Brookline Educators, School Committee Reach Contract Agreement

BROOKLINE, MA — Brookline’s public schools reopened Tuesday after the Brookline Educators Union (BEU) and the School Committee reached an agreement on contracts covering 2020 to 2026.

The two parties have been negotiating since Saturday and BEU members authorized a strike for Monday if a new contact was not signed by Sunday night. As a result, all schools were closed on Monday and educators rallied outside Brookline Town Hall.

As of early Tuesday morning, The BEU and School Committee have agreed to terms related to wages, educator diversity, and teacher prep and common planning time.

"We recognize that the process of arriving at these agreements has been a strain,” the School Committee said in a statement. "We thank students, caregivers, and the community for their patience and understanding, as we finalized these agreements that will further advance Brookline’s mission of an excellent education for every child."

Here are the key agreements in the new contract:

• A 6 percent across-the-board increase in all wages, stipends, and longevity pay from September 1 2020 through August 31, 2021, followed by an 8 percent increase over the period of September 1 2023 through August 30, 2026 and an additional 1 percent on August 31, 2026. These raises are in addition to the contractual “steps” which provide automatic annual pay increases for most teachers based on years of experience. Sixty-three percent of Brookline’s teachers currently receive these step increases, which raise the salaries of these teachers by an average of 3.7 percent each year in addition to the increases cited above.
• Starting in fall 2023 and for the first time since 2013, “longevity pay” (additional compensation for long-term Brookline teachers who have reached the highest salary step) will be increased as follows:
  
  • For educators with 11-14 years of service: $1,008-$1,252 additional compensation (previously $964)
  • For educators with 15-19 years of service: $2,016-2,504 additional compensation (previously $1,233)
  • For educators with 20-24 years of service: $3,024-$3,756 additional compensation (previously $2,036)
  • For educators with 25+ years of service: $4,032-$5,008 additional compensation (previously $2,305)
• The contract acknowledges that the Superintendent has authority to grant Professional Teacher Status to educators, including educators of underrepresented groups, as soon as allowed under the law and defines a “Working Group on Workforce Diversity and Underrepresented Staff” to “identify strategies and specific action steps to be taken to enhance the District’s ability to attract and retain a diverse workforce.”
• The contract also updates teachers' daily prep time as follows:
  • Teachers in K-5 will continue to receive 40 prep minutes per day under the previous contract’s guarantees;
  • Teachers in grades 6-8 will receive at least 40 prep minutes per full school day;
  • Teachers in grades 9-12 will have one unassigned block per full school day; and
  • Starting in 2025, most specialist teachers (e.g. art, world language, physical education) will have one unassigned period per day.

Patch will update this article when we receive a statement from the BEU.