Baltimore County teachers and support staff are pressuring school board members to finish contract negotiations by November 30.
Cindy Sexton, president of the Teachers Association of Baltimore County, said talks stalled on more than half of the union’s demands in a negotiation session last week.
That’s why the union hosted a rally with over 50 members outside of the county school board meeting Monday night.
“This is about so much more than just our money,” Sexton said at the rally. “It's about treating us fairly. It's about the workload. It's about our leave time. It's about so many things that are important.”
Megan Shingleton is a speech pathologist serving multiple schools across the county. She wants specialized instructors and support personnel (SISP) like herself to be explicitly included in contract language.
“It doesn't cost the district anything to just confirm within our contract, yes, we have a right to lunch; we have a right to plan,” she said.
Those benefits are already included in county contracts.
“But we get swept aside because we're not classroom teachers,” Shingleton said. “So there's a lot of misunderstanding and inconsistency from school to school about whether that applies to us or not.”
The county board of education stalled on discussing 21 of the union’s 40 demands, with only 10 days left until the end-of-month deadline.
Lena Amick, a social studies teacher at Pikesville High School, said the board needs to stop using the “old way of doing business” by “just saying no without giving any legitimate reasons.”
“We can never be adequately compensated without a contract,” Amick said. “But we're still fighting. And we're fighting hard these last couple of months and the last couple of weeks to get this settled.”
Sexton said that the union will vote on whether to employ “work to rule” if a contract isn’t finalized by November 30.
“We would only work our contract hours. We won't stay for those extra hours and hours that teachers put in on weekends and at night,” Sexton said. “This is really about helping the school system and the public to see what we really do, that extra time on our part. Because we're not compensated for that.”
The last negotiation session before the November 30 deadline will be held next Tuesday.