The treatment of our teachers is ‘an embarrassment’
When my husband and I were deciding where to buy a house nearly a decade ago, it was the obvious choice to pick the city where we’d spent the majority of our 20s and had already begun to raise our first child. Northampton’s progressive values and vibrant community were exactly what we wanted for our family. But the treatment of our public school teachers, nurses, and staff by our mayor and School Committee is an embarrassment for our community.
All three of our children are students in Northampton public schools. They know they are valued by their teachers and nurses and adjustment counselors and librarians and clerical and custodial staff and every adult working so hard in their schools to provide a safe and warm educational environment. But they cannot say the same for our city leadership.
It’s impossible to value public education — and by extension, our children — if you do not provide fair, living wages to our school staff. If teachers living in Northampton cannot afford to work here, if teachers and staff working in our schools cannot afford to live here, we are doing something very wrong. Northampton public school staff are underpaid, especially by comparison to what public school staff are earning in surrounding cities. This has gone on long enough. We cannot expect our public school staff to put 150 percent into their jobs when the School Committee and our mayor won’t fairly compensate them for half of that work.
My family supports the Northampton public school staff and their union. We support their decision to work to rule. We will support candidates for School Committee, City Council and mayor who know that being “progressive” demands that they act like it. The Northampton School Committee must make a serious and fair wage proposal to the Northampton Area School Employees now. Enough is enough.
Nykole Roche
Northampton