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BEVERLY, MA — Members of three North Shore teachers unions that have voted to strike planned a rally on Monday afternoon in Gloucester as students and families in Beverly, Gloucester and Marblehead face a day of no school on Tuesday without deals on respective new collective bargaining agreements.
Beverly and Gloucester teachers began their strikes on Friday, while Marblehead teachers voted to authorize a strike on Friday that will begin on Tuesday if no agreement is reached. Public union strikes are illegal in Massachusetts.
The rally is planned for 2 p.m. at Stage Fort Park in Gloucester.
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Beverly and Marblehead union leaders on Sunday criticized the lack of urgency from their respective School Committees and municipal leaders to work toward a deal and avoid a prolonged closing of classrooms.
“This is unconscionable,” Marblehead Education Association co-President Jonathan Heller said. “We are trying everything possible to settle a fair contract with all five MEA bargaining unions by Monday night. The kids need to be in school, but we also need to address issues thrusting or schools into crisis.”
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Those issues, according to both unions, include the need to increase wages to reduce staff turnover, dramatically increased pay for paraprofessionals, more support for “dyregulated” students, paid family leave, more class preparation time and longer lunch and recess for elementary students.
“We all know that children learn at lunch with their social skills as they did when they are out at recess,” Beverly Teachers Association co-President Andrea Sherman said.
BTA co-President Julie Brotherton said on Sunday that Mayor Michael Cahill and the School Committee “do not want to acknowledge the crisis in our schools” and do not “share our urgency to reopen schools.”
Beverly School Committee Chair Rachael Abell said in a community statement on Sunday that the BTA and city remain about $14.4 million apart on wage proposals — including $4.4 million apart on paraprofessionals’ compensation. She said that does not include other costs that would come with additional parental leave, tuition reimbursement increases and other union proposals — such as smaller class sizes — that the unions claims would not increase costs for the district.
Marblehead School Committee member Sarah Fox said last week that in that district the sides were about $5 million apart on proposals with either a tax override or 15 percent cut in staff and services across the board necessary to meet the latest MTA proposal at the time.
Abell said the Beverly School Committee met as a Committee of the Whole this weekend “to affirm our values and commitment to what we believe is best for our students, yet values our educators and aligns to our community’s fiscal reality.”
“We sincerely desire to make progress but we need the BTA to provide meaningful counter proposals versus demands and must understand that the wages cannot continue to be held for other monetary items to resolve,” Abell said. “We continue to urge the BTA to end their illegal strike and return to school on Tuesday and we can continue the mediation work without harm to our students’ academics and activities.”
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Brotherton said the BTA would be willing to hold open negotiations during the strike because the “the public deserves to know” each side’s positions and to “let the sun shine into the darkness of our school district.”
(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at [email protected]. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)
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