Good evening, Chair Causey, Vice Chair Henn, Superintendent Williams, and Members of the Board:

Team BCPS. Any organization can call itself a team. But to create a winning team, all components of the team must feel valued and respected. Every winning World Series or Super Bowl team will talk about the cohesion and support felt in the clubhouse from all aspects of the team—from front office, the manager, and to every player.

At the last board meeting you passed an amendment to the budget calling for a 15-minute extension to the school day—a move that you knew would be a significant cost. Tabco negotiated a $14.2 million 2% salary increase to fund that extension, and while not negotiable, the Para Educators salaries would increase by just over a million dollars.

CASE offered to accept the 2% increase negotiated by Tabco for its school-based members (principals and assistant principals), whose workdays would be increased as well. This would equate to $1.6 million. We were told that no money was budgeted for us but were offered a one-time $1,000 stipend instead.

Really?! Enough already! We talk nonstop about equity, but do we practice what we preach? This is not about equity; this is about discrimination! Each board member is given a $7,500 annual stipend for your service to our system. What if you were told that women on the board would only receive a $1,000 stipend because of fiscal issues, but men would receive the $7,500. Would that be acceptable? There is absolutely no difference between this scenario and what is being proposed for school-based administrators.

I have sent each of you almost 4 pages of testimony of the rationale for why principals and assistant principals should receive the same compensation as teachers for the extended day. The bottom line is that their day is being extended as well. Not to compensate them is not only unfair, it is wrong, it is discriminatory.

CASE is asking for this board to move and approve the same 2% salary adjustment for school-based administrators as they do for teachers. Team BCPS has some real issues in the clubhouse. This board has the opportunity tonight to address one of those issues on the surface, but candidly must do much more long term to value and respect all the players on the team.

Thank you,
Tom DeHart
Executive Director, CASE