Teacher, Admin Contracts Approved; Principal Pay Debated

by Laura Glesby

It’s official: over the next three years, teachers will get a 13.57 percent average raise and unionized school administrators will get a 9.6 percent average raise.

The Board of Alders made that commitment while issuing a final approval for two New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) contracts on Wednesday night, with lingering questions about the actual costs of the administrators’ union contract.

Alders approved the contract with New Haven Federation of Teachers (NHFT) with no dissent and one abstention from Fair Haven Alder Magda Natal, a teacher at Wilbur Cross.

The New Haven School Administrators Association (AFSA Local 18) contract garnered more pushback, with nine alders voting against the contract’s approval.

Currently, teachers with a master’s degree make a salary ranging from $53,615 to $97,356. The full potential salary range, from new teachers with bachelor’s degrees to longtime teachers with PhDs, is $51,421 to $104,297.

By the 2028-2029 academic year, teachers with a mater’s degree will earn salaries ranging from $57,906 to $105,655, according to a presentation compiled by NHFT. The full potential salary range will extend from $55,615 to $112,909.

Read more about the teachers’ contract here.

Westville Alder and Finance Committee Chair Adam Marchand expressed hope that these raises could “boost teacher recruitment efforts.” There are currently 50 open certified teacher positions advertised to Applitrack.com.

Meanwhile, the principals, assistant principals, and a handful of district-wide managers covered by the school administrators union will receive historic raises resulting from both salary increases and step movement, as union President Tara Cass told the Independent in January.

Neither the union nor the Board of Education has published a new salary schedule for the administrators union. Administrators’ salaries currently range from $123,138 to $181,990, with principals making anywhere from $137,117 to $175,749 depending on the age group, size of the school, and experience.

Read more about the administrators’ contract here.

Both contracts will extend from July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2029.

According to fiscal impact statements submitted from NHPS administrators to the Board of Alders, the teachers’ raises are estimated to cost the city an additional $20,217,553 over the next three years, while the administrators’ raises are anticipated to cost $1,845,420.

Those numbers differ slightly from the estimated cost presented to the Board of Alders Finance Committee in early February. At that meeting, NHPS leaders told the committee that the teachers’ raises would cost $20,112,963 and administrators’ raises would cost the city approximately $1,791,442 over three years.

NHPS spokesperson Justin Harmon said that the numbers presented to the committee may have been updated. “I think it’s a matter of a revised projection, but I’m looking to confirm that,” Harmon said.

Alders Debate Admin Salary Boosts

Finance Committee Chair Adam Marchand and newly elected Downtown Alder Christine Kim emerge with opposite takes on the administrators’ contract.

While the teachers’ contract passed in the Board of Alders without opposition, the school administrators’ contract faced some resistance.

Downtown/Yale Alder Elias Theodore, who graduated from Wilbur Cross High School in 2023, was the first to speak up against the proposal.

He told his colleagues that he felt “incredibly conflicted.” He later said that ahead of the vote, he reached out to numerous mentors, including “at least ten alders” and one of his former NHPS principals (he declined to say who). On the phone with his principal, “someone I really admire and respect,” Theodore said “we talked about the state of public schools.”

Standing before his colleagues, Theodore said that while “I feel so grateful to the administrators who taught me and led the school while I was there, my Wilbur Cross experience was also defined by vacant classrooms” and buildings that were “falling apart.”

He noted that the school system has a shortage of teachers, but not a shortage of administrators. He argued that the school system has more dire funding priorities than administrator raises.

“My vote is not a comment on their hard work,” he said of the administrators. He added after the meeting, “At the end of the day, the teachers in NHPS are the workers. The administrators are the bosses and managers.”

Fair Haven Alder Sarah Miller echoed Theodore’s concerns. “Each budget cycle, we wring our hands over the amount we give the Board of Education,” said Miller. She argued that “property owners across the city, most of whom make way less than New Haven Public School administrators,” will ultimately shoulder the cost of the raises.

Theodore and Miller voted against the contract alongside Downtown/East Rock Alder Christine Kim, East Rock Alder Anna Festa, Bella Vista Alder Henry Murphy, Fair Haven Heights Alder Mildred Melendez, Fair Haven Alder Frank Redente, Westville Alder Amy Marx, and Beaver Hills Alder Gary Hogan. The remaining alders on the 30-person board voted to approve the contract (save for Edgewood Alder Evette Hamilton, who was absent).

Kim, for whom Wednesday was her first meeting as a newly elected alder, said she voted against the admin contract because “almost all my constituents have talked to me about higher taxes.” She said that the school administrators’ salaries are high enough that a raise is “not a subsistence decision.”

Melendez summarized her vote in two questions: “Can we afford it? On the backs of who?”

Meanwhile, several alders who voted to approve the contract cited a need for cost-of-living increases, while expressing reservations about the logistical consequences of a denial.

“Since the pandemic, we’ve been dealing with inflation,” said Board President and West River Alder Tyisha Walker-Myers. “There are administrators that work hard.” She said that alders should focus on bringing in more resources, such as advocating for Yale to contribute more to the city in light of its property tax exemptions, rather than penalizing school administrators.

East Rock/Fair Haven Alder Caroline Tanbee Smith said that she initially thought the annual administrator raises were “a little high,” but she found out that the raises in the union’s prior contract had not kept pace with inflation. “The real value change was negative” in prior years, she said, so she believed that raises slightly above inflation were fair. She added that “New Haven appears, on the whole, on par” with Bridgeport and Hartford when it comes to administrator salaries, particularly for school principal salaries.

Board Majority Leader and Westville/Amity Alder Richard Furlow noted that school building repairs come from the city’s capital budget, so any funds saved by denying the raises would likely not result in more funding for school repairs. He questioned whether sending the union and the Board of Ed back to negotiations would result in a better outcome for the city.

“It takes a lot of hard work to negotiate a contract,” said Marchand, who said he thought about “the principals, the assistant principals” who have taught his own kids over the years while casting his vote in favor of the contract.