Glasgow Principals Get Raise

In the first in-person board meeting since COVID-19 hit, Glasgow School Board members, principals, Superintendent Sundby and members of the public sat six feet apart in the high school library on May 20 to discuss principal wages, following meetings earlier this month which brought a wage increase and one-time payments to teachers, classified staff and classified supervisors.

Before the board presented their proposal to the four principals, retired teacher and community member Kim Girard utilized the public comment period to inquire why the track was locked up after being open the entire month of March and April, even though the school was closed as a result of COVID-19, and now with the recent developments of communities opening up their public parks. She stressed there are a lot of adults who utilize the track and with 400 meters around, there are ways to social distance from others who might be on the track at the same time. Superintendent Sundby stated he was unaware the track was open during those months and upon finding out, he made sure it was no longer accessible.

“We’re going to get into the season of open fields and things like that, so if I were to open up the facility to the community then that would entice, I think an open field option, which I don’t want to start at this moment,” Sundby explained. He did state there are a few things that he is looking at to be able to open the track back up, as the National Federation of High School Association has developed ratings to determine sports as being a high, medium and/or low contact for COVID-19. “I would just hate to have a situation come back on the school district and somebody out there gets COVID-19, somehow, someway, and they come back on the district and say we didn’t do our due diligence to keep everyone safe,” he stressed.

Girard understood the rationale, however wants the information to be made known to the public on why the sudden closure of the track field. “The community does use the track for walking and they were just so kind to vote yes on the levy,” she stated.

After the public comment discussion was completed, wage discussions with the principals got underway with the board presenting their proposal to each of the principals in attendance. Similar to the teachers and classified staff, most of the proposal was agreed upon last year during wage openers and plans were in place for both scenarios in how the community would have voted in the levy.

The proposal presented included a one-time payment based on six percent of one and a half unfilled full time equivalence (FTE) monies. The FTE monies provided to each principal was calculated based on the average salary, cost of health contributions and the total number of principals providing a one-time payment of $1,187. “We know in the past we’ve always, well the last couple of years, we’ve wanted to do the principals on an individual basis and not as a unit, so this is kind of an odd year again, so I think we’re just offering this to the principals as a unit,” explained Board Chair Mona Amundson.

The second issue presented was increasing the base wage 3.75 percent, providing a raise in the amount to each principal. The third issue presented was a per principal sign-on bonus for current staff based on six percent of any available unspent 2019-20 General Fund year-end monies to be determined by July 15, with the hope that these monies will be available because of one-time cost savings associated with the schools being closed.

After presenting the full proposal, Amundson admitted the matrix in how the principals are getting paid isn’t working as well as when it was first developed so the plan is to create something different over the next year to either rework the current matrix, eliminate the matrix or go in a totally different direction.

Irle School principal is currently making $90,000 and will be receiving $93,071 next year while the Irle assistant principal is currently getting paid $68,513 and will be making $70,886. The middle school principal is currently making $80,185 and will be getting paid $88,257 next year as he also took classes to move over on the matrix. The high school principal is currently making $80,693 and will be making $84,245.

Though all principals agreed with the proposal presented by the board, principal Brett Huntsman brought up how retirement incentives should be discussed and possibly implemented within the contract of principals. Next year will be Huntsman’s fifth year in the district but his 28th year in education, but as a result of not being in the Glasgow School district long enough, he doesn’t currently have a retirement plan. He explained in discussions with other northeast Montana principals, they have other benefits that are currently not being offered by Glasgow schools.

“I think it’s our job to educate and talk to you guys about things that we’ve seen and directions that people can go because you probably don’t know about it until we sit down and have a discussion,” Huntsman stated. “It’s definitely not something you have to move on today, but it’s definitely something looking into.”

The board seemed open to the idea of further discussions regarding retirement incentives, however financials would have to be looked at to determine what could be done as well as determine how it would work with the principal pay structure.

“Maybe next year we can work on that kind of thing, with the whole structure of the wages as well as the benefits and the whole structure of the principals,” stated Amundson.

After discussing the want of re-classifying personal and sick days into discretionary days, it was determined more research and information needed to be obtained in order to modify the principals’ contracts to include a retirement incentive and the changing of personal/sick days as outlined by the principals. It was advised the principals come up with a written proposal to bring to the board in how the changes could be implemented so the school board members could determined how it would impact the district. Next year these desires will be discussed further to find a solution.