NEWTON, Mass. —
Newton Public Schools students will now miss an eighth day of class as teachers in the Massachusetts city remain on strike.
Newton Mayor Ruthanne Fuller announced Monday night that the city's schools will remain closed Tuesday.
The Newton Teachers Association voted to authorize a strike on Jan. 18, and union members have been on the picket line since Jan. 19.
"The Newton Public Schools are ready to open school doors wide as soon as we get the word from the NTA," Fuller said Monday night. "The union should call off the strike, and we will continue to bargain in good faith, with urgency, with the NTA leadership while educators are in their classrooms."
There are several sticking points in the negotiations, including pay raises, getting social workers in each of the city's nearly two dozen schools and what Newton Teachers Association members have called a "modern, humane" parental leave policy.
NTA representatives said they met with the Newton School Committee Monday morning to ask questions about the committee's most recent contract proposal and to better understand its priorities.
Members of the NTA then spent Monday afternoon negotiating internally about its own proposal and where they could find a compromise with the School Committee.
"The tone today was respectful, and we emphasized our sense of urgency in getting our students back to school. While we’re inching closer on smaller issues, we’re still far apart on many of the things that are most important to our students and our educators," said Lynn Penczar, a third-grade teacher at Lincoln-Eliot Elementary School and a member of the NTA Negotiations Committee.
"Today was a day of progress in negotiations. It feels like we are edging closer, but there is still a lot of ground to cover," said Chris Brezski, chair of the Newton School Committee.
Hearst Owned
One of the signs spotted at a rally held in support of striking members of the Newton Teachers Association outside of City Hall in Newton, Massachusetts, on Jan. 29, 2024.
Brezski said that just after 4 p.m. Monday, the NTA provided the School Committee with a response to the committee's contract proposal from Sunday night. He said the teachers' union dropped its request for a fifth year in the contract and withdrew longevity demands, among other adjustments.
"With the progress today and previous tentative agreements, including 12 weeks of paid parental leave, we are steadily addressing most of the major issues both NPS and the NTA have identified as important to improving the lives and experiences of our students and staff," Brezski said. "While making progress on systems and structures is important, we still need to talk about the money."
School officials did state the two sides have barely begun to talk about money and that the NTA and School Committee are more than $20 million apart over the life of the contract. The mayor said that all funds are on the table.
"We have reached deep and wide to pull together the funding for wages and benefits [that are] competitive with pair school districts. We’ve insured that funding will be able to support Superintendent (Anna) Nolin’s initiatives. We are using city revenues and one-time funds sustainably so no layoffs are required. And yet, there will be no school again on Tuesday," said Fuller, who is also a member of the Newton School Committee.
The cancellation of Tuesday's classes comes after Lital Asher-Dotan, a mother of three Newton Public Schools students, filed a motion Monday in Middlesex Superior Court in which she asked a judge to end the teachers' strike. Approximately 20 other families also submitted letters of support for the motion, according to a court clerk.
"It feels like nobody speaks about the kids," Asher-Dotan said Monday night. "(The teachers) ought to get a fair contract. We're all supportive of the fight, but it's been now seven days and the kids have been suffering."
Family asks Massachusetts judge to order striking teachers back into classrooms in Newton
Before NTA representatives addressed media members at the Newton Education Center, a handful of parents tried to make their way into the room where Monday night's news conference was being held.
Those parents were told it was a members-only meeting, but they expressed concerns that the Massachusetts Teachers Association — the largest union in the state — was driving the NTA's strike.
"We get support from the MTA, as do all local unions, but we are the ones making the decisions. We are the ones driving this," said Elana Cutler, a sixth-grade teacher at Brown Middle School and a member of the NTA Negotiations Committee.
It is illegal for teachers to strike in Massachusetts, but educators in five communities have hit the picket line for at least one day since May 2022: Brookline, Malden, Haverhill, Woburn and Andover. Newton Public Schools had the largest enrollment of those school districts, with nearly 12,000 students.
The Newton Teachers Association has faced court-imposed fines totaling $425,000 for the strike so far. A judge ruled additional fees of $50,000 per day will be tacked on for each day the strike continues, so the teachers' union now faces $475,000 in fines.
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NEWTON, Mass. —
There were no classes Friday for nearly 12,000 Newton, Massachusetts, Public School students after the city's teachers overwhelmingly voted to strike.
With Newton's action, there have now been teacher strikes in a half-dozen Massachusetts school districts over the last year and a half.
But Newton -- with 22 schools and nearly 12,000 students -- is the biggest district to deal with a strike so far.
After voting to strike Thursday, the teachers and their supporters rallied on the steps of City Hall. They're demanding pay raises, better benefits and more services for students.
The teachers' union insists the district has enough money to pay for its demands without raising taxes.
Newton teachers vote to strike, closing schools in one of Massachusetts' biggest cities
"The money is already there in the surpluses that the city has been running year after year. So, what we're asking for is the school committee and the mayor could settle this contract anytime," said teachers union representative Mike Schlegelmilch.
Mayor Ruthanne Fuller disagrees.
"I wish there were even more monies just sitting there in a closet waiting to be deployed. Sometimes we've had some one-time monies. We've allocated them and we've always prioritized the Newton Public Schools," she said.
But for now at least -- the classrooms and hallways remain empty, and there's no word when students might be back. Newton schools are still serving students breakfast and lunch in the form of grab-and-go bags.
"I mean the teachers deserve more money, sure. But it's not fair my kids are going to have to be home now. You know, we pay a lot of taxes in this city," one parent said.
Teachers strikes are illegal in Massachusetts, and a state labor board has already ordered the teachers back to work. The next step would be for a judge to impose fines.
The two sides have been meeting since noon Friday with a mediator.
Late Friday afternoon, a judge ordered teachers back to work but did not impose fines. Teachers have until 3 p.m Sunday to say if they will comply.
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