STRIKING TEACHERS RISK BEING FINED
The pressure is on the Newton School Committee and teachers union to come to agreement on a new contract by the end of the weekend.
A Middlesex Superior Court judge ordered the Newton Teachers Association to end its strike yesterday, and if it doesn’t by 3 p.m. Sunday, it will face fines since skipping class for the picket line is illegal in Massachusetts.
Nearly 12,000 students were out of class yesterday after 98% of the union’s membership voted Thursday to authorize the strike to begin immediately. Teachers have gone without contract since the beginning of the school year.
“We certainly hope to be back in our classrooms as soon as possible,” said David Bedar, who has taught at Newton North High School for 17 years.
The previous 3-year contract expired Aug. 31, and Mayor Ruthanne Fuller along with the City Council and School Committee had pressed the teachers union not to go on strike. Newton is the ninth largest school district in the state.
A day after Fuller blasted teachers for taking students out of the classroom by going on strike, the mayor told reporters the city has no other choice but to turn to the courts for help.
“I believe in collective bargaining it is important to negotiate,” Fuller said. “We want our teachers to have competitive salaries because our teachers are amazing. … Keep the kids in the classroom while we adults figure out this contract.”
City voters turned down a $9.2 million property tax increase that would have supported city services and schools last March.
The union in December voted no confidence in Fuller and the School Committee.
Thousands of community members rallied in the freezing cold at City Hall early yesterday afternoon, some holding signs featuring messages like ‘Students, students. What do you see? I see my teachers fighting for me,’ and ‘You can’t put students first if you put teachers last.”
Ashley Raven, a preschool special education teacher for 12 years at Newton Early Childhood Program, told the Herald the “biggest sticking point” in negotiations is the “financial constraints faced by the district.”
Officials have told teachers that if they want programs to remain funded, they have to “subsidize them with our own salaries,” Raven said.
Newton’s contract escalation follows similar teacher strikes in Andover, Woburn, Haverhill, Malden and Brookline, which accrued escalating fines for the unions.