{"id":17853,"date":"2021-02-19T02:49:25","date_gmt":"2021-02-19T07:49:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/?p=17853"},"modified":"2021-02-19T17:29:55","modified_gmt":"2021-02-19T22:29:55","slug":"brick-teachers-to-receive-12-9-raise-in-new-contract-but-layoffs-likely","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2021\/02\/brick-teachers-to-receive-12-9-raise-in-new-contract-but-layoffs-likely\/","title":{"rendered":"Brick Teachers to Receive 12.9% Raise Over 4 Years in New Contract, But Layoffs Likely"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Brick<\/a>

Brick Township Board of Education\/Schools (Photo: Daniel Nee)<\/p><\/div>\n

The Brick Township Board of Education on Thursday night approved a four-year contract with its teachers union, the Brick Township Education Association, that includes a total 12.9 percent salary increase, however officials acknowledged financial troubles will continue in the district.<\/p>\n

The contract, approved unanimously, provides BTEA members with salary increases of 3.3 percent for the 2021-24 school years and 3 percent for the 2024-25 school year year.<\/p>\n

Board President Stephanie Wohlrab called the pact a “fiscally responsible contract” despite concerns over the financial effects of the lingering coronavirus pandemic as well as additional rounds of state funding cuts that are due for the Brick district.<\/p>\n

“The best thing we can do is to have stability,” Wohlrab said, responding to a resident who asked why a four-year contract was negotiated over a shorter term agreement. “Having that fourth year offers stability\u00a0 … this is just another piece in moving the district forward.”<\/p>\n

In an unfortunate likelihood, however, some staff members will never receive those raises. Superintendent Thomas Farrell said the state will cut Brick’s school funding by an additional $5.2 million, on top of the $8.8 million that has already been cut over the last three years.<\/p>\n

“This means job cuts,” he said, without delving into details.<\/p>\n

Farrell said in response to the cuts, a result of an agreement between state Sen. Steven Sweeney and Gov. Phil Murphy, Brick has closed and repurposed Herbertsville Elementary School, shed more than 150 jobs and moved to self-insurance for employee health benefits packages.<\/p>\n

“We have exhausted all mechanisms and appeal to the state for help,” he said.<\/p>\n

Officials said Brick should be held up as an example of financial responsibility rather than targeted for cuts.<\/p>\n

Brick spends $15,101 per pupil under the state’s comparative cost model, the 18th-lowest out of more than 100 districts in its size and socioeconomic bracket, said Business Administrator James Edwards.<\/p>\n

“It is something I\u2019m not very proud of,” admitted Farrell, who said the district should be spending more to adequately educate students, but cannot due to the funding cuts and mandated 2-percent tax increases for seven years which will still leave the district short.<\/p>\n

<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Brick Township Board of Education on Thursday night approved a four-year contract with its teachers union, the Brick Township Education Association, that includes a total 12.9 percent salary increase, however officials acknowledged financial troubles will continue in the district. The contract, approved unanimously, provides BTEA members with salary increases of 3.3 percent for the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3140,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[13],"tags":[24,1539,471,2336],"class_list":["post-17853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-brick-schools","tag-brick-nj-news","tag-brick-township-education-association","tag-btea","tag-teacher-salaries"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/DSC_0004.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgt2Ft-4DX","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17853"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17853\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}