Burlington School District paraeducators are growing frustrated.
The assistant classroom teachers have been working through a pandemic without a contract agreement for 10 months. While district leaders say they’ve committed to a fair and thorough bargaining process, paraeducators have shown at recent school board meetings that their patience is thinning.
“I think the paraeducator workforce is an extremely, extremely undervalued asset,” Burlington High School special educator Tracy Rubman told school board members at their meeting June 15.
“Paraeducators deserve respect as educational professionals,” Burlington special educator Laura Betts told school board members. “Respect is a fair and speedy resolution to contract negotiations.”
And some at the meeting encouraged school officials to resolve what union leaders see as the remaining issue blocking a contract: retroactive back pay resulting from negotiated pay increases for paraeducators who worked during the school year but have since left their jobs.
“I also support retroactive pay for all, but especially my former colleagues who left this past year,” Burlington paraeducator Stacie Bilodeau told board members, “because this was an incredibly difficult year with concerns for their own health, or that of a family member with preexisting conditions.”
Lead paraeducator negotiator Mike Leonard told VTDigger that he does not think the negotiations have been contentious or disrespectful. He said the union believes the pay raise that has been secured through negotiations so far should apply to everyone who worked for the district this past school year, even those who left their jobs.
According to the union’s 2019-20 agreement, paraeducators make between $16 and $19 per hour in the Burlington School District.
He said he couldn’t give more details about any tentative agreements reached with the district, in adherence to good-faith bargaining ground rules. He did say that he hopes the retroactive back pay issue is what’s largely keeping the unit from securing a contract.
Andrew Styles, Burlington Education Association president, said all paraeducators signed a letter of intent to work under conditions to be determined by the finalization of a contract. Because that contract is expected to raise wages by a certain percentage, even those who left the district deserve to get that pay raise, Styles argued.
“It’s been an extremely challenging year for paraeducators,” Styles said.
In his experience, Styles said, 10 months is “quite a long time” to be without a contract.
“It’s not unusual to start the year without the finalized contract,” Styles said. “It’s very odd to end the year without one.”
As for why it’s taken so long to reach an agreement with the paraeducators, Leonard said that’s a question for the school district. In his three years working for the union, he said, no other negotiations have taken this long.
School Board Chair Clare Wool said negotiations were initially delayed because of the pandemic. While she recognized that the negotiations have lasted longer than others she has experienced in her three-year tenure as chair, she said the district has committed to 17 bargaining sessions and held two full days of mediation.
“We have worked very hard to expedite this and work hard on these negotiations,” Wool said.
Wool said it concerns her that the retroactive pay issue was divulged publicly, given the negotiating ground rules agreed to by both parties. She said the district has agreed to “generous” pay increases that acknowledge the work paraeducators completed during the pandemic for “eligible” employees — those who currently work for the district.
Stephen Carey, a school board member who’s on the negotiating team, declined an interview with VTDigger.
He instead pointed to his comments at the June 15 school board meeting. There, Carey said, “We highly value the role that paraeducators play in the Burlington School District.” He described bargaining as a “respectful and considerate process.”
“It’s my opinion that we are close to an agreement,” Carey said. “We’re not there. As I said at the last board meeting, I do remain optimistic and I am hopeful that we will come to a settlement soon.”
Burlington Superintendent Tom Flanagan also added at that meeting that he appreciates paraeducators’ work.
“We do truly value our paraeducators,” he said.
