Professional Pay Campaigns

Around the country, teachers and education support professionals are working in grassroots campaigns to improve wages and compensation. Here are some of the latest wins. Know about a success story in your school district or community? Email collectivebargaining@nea.org.

New & Noteworthy

 As of the 2008-2009 school year , all of Maryland’s 24 school districts will start new teachers at a salary of $40,000 or more .

 In the 2008 legislative session, the Iowa State Education Association won significant funding boosts for K-12 schools, area education agencies, and community colleges; continued salary increases for educators; and an assurance that money for future raises and other key state aid programs will be protected and will keep pace with inflation. And ISEA was successful in getting the following language included in Chapter 279 of the Iowa Code: “It is the goal of this state that every employee of a public school corporation be provided with a competitive living wage.”

 Following a rigorous selection process, the Washington Education Association has picked three well-organized ESP locals for “lighthouse” living wage campaigns, entitling them to WEA grant assistance. These affiliates—Bainbridge Island, Yakima, and Lake Washington—have hit the ground running, engaging in “prep” work such as one-on-one member interviews, organizing training, and committee building.  And not only is WEA focused on helping the “lighthouse” locals be successful, it will offer two living wage classes at its 2008 summer leadership academy.

MORE STATE & LOCAL CAMPAIGNS

Alabama

With just $400 a month in take-home pay, some Birmingham support professionals couldn’t afford to write a rent check or relied on government assistance to feed their kids. But after a nine-month living wage campaign, that all began to change.

Inspired by Birmingham's success, members of the Jasper City Education Support Professional Association (JCESPA) organized their own campaign in October 2004. A year later, membership increased by 10 percent to 119, and wages went up 1.5 percent above the state increase of 6 percent. That 1.5 figure updated a local salary schedule that had been in place since 1980.

Alaska

The Nenana Education Support Staff Association settled and ratified a three-year contract in May. Members made significant gains, including 4 percent salary increases in years two and three. Because of their ability to tell their story around insurance issues, they won a return to fully funded insurance, equivalent to a 3 to 7 percent raise for some members, and brought along the local teacher association on this benefit.

Arkansas

Watch video of the Mariana, Arkansas, rally  (3:36, Windows Media Player) Photo by Shaun Heasley

More than 100 Lee County teachers and education support professionals went on strike for a week in February after working three years without a pay raise. NEA President Reg Weaver and other NEA leaders greeted the educators at a rally. "When we heard some of our family members were not being treated like the professionals they are, we had to be here," said Weaver. "We are part of your family."

Colorado

The Westminster Education Association and the Aspen Education Association have become the first two locals in the state to win $40,000 starting salaries for teachers. Westminster's new salary package includes an entry-level salary of $40,000, while some veteran teachers can earn more than $80,000. Westminster education support professionals also received a raise, moving them closer to a respectable living wage. Aspen EA's new salary schedule has a base of $40,000, up from $33,000. Top salaries are now over $80,000 as well.

Delaware

Thanks to a two-year grassroots lobbying campaign, Delaware education support staff won the largest pay increase in 20 years. The secret to their success: Delaware's 62 legislators constantly heard from their underpaid ESP constituents--on supermarket lines, via E-mails and phone calls, through a 5,000-signature petition initiated by paraeducators, and through ESP visits to Dover, the state capital.

Georgia

The Clayton County Education Association won contracts and a significant salary increase for paraprofessionals,  setting starting salary as one of the top three in the Atlanta metro-area. CCEA paras have struggled with low wages and working multiple jobs to make ends meet.

Maine

Clerical, office, laboratory and technical workers at the University of Maine system bargained a tentative agreement in October that would raise minimum pay to $9.50 an hour. Some of these higher ed support staff, 86 percent of whom are women, make as little as $7 an hour and are among Maine’s working poor. In their continuing battle for professional pay, members have amassed some of the most detailed data available on their financial situation and the cost to the university in terms of turnover, recruitment, and training. Read their results in the Fall 2006 issue of the NEA Higher Education journal, Thought & Action.  (PDF)

Massachusetts

A four-day strike in June 2007 was the culmination of the Quincy Education Association's battle against a proposed hike in the employee share of the health insurance premium, without a raise that would prevent a pay cut. The Quincy local fought back hard, gaining a five-year contract that slowed the phase-in of a higher employee premium share and provided extra salary money to mitigate the change and keep teachers apace with inflation.

Missouri

School nurse members of NEA-St. Louis negotiated a written agreement that substantially boosted their pay scale. Key to their success: carefully briefing district negotiators about comparable nursing salaries elsewhere in the metro region and the complexity of modern-day school nursing.

New Jersey

With the ratification of its current contract, New Jersey's Tabernacle Education Association was able to reach the $50K mark as a starting salary for certificated new hires as of September 2009. This increase is a win-win situation for both the association and the board of education, who will now be able to remain competitive and attract the most qualified applicants. With 50 percent of TEA staff on the top step of the guide, and nearing retirement, it was important to increase the starting salaries as the retirement of the top salaried staff decreases the salary base.

The New Jersey Education Association's "50K the First Day" campaign has created a bumper crop of decent settlements in the Garden State. At least 521 of New Jersey's 593 school districts will offer starting salaries of $40,000 or more by 2008-09, and 17 districts will reach $50,000 or more by 2009-10.

One of the latest local affiliates to hit the $40k mark is tiny Chesterfield Township Education Association. As CTEA's 35 teacher members entered contract bargaining, the one-building school district enjoyed neither "extra" cash nor an exemption from tight state budget restrictions. Yet members ulimately signed a contract offering a starting teacher salary of $44,809, which will progress to $48,011 in 2009-10.

New Mexico

In New Mexico, NEA-Santa Fe members  bargained for a better than 5 percent raise for all  categories of classified employees covered under the bargaining agreement (all employees, except custodial and maintenance).

New York

Momentum is growing in the Empire State for living wage campaigns for education support professionals, reports NEA's state affiliate, NYSUT. At the NYSUT School-Related Professionals conference in October, a workshop gave some two dozen SRP leaders tips on mounting living-wage campaigns.

Oklahoma

Thanks to Oklahoma Education Association's member-driven lobbying efforts, all state teachers will get guaranteed $3,000 across-the-board pay raises, under legislation that was approved in a special session of the Oklahoma Legislature in June. This effort will help move the state closer to the Governor's stated goal of reaching the regional average in teacher salaries. The legislature also boosted ESP pay by 50 cents per hour.

Pennsylvania

The Pennsylvania State Education Association’s comprehensive teacher and ESP pay initiatives are pushing local affiliates toward (and above) the “40K” and living wage floors through a range of researched, field-tested tactics—starting with intensive bargainer focus on “best practices” for salary schedule development. Learn how.

The 71-member Homer-Center Education Association got its rural, 1,000-student district to pay starting teachers $42,566 this school year and up to $52,012 in 2009-10.

The Seneca Valley Secretaries and Paraprofessionals of Pennsylvania were grossly underpaid, with paraprofessional starting salaries pennies above minimum wage. Faced with the threat of losing positions, they held firm against their local school board, which finally rescinded its proposed cuts and passed a $3 million tax increase. Secretarial salaries were raised 18 percent over four years. Paraprofessionals' hourly starting salary increased from $5.50 to as much as $9.60.

Rhode Island

Members in Scituate — where test scores were highest in the state, but educator pay was dismal —won a 45 percent increase over four years.

Texas

Education Austin (EA) negotiated an 11.8 percent raise over the next two years for both teachers and support staff, after months of hard work by EA negotiators working with the Austin Independent School District administration and by EA members working to elect new school board and legislative candidates. The raises apply equally to certified and classified employees within the district, in keeping with Education Austin’s long-standing support for pay equity among teacher and support employees.

Vermont

The Burlington (Vermont) Education Association in November ratified a contract with the Burlington School District that phases in a living wage for paraeducators. The BEA has been seeking a so-called livable wage -- the hourly wage that is sufficient to meet an individual's or family's basic needs and taxes -- for years. The contract calls for boosting pay this year to $10.20 an hour and to $14.15 a year in the fourth year of the contract.

Thirteen paraeducators represented by the Ludlow Education Association achieved an impressive three-year settlement. The average raise for paras in year one is 13 percent,  5.7 percent in year two, and 5.2 percent in the third year. This translates to base wage rates of $10.37/hour this year, $11.23/hour in 2007-08, and 12.06/hour in 2008-09. The maximum wage is $16.43/hour this year, $16.86/hour in 2007-08, and $17.27 in 2008-09.

Instructional assistants in Montpelier won a 6 percent wage increase with a 25 percent reduction in health insurance co-pays and no reduction in benefits.

Virginia

The Virginia Education Association recently held its first Living Wage Conference to equip ESPs around the state to launch campaigns for improved pay. Said one conference speaker, paying ESPs a living wage "is not only an education issue, it's a moral issue, it's a civil rights issue, and it's a women’s issue."

VEA has also launched a media campaign to raise public awareness about the need to raise teacher salaries to the national average. Around the state, VEA members are organizing and speaking out on the low salaries that often force them into second, third, and even fifth jobs to make ends meet.

About 200 Russell County teachers rallied for a pay increase March 26. Salaries in Russell County, in the far western corner of the state, are among the lowest in Virginia. About 80 percent of teachers hold second jobs to make ends meet, Russell County Education Association President Richard Hess told the Bristol Herald Courier. The Russell County educators are part of a growing statewide initiative to improve educator pay.

In Sussex County, many education support professionals rely on public assistance programs or additional jobs to survive. Their living wage campaign is striving to give them a fairer shake.

Before they organized in 1999, school transportation employees in Stafford County routinely were asked to work without pay on tasks such as submitting to federally mandated random drug tests or appearing in court as witnesses to traffic violations. When they were "on the clock," their wages were much less than neighboring counties paid. After joining the Stafford Education Association, they were able to get the district to pay them for previously uncompensated work.

Washington

The Washington Education Association's "ESP -- Taking the Lead for a Living Wage" campaign is working to ensure a decent living wage so every education support professional can be a viable part of the community in which they live. The campaign is building awareness of the need for a living wage by highlighting the struggles of members such as paraeducator Carrie Strom. See more of Strom's story in this WEA video.

West Virginia

The West Virginia Education Association launched its 2008 salary campaign  on November 8 with a series of press conferences across the state. The goal: to increase teacher salaries to the national average and move the starting salary for beginning teachers to $35,000.

Wisconsin

Grafton Education Support Professionals launched a living wage campaign last spring that won members three increases over three years. The raises are a first step in eventually achieving a living wage for all Grafton ESPs, whose pay ranked them as one of the lowest-paid paraprofessional groups in the area. During the campaign, Grafton residents learned that although Ozaukee County ranks first in per-capita income in Wisconsin, 31 of the then 33 paraprofessionals in the district did not meet the living wage standard.

The Wisconsin Education Association Council Board of Directors has approved new statewide bargaining goals for its members —including securing a living wage for all education support professionals. Most Wisconsin ESPs don’t earn the statewide living wage average of approximately $11.50/hour.

Wyoming

Eight of Wyoming's 48 school districts are paying starting teacher salaries of $40,000 or more for the 2006-07 school year. A booming economy and a pro-public education state constitution contribute to the recent salary gains, but the real credit goes to the Wyoming Education Association (WEA) members and their long-term tactics for achieving professional, competitive pay.

In the 2007 legislative session, WEA members from the state's seven community colleges successfully lobbied, alongside college students and K-12 employees, for a $12.9 million campus salary appropriation in 2007-08. WEA's innovative "20-18-10" campaign for professional, competitive campus pay, launched by the WEA Council for Higher Education in mid-2006, illustrates how smart salary campaign tactics can pay off, even in a state without a collective bargaining law.