TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WTXL) - The Leon County school district now has a new contract agreement with its teachers.
Tuesday night, the school board voted to approve a collective bargaining contract with the Leon County Teachers Association.
However, issues with teacher pay at the state level continue to plague local educators. Part of Leon Schools' new agreement includes bonuses for certain teachers who are not covered by Florida's Best and Brightest program. The hotly-debated state law ties teacher bonuses to their scores on college entrance exams.
"First-year teachers have never been evaluated but because of their ACT score, they're going to get the $6,000 bonus," said Superintendent Rocky Hanna. "It causes a lot of animosity among older teachers who, it would take them 16 years to see a $6,000 increase."
"An SAT or an ACT score does not mean you're a good teacher," Hanna continued. "We have to start paying our teachers better but we can't as long as the state handcuffs us."
"What [the Best and Brightest program] is doing right now to our teachers is it's putting them further and further behind every year," said Scott Mazur, Leon Classroom Teachers Association President. "A bonus is not a raise. Inflation goes up, cost of healthcare goes up, so it's not the best way to get people into public education."
Also approved at Tuesday night's meeting: an application for the Unified School Improvement Grant, which would give the district more than $400,000 in federal funding to help students at struggling schools.
"Right now, we have Oak Ridge Elementary School and Riley Elementary School that will apply for that grant," said Hanna. "We only have two D schools. We've reduced from six down to two. Now how can we provide resources to those two remaining schools to pull them up to a C or better this next year?"
Although the grant money would help the two schools, Hanna calls it a band-aid. He would rather see permanent money coming in to make sure any new programs to help students could continue.
The new Teachers Association contract also includes a 10% increase in the supplement base for teachers who work with students after hours on academics, performing arts and athletics.
