D65/DEC Tentative Agreement includes 2.3% Salary Increase

This piece is not intended to be critical of anyone or the negotiating teams, but I am trying to point out a problem; one which is not only hypocritical1 but also an example of bad governance leading to bad outcomes.

According to documents I’ve seen - the tentative agreement between District 65 and the Teachers Union (DEC) includes a 2.3% cost-of-living increase for this year and 2.27% next year. The teachers vote on the agreement this week.

At the last board meeting where they announced the agreement, I gave a public comment. I expressed how crazy it is that two school districts (District 65 and ETHS) with exact same boundaries, relatively similar per pupil funding, and the same kids pays educators so differently. It’s hard to rattle off numbers on the podium and get them to stick.

Anyway, you can see the disparity by looking at the state’s reporting. Here’s the numbers from the Illinois School Report Card, showing that in 2023-24 there was a 21% pay gap between District 65 and ETHS.2

You may argue: ETHS has better retention and on average, more tenured staff, plus the staff get extra compensation for coaching, etc. Therefore, it makes sense that the average teacher at ETHS would make more money. Yet, we can look across all stats - including the entry level minimum salary, highest salary, and find a similar pattern.3

These are some seriously material differences! Evanston taxpayers pay a first year 8th grade science teacher $15,437 less than a similar 9th grade science teacher, for really no good reason at all. No wonder why ETHS has better teacher retention!

You can confirm these numbers in the collective bargaining agreements (D65, ETHS) or look at my compensation data I used here.

District 65 Teachers Falling Further Behind

I wrote about this a few weeks ago regarding the 5% annual tax levy that both District 65 and ETHS asked for this year. It works like this:

• The Federal Government issues an inflation indicator called the CPI. This year’s CPI is 3.4%.

• Taxing authorities (like ETHS or D65) ask for an annual increase in their tax levy, which is either the CPI or 5%. If they want more than that, they have to hold a referendum.

• Cook County bills property taxes assessed this year, next year. So if the CPI is 3.4% this year, then they get 3.4% more money next year. Mid-year they grant teachers raises based on this CPI.

Districts functionally decide how much of their CPI increase to share with teachers and how much to use on other things. This is negotiated in the collective bargaining agreements.

When inflation is high things get messy.

Consider last year SY2023-24: the inflation CPI was 7%, the State of Illinois capped it at 5%. ETHS functionally paid 70% of their CPI increase to teachers versus D65 which shares less, 53% of their CPI increase.

The numbers for SY2024-26 (2.3% and 2.27%) for District 65 are based on the tentative agreement between the DEC and District 65. The agreement has yet to be ratified by the teachers or signed by the Board. I’ve seen copies of this document but do not having anything I can share.

The math is a little bit more complicated than I’ve written and if you’re interested in the details, you can view this spreadsheet.

Administrator Compensation

Last year, the highest paid District 65 educator made $120,861.49 in salary and pension contributions. If the tentative agreement is signed, that educator now makes around $123,641.

There are currently 29 staffers in the District 65 Central Office that earn more in compensation than the most senior educator who likely has more than 30 years of experience. I think most taxpayers are fine with executive compensation (Superintendent, CFO, etc) being higher than educators, but there are a lot of people on this list for a District heading barreling towards insolvency.

You can view the full list here. You should also read the Evanston Roundtable on some of the staffing reductions suggested by the District 65 consultant.

I’ve written about the administrative staffing costs before, you can read at this link. Let me know what you think in the comments. I personally think the long-term solution is consolidation and I’ve written op-eds on the subject. A consolidation does not need to immediately resolve the compensation issue and is not handing over the keys of ETHS to District 65. But in the end, it can optimize administrative costs and provide unified K-12 support and special education services for the kids of Evanston.