Teachers Union Master Contract
The San Dieguito Union High School District (SDUHSD) held a Board Meeting on September 14, 2022. This report is about the important District business we completed during this meeting – the ratification of a new contract between the District and the San Dieguito Faculty Association (SDFA), which is the name of our teachers union.
As a brief background, the District’s certificated staff – consisting mostly of our nearly 600 teachers and counselors at all ten of our schools – are represented by the SDFA, which itself is part of the California Teachers Association (CTA), the largest union and political force in the State of California. 300,000 California teachers pay $1,400 per year in Union dues, generating about $300 million dollars per year, much of which is recycled through our political system to help elect candidates to office, including school board trustees. (I believe an obvious conflict of interest exists when the teachers union supports school board trustees, who in turn are responsible for directing and approving the collective bargaining agreements that determine teacher pay.)
Our District has historically negotiated 3-year contracts with the teachers union to agree on teacher pay, benefits, working conditions, and other terms.
Our contract with the SDFA expired on June 30, 2021, so we needed to negotiate a new contract for the three-year period ending June 30, 2024. The District reached a tentative agreement with the union, and the Board ratified the agreement at this Board meeting.
It is not a good deal for our District. It is a very good deal for the teachers.
One might ask, if the prior deal expired on June 30, 2021, how did we know what to pay teachers for last school year, from July 1, 2021 through June 30, 2022? The law in California provides that the parties are to continue to operate under the terms of the expired contract until a new one is agreed. In theory, the lack of any pay raise until a new contract is agreed provides an incentive for both parties to agree to a new contract.
Except in the case of public school systems in California, the teachers continue to receive pay raises even after the contract expires. Pay raises were provided on July 1, 2021, and again on July 1, 2022. This is because the expired contract contains a clause that provides that teachers will be paid based on their number of years of seniority (as well as education level), with increasing pay for longer seniority with the District. The specific levels of pay are provided in the contract. As such, when the District operates under the old contract, it does not mean that the actual pay levels stay the same, it means the pay mechanism stays the same. Our teachers receive raises according to “Schedule A” in the contract, even when the prior agreement has expired.
Look what can happen with this clause.
In 2021, the union thought if they put off negotiating a new deal, and if they could successfully recall me, they would get a better contract with a new Board. But the recall failed and the reputational damage to the union due to adverse publicity and heightened awareness by the public was not insignificant.
After the failed recall, the teachers union was forced to eventually start negotiating a new contract.
New teacher contracts can be approached using two general philosophies. Trustees can advocate for increasing salaries as much as possible with little concern about current deficits, hoping that an improving economy will take care of budget deficits with more money coming from the state or from increasing property taxes. Or Trustees can believe that we should pay attractive and competitive wages, but that we must live within our means and budget while also recognizing that there are other competitive uses for our scarce capital.
You can see this difference in philosophy in the way Trustees spoke at the meeting on the proposed new labor agreement.
When I spoke, I described why I was going to vote against the proposed new contract.
In summary:
1. Our teachers are paid about 20% over market
2. The raises built into the proposed contract range from 7.5% to 11% depending on teacher seniority, and the average is 8.7% District-wide.
3. Although the term of the proposed contract will be for three years, ending on June 30, 2024, wages are only settled for this school year. We will be negotiating teacher pay again next year.
4. We can’t afford the raises in this contract. This contract will push us into an operating deficit of about $15 million, which is nearly 9% of our revenue. I’m not sure if our District has ever had that large a deficit.
Finally, after about 30 minutes of discussion, the Board voted and the motion to ratify the tentative labor agreement passed by a 3-1 vote.
As the vote was announced, the teachers in the room erupted with joy. There here hugs, smiles, laughs, and high-fives all around. The teachers are very happy with their new contract.