Hingham Teachers Settle on New Contract

The Hingham Education Association and Hingham school officials have reached agreement on a new contract earlier this week.

 The new contract will be for classroom and specialist teachers, counselors, psychologists, librarians, nurses, occupational, physical and speech/language therapists, and technology specialists.  Extracurricular and coaching stipends are also covered in the collective bargaining contract.

On Monday, Hingham’s School Committee ratified the labor agreement with the Hingham Education Association. This comes a month after the HEA Negotiating Team and the School Committee’s Salary and Negotiations Subcommittee reached a verbal agreement at the end of August and the Agreement.

The new contract settlement includes a one year agreement for the 2010-2011 school year and a three-year agreement for the 2011-2012, 2012-2013, and 2013-2014 years.

According to a statement submitted by Superintendent Dr. Dorothy Galo, “there were no language or salary scale changes in the one-year agreement.  In other words, the 2009-2010 salary scale remained in effect for 2010-2011.”

According to Galo, in the new three-year agreement, from 2011-14, there are three successive 2 percent increases in the salary scale for each of the years and some language changes related to bereavement leave, maternity leave, and personal leave.  In the 13-14 year, there also is an increase in longevity payments for teachers with 15 or more years of experience in the Hingham Public Schools..

The previous contract had expired at the end of August 2010 and Hingham teachers were unhappy they had to work over a year without a new one.  Last April, Alec Porter, a French teacher at the and the vice president of the Hingham Education Association said he believes negotiations have stalled over the year  for many reason including finances, working conditions, and language in the contract. Without a new contract,  Porter said some teachers had cut back on volunteering their time to the town, but had continued to meet job requirements.