Kane County Reporter

While teachers are back in classrooms at Geneva District 304 after a week long strike, the school district has refused to release the details of an agreement accepted by the union representing school employees.

Geneva District 304 board president Mark Grosso told the Kane County Reporter that he was not permitted to disclose the details of a tentative contract agreement with the Geneva Education Association (GEA), which represents some 450 teachers in the district, until final board approval.

The board will meet some time this week, he said, but a date and time has yet to be set.

Geneva District 304 board president Mark Grosso.

The board reached an agreement with the GEA early Monday morning, and two-thirds of the teachers voted in favor of the agreement that afternoon. Classes for the 6,000 students at the nine schools (six elementary, two middle and one high school) resumed Tuesday. The teachers walked out last Tuesday, cancelling classes and numerous athletic events.

Grosso said he had no comment when asked if the terms of the deal would require yet another property tax increase in the district, a concern of many residents. Grosso also had no comment when asked to name a guidance counselor who last Saturday reportedly texted a petition to students to urge the board to accept the union’s latest offer. Many parents were reportedly angered by the text.

In a statement, GEA president Kevin Gannon did not disclose the dollar amounts of the new contract, but did say that in the initial years of the contract teacher salaries would increase according to the board’s hybrid offer which includes a combination of percent and dollar amount increases. In the latter years a “step and lane” system of increases would be added with automatic salary increases based on a teacher’s years of service (the step) plus a teacher’s level of education (the lane).

The step and lane approach is “part of a complex, convoluted system that deceives members of the public into thinking teachers are getting smaller raises than they actually are,” the Illinois Policy Institute wrote in February 2016 regarding contract negotiations between Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and the Chicago Teachers Union.

“CPS is not the only district that uses nontransparent salary schedules to pay its teachers,” the Illinois Policy Institute article said. “Public school teachers unions across Illinois have clung to such outdated pay schemes for decades, despite evidence that shows salary schedules reward teachers for things that have little to do with improving student outcomes. Salary schedules pay all teachers in the same step and lane the same salaries, regardless of that teacher’s skill, effectiveness or achieved outcomes for students.”

The average teacher at Geneva Unit District 304 received $124,673 in total compensation in 2017 for working nine months, according to an analysis of Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) and Teachers Retirement System (TRS) records by the Kane County Reporter.