COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — Columbus teachers are back in the classroom after giving a new labor contract their stamp of approval.
After refusing to accept the district’s “last, best and final offer” on Aug. 18, the 4,500-member Columbus Education Association launched a three-day strike, assembling picket lines outside empty school buildings as students logged in to Zoom for remote learning.
The bargaining teams for both sides convened on the third and final day of the strike, leaving a nearly 14-hour negotiating session that resulted in the contract agreement.
“It is important to remember that just 10 short days ago, at our last bargaining session before the strike, CEA was told ‘no’ on guaranteed air conditioning and heat in every building, ‘no’ on class size reductions in middle and high schools, and ‘no’ on improved access to art, music, and P.E. at the elementary level,” union spokesperson Regina Fuentes said.
Among the agreements reached in the adopted contract include a 4% annual wage increase for CEA members, paid parental leave, a guarantee that HVAC systems are functional and a cap on class sizes for elementary, middle and high schools.
“This is a contract that keeps students at the center of all we do and supports our board’s educational mission for Columbus City Schools,” Board President Jennifer Adair said. “Together with CEA leadership, we have created an agreement that recognizes the critical role all CEA members play in achieving our mission.”
Salary for CEA members
| Adopted contract agreement on Aug. 28 | The district’s “last, best and final offer” on Aug. 18 |
| 4% raise annually for three years | 3% raise annually for three years |
| Retention bonus equal to three days of member’s daily pay rate | $2,000 retention bonus for all CEA members paid out by 2024 |
| Starting teachers to earn $55,000+ by the end of the contract | Starting teachers to earn $53,000+ by the end of the contract |
Under the contract, CEA members get a 4% annual raise for the 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years, a 1% boost from the board’s Aug. 18 “last, best and final offer.”
In late March, the CEA proposed to the board that its members receive an 8% salary increase annually for the school years 2022-2023, 2023-2024, and 2024-2025, according to an unfair labor practice charge complaint filed by the district on Aug. 3.
The board’s counteroffer in late May was a 2.25% annual raise, but the CEA stuck with its 8% proposal during a negotiation session in late June. The board bumped its offer to 2.5% on July 27 and eventually to its “last, best and final offer” of 3%, which Adair called a competitive offer that raises CCS in the market.
“Teachers are underpaid – the Board of Education knows that – but we have to be responsible to our taxpayers,” Adair told NBC4 on Tuesday.
The 4% annual raise means first-year teachers are poised to make at least $55,500 by 2026, as opposed to the board’s Aug. 18 offer that would have landed them at $53,914, according to the CEA.
The average salary for CCS teachers was $74,625 in 2021, according to data from the Ohio Department of Education.
Heating, ventilation, air conditioning (HVAC)
| Adopted contract agreement on Aug. 28 | The district’s “last, best and final offer” on Aug. 18 |
| A guarantee that learning spaces and teacher work areas will be climate-controlled by the first day of the 2025-26 school year | The board will make “reasonable efforts … to address lack of power, heat, air conditioning, or water in a building” |
| Creation of a Labor-Management Health and Safety Committee (4 CEA members, 4 Board members) to review infrastructure-related issues |
One of the loudest demands from CEA members — and a stark contrast between the Aug. 18 and Aug. 28 contracts — was a guarantee that the district’s school buildings be equipped with functional heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems.
Learning spaces, including but not limited to, classrooms, auditoriums, gyms, libraries, cafeterias and teacher work areas, will be climate-controlled under the new contract.
“After three days on strike, we have contractually enforceable language that every teacher work area and student learning area will be climate controlled by the end of our three-year agreement,” the CEA said in a news release on Sunday.
The overhaul of CCS school buildings — many of which are several decades old — launched in 2016 after voters approved a $280 million levy to fund Operation Fix It, the district’s program to upgrade HVAC in its buildings.
Of the district’s 113 buildings, six will not have building-wide air conditioning until September, largely due to supply chain issues, CCS director of capital improvements Alex Trevino said during an Aug. 16 board meeting.
- Fairwood Elementary School (late September)
- Johnson Park Middle School (mid-September)
- Yorktown Middle School (mid-September)
- Valleyview Elementary School (mid-September)
- West Broad Elementary School (mid-September)
- Westgate Elementary School (mid-September)
Three remaining schools not included within the district’s Facilities Master Plan – Hubbard Elementary School, Mifflin Middle School and Columbus Alternative High School – are poised to have updated HVAC systems by the summer of 2023, Trevino said.
CCS’s master plan indicates that 97% of its buildings have air-conditioning, but union members continued to demand “functioning HVAC in every building” and maintenance to those systems during its negotiations.
While Operation Fix It equipped nearly all of the district’s remaining buildings with updated HVAC, Fuentes said it “opened up a whole new can of worms” by revealing structural problems in other areas like antiquated plumbing and electric systems.
“We get all types of vermin – we do actually have to deal with vermin almost on a daily basis. I’m talking mice, I’m talking bugs, I’m talking water dripping from the ceilings,” Fuentes told NBC4 on Day 1 of the strike. “It’s a true, real problem – we’re not making this up.”
Adair said including functional HVAC guarantees within the contract “doesn’t solve that problem” of systemic infrastructure issues within the district.
Vladimir Kogan, an associate professor of political science at Ohio State University, told NBC4 on Day 3 of the teacher strike that it’s not clear whether the district will have a secure funding source in coming years to ensure the constant functionality of its HVAC systems.
“If we write this in the contract and we guarantee that every A/C will get fixed without having a money source, that means we’re gonna have to lay off teachers if that happens,” Kogan said. “Because it’s not a magic money tree that you shake every time the A/C breaks.
The board had planned to put a combined $680 million bond issue and permanent improvement levy on the November ballot, largely to afford the construction costs of six school buildings and other infrastructure projects.
But on Aug. 16, the seven-member board unanimously voted to rescind the initiative from the ballot, citing its uncertainty that Columbus voters would approve it given current economic challenges and the potential perception of a divide between the CEA and board members.
Calamity days
| Adopted contract agreement on Aug. 28 | The district’s “last, best and final offer” on Aug. 18 |
| Superintendent has sole discretion to officially declare a calamity day | Superintendent has sole discretion to officially declare a calamity day |
| At the building level, CEA members are not required to work on calamity days | CEA members are required to work on all calamity days |
| At the district level, CEA members must work a planning day from home on the first calamity day of the semester | First calamity day of the semester is a planning day from home |
| At district level, CEA members must remotely provide asynchronous work for students on all other calamity days | Second calamity day of the semester requires a synchronous check-in from home and asynchronous activities |
| Third calamity day and beyond requires teachers to go into the classroom to administer synchronous remote learning |
CEA members are not required to work on as many calamity days as they would have under the district’s “last, best and final offer.”
Smaller class sizes
| Adopted contract agreement on Aug. 28 | The district’s “last, best and final offer” on Aug. 18 |
| Elementary school (kindergarten through fifth grade) class sizes are capped at 27 students by 2026 | Elementary school (kindergarten through fifth grade) class sizes are capped at 27 students by 2026 |
| Middle school class sizes are capped at 33, a two-student reduction beginning 2023-24 | |
| High school class sizes are capped at 36, a two-student reduction beginning 2023-24 |
High school and middle school class sizes will also be reduced, thanks to the new contract. The board’s Aug. 18 offer capped only the number of elementary students in a classroom.
The average CCS class size is 22, the district said in an Aug. 3 news release.
Elementary art, music and P.E. teachers
| Adopted contract agreement on Aug. 28 | The district’s “last, best and final offer” on Aug. 18 |
| Elementary art, music and P.E. teachers will not be assigned to more than two buildings | Beginning 2023-24, the board will devise schedules with the intent that elementary art, music and P.E. teachers are not assigned to more than two buildings |
Subcontracting
| Adopted contract agreement on Aug. 28 | The district’s “last, best and final offer” on Aug. 18 |
| Subcontracted positions cannot exceed 15% of the CEA’s total membership | CEA president must be notified about when and where subcontracting work will begin and end |
| Upon the CEA president’s request, a meeting can be held with the district’s superintendent or other leaders “to determine the feasibility of performing the work in-house” | Upon the CEA president’s request, a meeting can be held with the district’s superintendent or other leaders “to determine the feasibility of performing the work in-house” |
| The board has final say about subcontracting, but it is prohibited from laying off any union members because of subcontracting | The board has final say about subcontracting, but it is prohibited from laying off any union members because of subcontracting |
| CEA president must be notified about when and where subcontracting work will begin and end | CEA president must be notified about when and where subcontracting work will begin and end |
The CEA has also demanded that union member positions “are not outsourced to private, for-profit corporations from outside our community.”
As opposed to the district’s “last, best and final offer,” the new contract agreement caps the number of positions that can be outsourced.
You can read the approved contract at this link.
