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About the artist: Members of the Andover High School Art Club created the art on this page.
Feature Article
To the Editor of the Lawrence Eagle Tribune:
Your editorial, “Don’t let teachers hold town hostage” [Nov. 21], criticizes Andover teachers for walking out of the School Committee meeting after we had delivered our statement calling for a fair and speedy contract settlement. “A contract dispute won’t be settled by refusing to talk about it,” you wrote.
Andover teachers couldn’t agree more. That’s why we have been talking to the School Committee about a new contract for more than 10 months. In fact, last winter representatives from the committee and the union engaged in a collaborative bargaining process and came to an agreement that Andover teachers would need pay raises of more than 9 percent over three years to keep us competitive with school systems in comparable communities. Unfortunately, the School Committee has chosen to ignore that agreement. Its current offer is significantly less. Your statement that “teachers have already been offered a generous increase of about 10 percent over three years” is just plain wrong.
The School Committee is also proposing that high school teachers teach six instead of five classes per year – a number of classes higher than those taught by teachers in the vast majority of school systems in Massachusetts. Your editorial refers to this proposal simply as a move “to replace cafeteria and parking lot duties with instructional time.” But it is much more than that. As a high school teacher with almost 30 years’ experience, I can assure you and your readers that every hour of instructional time requires additional time – and often hours of additional time – outside the classroom for planning lessons, grading papers, and meeting with students and parents.
Finally, I must comment on your statement that “If some teachers do choose to leave, it is not the end of the world they are not irreplaceable.” On the surface, your statement is true, but it reflects a deplorable and irresponsible attitude towards a great school system. Yes, excellent teachers are not irreplaceable, but they are not easily replaceable. And a system that would willingly allow them to leave is not only being penny-wise and pound-foolish, it is also risking the very excellence of the system these teachers have helped to build and maintain.
There is an old educational truism: “The teachers’ working conditions are the students’ learning conditions.” This contract crisis has the potential to damage the working conditions of Andover teachers. If it is not soon ended, it may harm the learning environment so important to our students.
Sincerely,
Thomas Meyers
President
Andover Education Association
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