeks, winning raises of about 18 percent over two years.
The new contract runs through June 2005. Negotiations will begin again in November for the next contract.
"We need to keep going at it," Husted said. "We told the governor we were going to continue to concentrate on getting teachers' salaries up to being competitive."
