The Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District Board of Education is trying to save the jobs of 20.5 teachers.
On May 19 the board sent a letter to the Manalapan-Englishtown Education Association (MEEA), which represents the district’s teachers, and made an offer which it says would save the jobs of people who are scheduled to be laid off prior to the start of school in September.
Superintendent of Schools John J. Marciante Jr. said the members of the MEEA are due to divide an overall raise in their wages of $1.2 million during the 2010-11 school year. The raises would be handed out depending on where a teacher is on the district’s salary guide (i.e., years worked and degrees attained).
The board is asking the MEEA to use $700,000 of that overall salary increase to retain the 20.5 teachers who are scheduled to be laid off and to divide the remaining $500,000 in that $1.2 million pot as a raise on a revised salary guide for the upcoming school year, Marciante said.
According to information provided by the superintendent, the following positions would be saved if the MEEA accepts the offer: nine elementary teachers, one-half kindergarten teacher, two teachers of academically talented students, five elementary school counselors, one physical education teacher (MEMS), one cycle teacher (MEMS) and two child study team positions.
Following an executive session on May 18, the board passed a resolution directing the superintendent and the district’s labor relations consultant to seek a reduction in salary from the MEEA for the 2010-11 school year whereby the cost of the existing 2010-11 salary guide will be reduced by $700,000 by developing a new salary guide for that year with the intent to equally distribute the remaining salary increase.
Marciante was further directed that if the $700,000 can be recaptured by a restructuring of the 2010-11 MEEA guide, that money is to be used to re-establish 20.5 teaching positions for the 2010-11 school year as noted above.