Noting that the district has several challenging decisions ahead, Danville School Board President Dr. Randal Ashton said it is important that the district have a contract with its teachers in place for next year.
School board members and the Danville Education Association each voted on the last day of school to approve a two-year extension of the previous employee contract agreement. Under the contract, all DEA members will be receiving a $2,000 salary increase for the upcoming school year, and a $1,640 salary increase for the 2022-23 school year.
“District 118 as a whole wins on this,” Ashton said during a special board meeting Friday night.
DEA President Derrice Hightower said 273 staff members participated in a meeting at Danville High School Friday afternoon, and 63 percent voted in favor of the extension. The school board voted 4-1 to approve the contract, with Lon Henderson opposed, Darlene Halloran abstaining and Bill Dobbles absent.
Henderson said he is “bewildered” by the agreement, saying that not all board members had enough time to review the details, and said it would limit the district’s competitiveness because the starting salary is not increasing. While Halloran said she supports the agreement, she has not had enough time to process the information.
Board member Johnnie Carey disagreed with Henderson’s assessment, saying every board member had a chance to present their opinion and deliberate the issues.
Hightower says the process first started at the end of April once the current board leadership was seated. She said she is personally supportive of the new agreement.
Board Vice President Shannon Schroeder thanked Hightower for her work over the last month and said the extension will be good for the district.
“I think that this agreement has balanced, in an incredible way, our responsibility toward the taxpayers, the responsibility toward our employees that we value incredibly, and our teaching assistants who need to be brought whole,” she explained.
