Education
Seth Morton podium 02-28-17

Darien RTM Approves Teachers Union Contract, Ox Ridge Land Purchase

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The Representative Town Meeting on Monday approved a three-year teachers union contract that raises salaries by an average of 3.4 percent each year but is expected to result in some other savings. The contract will be the biggest single item in the town budget for the next three years. For this fiscal year, ending June 30, salaries paid under the current contract cost the town about $39.4 million out of a total town budget of $140.6 million, or 28 percent of the total. That amount is expected to rise by an estimate of $1,339,889 in the 2017-2018 fiscal year and by slightly more in the following two years. (None of the figures in this paragraph or the previous one were given to RTM members before the vote.

Education
Town Hall

RTM to Vote Monday on Teachers Union Contract — the Biggest Part of the Town’s Next Three Budgets

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Two Representative Town Meeting committees have each voted to recommend that the full RTM, when it meets Monday night, approve the teachers union contract. The proposed three-year Darien teachers union contract will be the single largest expenditure made by the town — not just for the coming fiscal year, but for the two that follow it, as well. Once the RTM vote is taken, that expenditure of tens of millions of dollars a year will be locked in, essentially, unavailable for either the Board of Education or RTM to change for three years. Most of the town’s education spending is on teacher’s salaries, and town education spending is close to 70 percent of the entire town budget. The RTM’s vote will be the final one, putting the contract into effect starting July 1 and ending June 30, 2020. 

Top school administrators and several members of the Board of Education answered questions about the contract on Tuesday at a joint meeting of the RTM’s Education Committee and Finance & Budget Committee.

Education
Joslyn DeLancey Darien Education Association Teachers Union 02-16-17

Full Statement: Teachers Union President States Objections to Plan for Department Chairs

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Joslyn DeLancey, an elementary school teacher and president of the Darien Education Association, spoke to the Board of Educaton on Jan. 10, giving the teacher union’s reaction to Superintendent of Schools Dan Brenner’s proposal for six new academic department chairs for the high school and middle school. (Since then, a second department chair for special education has been added to the proposal, bringing the total to seven.)

Here is DeLancey’s full statement to the board, which was included in the Feb. 14 packet to board members, along with the minutes of that meeting (a video including her comments is beneath the statement):

Hello, my name is Joslyn DeLancey. I am the president of the Darien Education Association, and am here to speak on behalf of the teachers of Darien regarding Dr. Brenner’s proposal to shift the middle school and high school department chairs and coordinators to administrative positions.