##VIDEO ID:6Rb1eIXTYnU## e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e welcome everyone I'm calling this meeting to order at :05 can we all stand for the Pledge of Allegiance andice for can we get a roll call for attendance Mr Gomez Pera will be a little late today Miss alaro Miss Hernandez present Mr orrian pres Miss koves carav present Miss balderas present Dr Neville present Miss Enriquez and Miss cabal is absent today that's seven in the affirmative and two absent thank you we'll move on to new business consideration and action to vote on the collaborative collective bargaining agreement between the Chelsea school committee and the Chelsea teachers union clerical unit for the period of July 1st 2024 through June 30th 2027 the contract is subject to ratification by the Chelsea school committee and Chelsea teachers union can I get a roll call Christine Le would you like to come up and do your presentation for this section thank you I'm sorry we'll do the rad call after good evening school committee I am happy to present our contract to you that is a tenative agreement and if you have any questions after this presentation happy to answer any questions these are tentative agreements for the CTU teachers unit the PA professional unit and the clerical unit so just a little timeline of the journey that we've been on the last year we began in February of this year uh on the 12th um we' went through a series of uh meetings throughout the year as you can see here um um and finally on December 11th we had a tenative agreement which I'm happy to present to you today but it was um a lot of collaboration a lot of work thank you to um chair Anna Hernandez and Dr beta for leading this um very important contract but it was uh quite a a long road but we're happy to be here today the team that worked together on this contract uh was led by um Anna Hernandez and Dr beta uh Rebecca Bryant was our legal council and Lead negotiator we had Nate Meyers Jackie bar bav Maloney who's our former principal and Nate Myers is our lead principal and currently the principal of the um right right School Middle School uh doc myself and Dr Jennings um Malik Haan Jerry McHugh former um executive director Monica lamboy and Michael Sullivan um so we uh worked hard together we almost we kind of joked you know we're going to miss some of the times that we've had together but we're also very happy to have settled this contract The Guiding negotiating principles that we adhered to as we um discussed many different topics with our teachers union are as follows number one to always do what is in the best interest interest of our students students first to deepen and extend the culture of care to students and to all adults who work in our schools and ensure that they know we value each of them at every stage of their career in life because we do value our staff we also sought to reduce turnover by incentivizing reasons for staff to make a career in Chelsea we want the we want to track um great great hires and we also want to reduce anything in their contract that might prohibit people from staying and lastly we uh wanted to make sure that we make salary increases that are fiscally responsible and prudent within the limited resources that we do have and so as mentioned before we have the educator perah and clerk units the contract duration is from July 2024 uh which we will back dat um until June 30th 2027 and I'm going to kind of go over a few language changes that we had agreed upon first of all highlights of the contract as it relates to wage wages uh we offered for all three units a 133% wage increase over the duration of the contract so the first year is a 3% the second year is a 5% and the following years is 5% we also offered for our PA professional an additional differential adjustment to their base salary we wanted to make sure that we are um providing a salary for Paras to really be the pipeline of Educators for our teachers we felt that that was very important so this current year there will be a $3,500 differential next year will be a $2,000 differential and the following year after that will be a $1,500 differential for the clerical unit we added two additional steps steps four and five to the pce schedule because we have a lot of Veteran clerks and we we wanted to recognize their commitment to Chelsea um in addition we offered a ,000 differential to their base pay and uh another ,000 the following year um and so we are really proud of the budget we have stretched as much as possible um and so we're we're happy to be able to offer this financial package to um to our Educators some one of the features of our contract are expanded Le policies we wanted to make sure that we are providing a Le package uh for parents um moms and dads families who are trying to start their families or expand their families and and so we did align our language to um the Massachusetts uh parental Leave Act and also FMLA um we will be offering six fully paid weeks of maternity and paternity uh starting in uh 2025 July 1st 2025 for this year we will be offering three weeks for anyone who's currently on a leave upon r ification um this is a very um there's this is a Monumental thing that Chelsea is doing because many districts across the state um have offered some benefits but Chelsea is definitely one of the Front Runners uh to providing this kind of benefit to our Educators and this is something that Dr AA was also very passionate about and so um we we hope that our educators are um able to utilize this benefit we have also offered uh an additional uh sick days to care for a family member prior to this contract it was um you could use up to 15 days of your own sick time to care for a family member under FMLA but now we are allowing for an additional 45 days um and lastly we have expanded the use of the sick Bank prior to this contract the sck bank was only for the individual staff member but now we have expanded it to um if they need to care for an immediate family member some additional highlights in the agreement we uh there are some Provisions to that will support professional development opportunities and enhance working conditions and Foster a positive and collaborative School culture um we're also um happy to provide a $1,000 annual stien for any uh staff member who goes through a certification process um for being bilingual or biliterate and so that's something we are developing but that will be an extra um stien that is offered to certified individuals we are also increasing longevity bonuses across all units and we are also excited to provide a step increase for any CHS graduate so anyone who has graduated from Chelsea High School um and want to return you will get a step increase and then so spread the word we would love to have Chelsea folks come back in um educate our students um some a few additional highlights our educator pay rates did increase the hourly rates and we are going to be piloting a class siiz program um so that will be in effect uh come July 1st 2025 uh clerks we wanted to encourage enourage them to go back to school and U pursue their educational degrees and so we have increased the cap for the clerks to $110,000 annually so in summary we do believe that these uh contracts reflect a shared vision of the future of Chelsea Public Schools we are committed to our students and also creating a place where staff want to come and uh teach our students and be happy because we believe that happy staff happy students happy students happy staff um and so we're really proud of the work that we've done and we you know this little student gentleman is giving us a thumbs up that we got it done and so we're very happy about that so I'm happy to take any questions does anyone have any questions just quickly um just quickly I was wondering if you can tell us a little bit about the pilot program for class caps I'm curious to know what that looks like sure um and Dr V feel free to weigh in um essentially we have offered let me just pull up the class caps so as you know we are constrained by land in Chelsea and so we're not able to do a pure class siiz cap and so what we did do was um we have a set number of students that different grade level of teachers can have in their classroom and once they um reach that point there are a number of steps that they can do so one of the steps is first discuss with your principal about the class sizes because sometimes it might be one student over it might not be a huge adjustment and so it's a simple reassignment of students um if at this School level uh this the teacher and the principal are not able to um resolve the issue then they can U bring it up to the superintendent level and we can discuss some different options and so we wanted to see you know what the issue was because when we looked at our class sizes for the most part there is there are two adults in almost every classroom um which per you know the ratio between students and teachers is actually quite um small compared to other districts and we you know we understand that sometimes there might be class sizes that are larger um one feature of the class sizes is at the high school level um we capped it at 140 students total and so we understand that some classes might be larger some might be smaller um particularly uh we know that the AP classes are in very high demand which is great um but we don't have you know all the teachers that we would love to have to teach those classes so we understand that there will be some larger classes in some sections but total um we we do believe that we can um adhere to that that range so that's a little bit about that's a little you know hopefully that helps help you understand the what we're trying to achieve which is ultimately a conversation um because our intent is to make sure the the job is sustainable I um I just want to let you know that I very happy that I mean we can do those adjustment I know that you say we uh if the tear are happy you know everybody's happy and I think um the the value of you know the the teachers and the students are priority and I think you know it's it was a little hard but I mean it's it's great that everybody is agreement thank you for the presentation you're welcome um I just want to say thank you uh for the presentation uh as far as the numbers and the class sizes um we've had the discussion before and um in other meetings as well I just want to say while in some cases yes we don't always get to the class sizes and I've I've mentioned this myself um sometimes it just takes you know like like you mentioned just the pivot um between the classes because we have to get a student assess sometimes the student is only there for a short period of time but I've mentioned this myself as a parent I know the difference that even with two Educators and sometimes the um additional support staff that having an extra student if it does um become a situation where we do need extra help for one or two students it can cause a little bit of um extra uh class time taken away from the the the greater numbers so what I would like to see going forward is more communication before we have the negotiations um a lot of the information that was presented um during the the times and the meetings was information that I in in most cases I would hope is presented to to um you know a supervisor or someone ahead of time not just in a a contract agreement or something along those lines because as you said happy uh student happy um happy Teacher happy student so I'm hoping that those conversations are taken behind uh behind the scenes prior to a contract agreement um in theory right so thank you so much for all of the time that you guys took um there were multiple meetings besides the ones that you guys were having um so there was a lot of collaboration thank you for that thank you for um as Fel for um stepping in and also um being here as well today um for the rest of my colleagues thanks for all of the um perspectives some of them were very different but I think um overall we we had a lot of uh vibrant conversations um Veronica you always bring your energy your Wis them to the table so I appreciate that as well but we did it for the district um and I'm very very happy that we could just come to something that is both Equitable for our district the students um very forward um and leading and Paving the way so I am comfortable with what we're deciding um and I think it's it's a step in the right direction so thank you for listening and um hearing all of us out thank you oh yes here thank you Christine for the presentation and also at the same time I just want to commend the uh Team efforts because this is even that it took some time eventually everybody is is um accomplished what I was expect to uh to be happen and this is something that I like um everybody is pleased and hopefully in the future we continue work working has um has a team because the team effort is the most important uh in order to accomplish uh Victory and in some kind of issues or uh like a contract like this situation so thank you so much to all the teams that are working this um contract thank you okay thank you Christine okay we'll move on to the Roll Call M Hernandez yes Mr Oran yes Miss kovas carabo yes Miss vas yes Dr Neville yes Miss Enriquez yes Mr maltz yes that's seven in the affirmative and three absent seven in the affirmative and three absent motion carries consideration and action to vote on the collective bargaining agreement between the Chelsea school committee and the Chelsea teachers union par professional unit for the period of July 1st 2024 through June 30th 2027 roll call Miss Hernandez yes Mr Oran yes Miss koves carabo yes Miss Valderas yes Dr Neville yes Miss hriz Mr maltz yes that's seven in the affirmative and three absent seven in the affirmative three absent motion carries next item consideration and action to vote on the collective bargaining agreement between the Chelsea school committee and Chelsea teachers union teacher unit for the period of July 1st 2024 through June 30th 2027 roll call Miss Hernandez yes Mr ran yes Miss koves carav yes Miss Valderas yes Dr Neville yes Miss Enriquez yes Mr maltz yes that's seven in the affirmative and three sum in the affirmative three abson motion carries next item is consideration and action to accept the terms and con and conditions in the employment contract for the chief financial and operation officer Billy Joe Turner roll call Mr hernandz yes Mr rean yes Miss kovas carabo yes Miss madas yes Dr Neville yes Miss henriquez that's six in the affirmative and three AB six in the affirmative three option motion carries with this does anybody have any comments Dr ala I would just like to say thank you to everyone our school committee for your support during negotiations and to our teachers union uh I do believe that this contract is an extremely strong contract and solid and it will attract and retain help us attract Educators and retain Educators it is very centered on um what is best for our employees and staff and I do believe that we have come to a contract that I can say um I'm very proud of and so I just want to say thank you it it was it was although it took a while I think we're in a really good place and uh especially thank you to Anna who was at every meeting and to the team and um and just really thank you I can't thank you enough so just grateful we have a one-pager highlight for you um to read it's there and then I also just last time the plaque was not here but we have Anna's plaque um this is her last um school committee for this year as chair and so um we just want to present this to Anna and appreciation for your service and dedication as chair of the school committee for 2024 thank you and that's all I have to say um I just share something I just want I just want to make a comment um I want to thank everyone it's been a pleasure leading the school committee this year it's been um it's been great working as a team um we have a very good team and I look forward to doing more and achieving more I think we have a lot of goals to achieve and I think that we will reach all of them um the contracts it was my first time really being this involved in in this contract negotiations and I have to say that it was it was it was rough it wasn't it wasn't easy um and we had a lot of work that we had to do but I think we really got to a place where I think that the union um understood that we were truly giving everything we could and I think um we got to a really good compromise be between both sides and I think at the end I think everyone was really happy with what we were able to sign off on and I was very happy with the contract that we were able to accomplish and I'm glad that we were able to give all all that we did um so with that um I just wanted to say thank you to everyone to my peers um to Dr albaa to all my colleagues that I worked with that it was so interesting getting to know each and every single one of you Monica sorry to see you go it was great working with you all these years I had the pleasure of being with you the whole six and a half years that you were here um and I wish you so much luck from all of us um in your new role and I know your new your new chapter will be a bestseller um and with that um I'll hand it over to MAA she wanted to make a comment um I just want to um let you know that I mean as people are watching uh we are working hard uh to make those sizes of the classrooms more you know smaller but I know it takes time um we need more budget so um we are working working to see if we can get more budget and kind of like we um asking if you can come to the state house too um to ask for it and to let them know the needs that we have and that we really need more money so we can make those changes and um especially because you know the quality of Education that we need for the students you know we have to do very um High and um I know if we get more budget we can make a difference and um we as a team are working and we just want the best um for our students and their team everybody who's working the staff so I'm assuming that I mean this is only the beginning of you know this contract and that we were able to do it but um we working you know to to reduce um the limit of the students in classroom because we know it has a lot and I'm hoping we can make a difference next year and see what we can do by asking more money in the state house and see another strategies that we can do thank you everybody because this is my first year too and has been a pleasure for me to know every one of you and be part of this I never thought I was going to be in this position but I mean I have been learning so much and I enjoy it uh especially with a special education too I have being learned so much over there things that I didn't know before so thank you for the opportunity that you have given me thank you and thank you Fidel for all your support um you have been a great help to us and a great support to us and we can't thank you enough from the school committee we extend our deepest thanks um and I know that we we're going to do great things in Chelsea because Chelsea is small but it's very big and um I want to wish everybody a very happy holiday season and I hope to set the new year on a fresh foot and get so much more accomplished and we will so with that um I ask a motion to adjourn I second meeting has adjourned e for