Denver Denver Educators Strike Over Base Pay
Denver Denver instructors carry placards as they wait to march after a rally in assistance of a strike outside the state Capitol last month. Denver schoolteachers are going on strike over how their base pay is determined. David Zalubowski/AP hide caption toggle caption David Zalubowski/AP Denver teachers bring placards as they wait to march after a rally in support of a strike outside the state Capitol last month. Denver schoolteachers are going on strike over how their base pay is computed. David Zalubowski/AP Denver teachers are going on strike over how their base pay is calculated. The teachers union and the school district stopped working to reach an arrangement after more than a year of negotiations. It is the first instructors strike for the city in a quarter-century, and it impacts about 71,000 trainees throughout 147 schools, Colorado Public Radio reports. Most public schools will stay open, staffed by hundreds of substitute instructors. Early reports indicated that at least 2,100 of the district’s more than 5,000 teachers honored the walkout. Gov. Jared Polis says it will cost about $400,000 a day to keep the schools running during the strike. That’s about 1 percent to 2 percent of the budget plan for the school year if the strike lasts a week, the The Colorado Sun reports. “We will strike Monday for our students and for our profession, and maybe then DPS will get the message and return to the bargaining table with a major proposal intended at resolving the instructor turnover crisis in Denver,” said Henry Roman, president of the Denver Classroom Educators Association, said Saturday in a declaration. The fundamental disagreement concerns how base pay is determined. Twenty years ago, the district very first piloted the Professional Payment System for Teachers, known by most as ProComp. Colorado Public Radio’s Jenny Brundin explained the pay incentive system on Morning Edition: It lets teachers get numerous perks to motivate them to take things like hard-to-staff positions for mathematics, or work in a high-poverty school. However over the years, it ended up being really made complex and unpredictable. Some of the incentives would all of a sudden vanish or shrink. And instructors say that makes it actually hard to plan or even pay rent. In interviews with about 40 instructors I did, not one could tell me exactly how much they made. Both sides have actually provided propositions to simplify the system, however there is still disagreement over the use of perks. The district’s proposition allocates more money toward base pay but still uses up to $2,500 in incentives for teachers working in particular schools, The Denver Post reports. In its Saturday statement, the instructors union said the district’s proposal does not have transparency and “pushes for failed incentives for some over meaningful base salary for all.” Superintendent Susana Cordova said Saturday that the district’s proposal “responds to what we heard from our instructors” and “significantly increases the base pay for all of our teachers.” A beginning instructor income in Denver presently starts at $43,255 a year, USA T oday reports. The district proposal raises that to $45,500, but teachers want $45,800. In anticipation of a strike, the school district employed 300 new substitute instructors to bolster its roster of 1,200 subs, the Post reports. An extra 1,400 administrators are likewise prepared to help out where needed at the schools. Every school in the district will stay open Monday, however preschool classes will be canceled.
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