Cape school employees getting raises

After a year of pay freezes, teachers, administrators and staff members in the Cape Girardeau School District will receive a raise in the 2011-2012 school year.

The Cape Girardeau School Board on Monday approved a total salary increase of 1.24 percent for certified employees, with average teacher pay rising 2.53 percent, and administration salary up 2.38 percent. The increases are offset by flat or minimal pay rates among other certified positions.

Classified employees, from custodians to coordinators, will see a composite increase of 3.22 percent next school year, driven in part by bigger pay raises in support staff positions traditionally among the lower paid jobs in the region. Workers in the district's Nutrition Services Department will receive an 8.77 percent raise, with a starting wage increase of 50 cents, from $7.50 to $8 an hour. Wages for custodians will rise 7.7 percent, with starting wages up from $8.35 to $8.80 per hour. Custodians have not had a raise in at least three years, Neil Glass, the district's director of administrative services, has said. The pay increase would bring the wages up closer to the competitive edge, Glass said.

Base salaries for administrators will begin at $49,000 a year, $48,500 for coordinators.

The highest paid administrator on the new pay schedule will be the assistant superintendent of public instruction, at 92,300. Superintendent Jim Welker, not included in the salary schedule, will earn $135,000 this fiscal year under his current contract.

Base salary for teachers with a bachelor's degree would increase slightly, from $29,463 to $29,500.

The raises for teachers come with a dual salary schedule, designed to fix the flaws of the old step system while moving teachers to the new schedule over time. The new pay plan, with multiple pay levels for experience and incentives to teachers to further their education, is the result of a long campaign of "trial and error" led by Misty Clifton, the district's chief financial officer.

The new salary schedule does away with the old pay freeze in the opening steps, that kept starting teacher wages fixed at $29,463 for the first four levels. Teachers entering step five next year will get a raise of more than $1,300, making up for the frozen wages over the first four years. Clifton said educators in the first eight steps would start out under the new schedule, with others shifting over when it becomes more beneficial in coming years. With the existing certified salary schedule frozen going forward, the new schedule will eventually pay off for more experienced teachers.

The idea is to reduce the compression ratio, or the difference between the lowest paid and highest paid certified employees, a ratio now at north of 2 percent.

Board president Stacy Kinder called the measured approach to fixing the salary schedule "creative," adding that the solution "hits all the various problems" associated with the old schedule.

"I like the fact that it really doesn't penalize anyone," Kinder said in a Monday work session before the board meeting.

"It was a lot of trial and error. We tried a lot of different options, and we got something that works," Welker said.

All told, the raises will cost the district more than $472,000 next year in salary increases, with a more than $1.19 targeted increase in total compensation -- from FICA to health care coverage to retirement benefits.

The raises come two years after the last salary increases, a 2.29 percent boost for teachers months before the board was forced to use reserve funds to balance the district's budget. The move prompted criticism from board members and promises from the administration to balance the budget in the current fiscal without using reserves.

In other business

The board approved a 5-cent increase in lunch prices for all grade levels in 2011-2012. Board members said the federal government is to blame for the higher prices.

Effective July 1, the federal Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 requires districts participating in the National School Lunch Program to provide the same level of support to students who are not eligible for free or reduced-price lunches as they are for lunches served to students eligible for free lunches.

"The act calls for the comparison of average prices charged for paid lunch to the difference between the higher federal reimbursement provided for free lunches," a district memo says.

The USDA has determined districts that are below the free reimbursement must increase lunch prices by a nickel per meal, the memo says. So prekindergarten to fourth-grade lunch prices increase to $1.55. In grades five to eight, prices rise to $1.80, and up to $2.05 for students in grades nine to 12, and at the Cape Girardeau Alternative Education Center.

mkittle@semissourian.com

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301 N. Clark Ave., Cape Girardeau MO