LAWRENCE COUNTY - JUNE 23, 2022 - The North Lawrence School Board and North Lawrence Education Association will be negotiations this fall for better teacher compensation. The last teacher two-year contract was approved during November 2021 school board meeting.
The North Lawrence Community School Board has approved a new pay scale for Administrative Assistants, Skilled Maintenance, Maintenance, Custodial and Security staff during their meeting Monday night.
In addition, the school board approved the extension of the contract for Superintendent Dr. Ty Mungle up to 2025 and various administrators and assistant administrator contracts were also approved for one- or two-year extension.
The North Lawrence Community School teachers last two-year contract was approved in November 2021. In the two-year contract school board members voted to increase the education fund to supplement teacher benefits.
All the teachers will receive a $1,000 increase in salary as a stipend to be paid in December 2021. Special Education teachers had a opportunity to receive an additional $1,000 to $2,000 additional per semester depending on their caseload.
In the contract it included and increase in contributions to their Health Savings Account of up to $750 per plan and a change in the parental leave policy up to five sick days in addition to their granted parental leave.
North Lawrence School board also approved additional contributions to health insurance plans which would pay up to 85 percent of the health insurance costs, which in 2021 increased up by 12 percent.
The two-year contract will be opened this Fall to negotiate base salary and health insurance.
Raises for teachers was a major issue when the school board voted to close four elementary schools and one middle school in 2020. The plan of the school corporation was to cut operational costs, with the goal to increase pay for teachers and staff.
" It has taken us a while to get there but we are living up to the promise we made, " said Dr. Ty Mungle.
Indiana gave a raise to Indiana school teachers and a higher pay bench mark for new teachers. By Indiana State Law all new teachers will make a minimum of $40,000 which is an increase of $3,600.
The money provided by the State of Indiana will be used when it comes to budget and contract units which will be based on student enrollment.
In April of this year, The NLCS school board voted to contract out food services who entered into a agreement with Chartwells. Chartwells are responsible for their own wages and compensation and was not part of the wage increases voted on Monday night.
A severance package was offered to the North Lawrence Community Food service workers based on years of service and given a chance to apply to Chartwells.
The rationale behind the new food service company was to improve opportunity for promotions and better employee benefits as well as wage increases. This was a concern as the decrease in state funding.
Each employee was set to receive a $1.25 pay increase and starting pay to increase from $10.40 to $14.25.
North Lawrence Community school employs around 800 employees including over 300 school teachers. The school corporation is one the three largest employers for Lawrence County.
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