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September 29, 2023 

Dear Members of the North Andover Public Schools Community,

As you may be aware, the North Andover School Committee has been in negotiations for a successor agreement with the North Andover Teachers Association since December of last year. The current agreement expired on September 1, 2023, but per Massachusetts labor law all the language and conditions of the prior contract continue until a successor agreement is reached. As a rule we would not address negotiations in public, but given that the Teachers Association has engaged the public, we feel it is necessary to share our perspective on these negotiations with you as well.   

First and foremost, we respect our teachers and believe they are critical to the success of our students. That is why we have offered them what we believe to be a fair and competitive salary proposal. The past three negotiated agreements have averaged just over 6% for each three year period, and our initial offer in these negotiations was in line with the past agreements. The Teachers’ Association has maintained their initial position of 13.5% over three years and at the last meeting requested an additional year at 4.5%. 

Working with the Town Manager on creative ways to fund a contract increase without negatively impacting North Andover tax payers, the School Committee has increased its salary proposal 2 times. With recent inflation in mind and trying to maintain competitive salaries with neighboring school districts, the School Committee's last offer to the Teachers Association is a 12.5% increase over the 3 year period of the new contract.  The School Committee and Town Manager do not believe they can in good conscience offer any more than this without increasing risks of cuts to the School District budget in the coming years. The offer by the Committee would result in the average salary for a teacher moving from $84,704 per year to $100,116 per year, and the top salary for a teacher moving from $102,040 per year to $115,317 per year.  The School Committee’s offer will increase teacher salaries in line with our neighboring districts.  This offer was rejected by the Teachers’ Association.  

Please know that we value and appreciate the work of our teachers and we understand how unsettling this situation is to our teachers, our students, and our community.   We also owe a duty to the citizens of North Andover that we get a fair and equitable contract.  To that end, we believe that the financial proposal that we have put forth does exactly that for both the teachers and residents.  

Respectfully,

David S. Brown
Chair, North Andover School Committee