DANVERS, MA — A yearlong contract negotiation between Essex North Shore teachers and the district — which included a vote of “no confidence” in the superintendent and School Committee early last month — came to a resolution with the teachers union agreeing to a new contract through the 2025-26 school year.
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The Hathorne Teachers Federation said the union reached a deal that includes raises of between 12 and 15 percent over four school years and calls on the district to provide support to teachers that have high student loads, and increased preparation time and compensation to offset the increased class loads.
“The milestone achievements in this contract will help to make our school both more sustainable and more successful for students and teachers,” Union president and biotechnology teacher Debora O’Reilly said in a statement provided to Patch. “This accomplishment would not have been possible without more than a year of organizing by teachers, students, parents, and community members.
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“We achieved this together.”
The union representing more than 160 teachers and staff at the school said last month that its members held a “no confidence” vote in Superintendent Heidi Riccio and School Committee Chair Mark Strout after contract negotiations hit an impasse over what the union called “the district’s repeated attempts to intimidate, coerce, and bully union leaders, activists, and supporters.”
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Riccio provided a statement to Patch in response to the “no confidence” vote saying that the district was “saddened” by the Hathorne Teachers’ Federation’s “preference for theatrics over good faith bargaining” and blamed the breakdown, not on compensation divides but on a disciplinary investigation that Riccio said the union demanded to be stopped as part of the contract agreement.
The union claimed the investigation is an attempt to target its leadership during the negotiations.
While the union did not address the investigation as part of its statement on the new deal, they said that the contract helps recognize teacher value to the district’s success and thanked students and families for their support over the past year of negotiations.
“As a vocational school, we teach all of our students the value of hands-on experience in our various fields,” Union vice president and cosmetology teacher Cassia Gilroy said. “In addition to addressing concerns around workload and compensation, this contract will make great strides in recognizing the value brought to the school by our CTE teachers’ real-world experience.”
The agreement will now be sent to the rank-and-file union membership and the school committee for ratification.
(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at [email protected]. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)
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