As summer rounds the bend, the State College Area School District is getting closer to the deadline to have a new contract with its teachers.
Representatives from SCASD and the State College Area Education Association teacher’s union have been getting together since March to hash out the details of a new contract. Both sides say they want to have everything in place by the start of the school year this fall.
“The process has both parties working collaboratively on a wide range of work-place and economic issues,” says school board member Jim Leous and science teacher Todd McPherson in a joint statement.
Both sides decline to explain what specific issues are under negotiation. Education association president Eugene Rucchio has previously told StateCollege.com that “[issues like benefits, pensions and salaries] are major issues statewide, but any issue could be negotiated and anything could be agreed upon.”
The contracts detail everything from salary to benefits to sick days, and have a direct impact on the school district’s educational costs – meaning they also have a direct impact on taxpayers.
According to information from the Pennsylvania Department of Education, SCASD spent just under $54 million on instruction-related costs in 2005-06. By 2012-13, that number had increased by over 23 percent to more than $66 million. Other nearby school districts such as Bellefonte, Bald Eagle and Penn’s Valley have seen similar increases.
According to past contracts between the district and the union (made available to StateCollege.com by SCASD), that increase in instruction-related costs may be tied to gradual increases in salaries and other expenses.
In the 2001-02 school year, a teacher’s annual salary could range from about $31,000 to $63,000, depending on a teacher’s number of years with the district and level of higher education. By the time that contract expired in 2006, a teacher’s salary could range from about $34,000 to over $72,000.
At the start of the 2006 to 2011 contact, a teacher’s salary could range from about $35,000 to $76,000. When that contract expired, salary ranges were set anywhere from about $42,000 to over $84,000.
The school district has been hit hard by other costs as well.
SCASD Business Administrator Randy Brown has previously told StateCollege.com that the district is currently dealing with the statewide pension crisis, which has contributed to proposed tax increases in the 2015-2016 budget. He says the amount that the district pays into a teacher’s pension plan has dramatically increased from 5 percent in 2011 to 20 percent in the current year.
SCASD teachers will work under the terms of the current contract, which expires in June, until a new contract is agreed upon.
