School district, teachers union, reach tentative accord
The School District of Lee County and the Teachers Union of Lee County have reached a tentative contract.
The agreement includes salary increases, unprecedented parental leave, changes to the bereavement leave, terminal pay language and 45 additional work minutes per week and a 30-minute lunch, officials said.
TALC President Kevin Daly said the increases were based on performance pay of $300 for highly effective and $225 for effective grandfathered, an increased base salary for nine more minutes of work per day – an approximate 2% increase and compression adjustment based on years of credible teaching experience.
The increase starts at three to five years at 3%, six to 14 years at 5%, 15 to 20 years at 4.5% and 21 or more years at 3%.
A base salary was also established at $54,500 and the base salary for special instructional at $62,500.
Daly said other benefits added to the contract include a 45-minute cap on mandatory meetings called by administration, and coverage language for special instructional teachers – one day pay for every five days covered. He said there are also up to four weeks paid by the employer retroactive to July 1 for parental leave and up to three days per incident retroactive to July 1 for bereavement leave.
“You would have to take a leave, or use other days. It’s an added benefit,” Board member Debbie Jordan said of the bereavement and parental leave – new to the contract this year.
Teachers also will receive nine additional minutes per day for planning time.
“We are pleased that we reached an agreement,” Daly said. “As with any negotiations, there are areas where we would have liked to see more or get other things done. We will be going back to the table in February of 2026 for the ’26-’27 school year and will again be advocating for the employees of the School District of Lee County.”
Daly said he is pleased with the attention paid to the negotiations from the media, the TALC members, and the public.
“I think the fact that the negotiations are in the ‘sunshine’ is a great thing. People should be attending the negotiations to hear what we are talking about as we say it,” he said. “I also think that the entire community has an interest in the process because the School District of Lee County touches everyone in some way. It doesn’t matter if you’re an employee of the school district, a parent of a student in the SDLC, or a community member, you will most likely have an interaction with a graduate of the SDLC and its imperative that we continue to keep up with our neighboring districts, the state, and the nation to ensure we are able to retain and recruit the best employees to work here. Great public schools produce great communities.”
The new salary and benefits, pending approval, will be retroactive to July 1, 2025.
“We do need to make sure we are taking care of the teachers. All of our staff. We need to make sure we support all of them,” Jordan said.
Daly said they are working on finalizing the language in the new Collective Bargaining Agreement with the district based on agreed upon changes. They will produce employee-specific compensation letters before ratification.
“That document should be available to the employees and public on Oct. 3, 2025. We will have the document up for review and will be making informational items for our membership in the week after that,” Daly said. “The district will be producing employee specific compensation letters before ratification. We are planning on ratifying on Oct. 29-Oct. 30.”
The contract will go before the school board in November.
“I am very happy that it is almost completed and we will be able to put money into their hands hopefully before the Christmas holiday,” Jordan said.
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