Educators and community supporters gathered for a forum on the North Shore Thursday night to discuss concerns including wages, benefits and school safety, as four local districts have soon-to-expire contracts just days before school begins.
Contracts for educators in Marblehead, Beverly, Gloucester and Revere expire by the end of the month, Jonathan Ng, communications specialist for the Massachusetts Teachers Association, told Boston 25 News.
Teachers and special educators shared stories of physical abuse at the hands of their students – punching, hair pulling and spitting – while also grappling with the mental health needs of students dealing with dysregulation exacerbated by the COVID pandemic, they said.
“We absolutely have seen an uptick in violence. There were several incidents last year in Revere where teachers were hit, punched, kicked, lashed out at by students who were dysregulated, not having their needs met,” said Jane Chapin, a seventh-grade math teacher at Rumney Marsh Academy in Revere and co-president of the Revere Teachers Association. “We do not have the resources we need to support students.”
Educators are asking their respective school committees for more social workers and programs to help students with their mental and physical needs, as well as improved wages and benefits, among other proposals.
Paraprofessionals at some schools receive as little as $11 an hour, Ng said, well below the state minimum wage – legal due to an exemption in the law for municipal workers.
“We have high school students that after the school day are going into the community and they have their after-school jobs that are making more than our paraprofessionals,” said Jonathan Heller, a sixth-grade teacher at the Village School in Marblehead and co-president of the Marblehead Education Association. “[Paraprofessionals] are the backbone and the support within the classroom. They are working with our students. They are supporting our students’ needs each and every day.”
“My first term as vice president,” added Deb McCarthy of the Massachusetts Teachers Association, “I was horrified about the number of women that I was meeting who were in their 60s and 70s working two to three jobs who couldn’t afford to retire on the salary of a paraprofessional.”
Educators across all districts at the forum also called for paid parental leave, some discussing a common need to take unpaid time off while struggling to pay the bills and care for a newborn.
“Public educators have been denied a benefit, and it’s a huge issue, and it’s also an issue of why educators are leaving the profession,” McCarthy said.
Asked whether teachers at any districts plan to strike, McCarthy said only that educators would “what is necessary to protect the safety of our students in our classrooms.”
“[Most educators] are not used to putting their stories front and center like this,” McCarthy said. “But we’re in a crisis, and we are so committed to public education that we are willing to do what is necessary to have the public address these huge concerns.”
Boston 25 News emailed school committees from all four districts with expiring contracts for a comment Thursday night but did not receive a response.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates as more information becomes available.
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