To: Members of the Board of Education
From: Cheryl Bost, President
I write to you to express my support for TAAAC’s bargaining priorities. As we all know, implementation of the Blueprint has an extended timeline with higher standards and expectations for students and for teachers. In order to achieve and successfully implement the Blueprint provisions relative to employees, it will require collaboration between the union that represents teachers and the Board and its employees. The time to begin that collaboration is now, especially with a new Superintendent who will come on board on July 1, 2022.
Superintendent Mohammed Choudhury and I have embarked on a new partnership on the State level relative to Blueprint implementation that should be replicated in every county. This includes regular meetings, regular inclusion in conversations relative to the Blueprint, and access to staff charged with Blueprint development and implementation. Dr. Choudhury recognizes that if we are to bring about real, meaningful change to education that teachers – those responsible for implementing the change – must be included in the development of those same policies that they will ultimately be charged with implementing.
With effective partnerships, counties have improved not only salaries, but also, and just as important, working conditions. I have included a chart of career earnings for teachers in Maryland. Significantly, Anne Arundel County is number 10 in the State, but is surrounded by counties with higher earning potential and better working conditions. The improved working conditions in the surrounding counties include more individual planning time, prohibitions on non-professional duties, and compensation when required to provide class coverage in the absence of a substitute. Improvements in these areas are all consistent with the vision of the Blueprint. Accordingly, the TAAAC bargaining team is committed to securing improvements in the contractual language on all of these items to improve working conditions and to begin alignment with the vision of the Blueprint.
Anne Arundel County would be well served by these improvements enabling it to better attract and recruit a qualified workforce to serve the students of Anne Arundel County. I encourage you to develop a more collaborative relationship with teachers – experts, in their own right, with knowledge of the students they teach and effective strategies to engage them.
Career Earnings for Teachers in Maryland Public Schools
| 2021-2022 | ||||||||
| 2020-2021 Career Earnings* | 2009-10 Career Earnings | |||||||
| Bachelor’s Steps 1-10 | Master’s Steps 11-20 | Master’s +30 Steps 21-30 | Total Career Earnings | Rank | ||||
| Montgomery | 595,651 | 945,644 | 1,111,774 | 2,653,069 | 1 | 2,562,608 | 2,386,016 | |
| Howard* | 631,617 | 919,490 | 1,074,227 | 2,625,334 | 2 | 2,388,760 | 2,097,112 | |
| Calvert* | 584,060 | 817,896 | 995,055 | 2,397,011 | 3 | 2,373,280 | 2,214,589 | |
| Prince George’s | 557,538 | 823,945 | 1,014,220 | 2,395,703 | 4 | 2,371,982 | 2,128,750 | |
| Washington | 607,985 | 822,251 | 892,330 | 2,322,566 | 5 | 2,293,822 | 1,919,908 | |
| Baltimore | 562,461 | 782,624 | 974,295 | 2,319,380 | 6 | 2,195,498 | 1,893,468 | |
| Cecil* | 581,586 | 812,390 | 916,574 | 2,310,550 | 7 | 2,229,810 | 1,853,932 | |
| Harford | 578,765 | 789,864 | 941,730 | 2,310,359 | 8 | 2,209,631 | 1,866,809 | |
| Charles | 559,509 | 807,563 | 919,650 | 2,286,722 | 9 | 2,264,192 | 1,994,825 | |
| Anne Arundel | 566,639 | 765,151 | 954,243 | 2,286,033 | 10 | 2,263,401 | 2,102,765 | |
* The starred counties include FY23 settlements
Individual Planning Time:
- Howard County – Elementary has 300 minutes with 220 minutes scheduled in blocks of no less than 55 consecutive minutes. Secondary has 50 consecutive minutes per day with an additional 30 minutes each week.
- Calvert County – Elementary receives 45 consecutive minutes per day; and secondary receives the equivalent of a daily period per day.
- Prince George’s – Elementary receives 225 minutes per week and in addition to the 225 minutes, each teacher receives 30 consecutive minutes of uninterrupted time on a daily basis. Secondary receives a daily 45-minute block of time.
