SAUGUS — The School Committee appears poised to hike pay for substitute teachers from $90 to $110 per day, after the idea gained support at a Finance Sub Committee meeting Monday evening.
Talk of raising substitute pay in Saugus dates back several months, as the town is an outlier compared to its neighbors. Former Deputy Superintendent Margo Ferrick told the sub committee in February that Wakefield and Reading pay $100 a day, Melrose pays $110 a day, Peabody pays $125 a day, and Lynnfield pays $175 a day. Nearby North Reading also pays substitutes $90 a day but is raising its rate to $100.
The raise to $110 is good for an extra $3.33 per hour, and would bring substitute teacher pay above minimum wage. With the minimum wage rising statewide, Saugus would not have to continue to raise pay commensurate with the minimum-wage increases if the $20 daily raise is approved.
Acting Superintendent Mike Hashem and Executive Director of Finance and Administration Pola Andrews said the district tends to “lose people” around 45 days into a substituting job, when they essentially become full-fledged teachers for particular classes.
“Once I have to start doing lesson planning and grading and going beyond just trying to fix it for the moment, that’s when it’s now, I’m actually not the teacher of record but getting towards that, that’s when they would want more money,” Hashem said. “That’s when you start to get somebody where they need more skills, they have to have more dedication, and $90 a day is not going to suffice.”
Partially as a result of Hashem’s remarks, the sub committee also considered the implementation of an additional rate — $125 a day — for currently or formerly licensed teachers.
Hashem, himself a veteran teacher, explained that those with certifications would have likely picked up “tricks of the trade” that a less-experienced substitute would not have learned, and thus could handle a more challenging assignment, like covering a class on a long-term basis.
“If it was an elementary-school teacher, a former elementary-school teacher subbing at the elementary-school level, you could definitely make a case they would have better knowledge and ability to do whatever needed to be done for that day,” he said. “At a secondary level, to say you’d have a licensed teacher, they’d know the ropes.”
School Committee Chair Vincent Serino emphasized that the increase would be to compensate for that general expertise, and not necessarily expertise in a particular field.
Andrews did not note any significant financial impacts of a pay increase for substitute teachers.
At least one of the pay increases will likely be implemented when the full School Committee meets this Thursday. No motion was made in the Finance Sub Committee meeting, but it appears likely that the hike for all substitutes will clear the full committee, with three members in attendance Monday. Hashem suggested the sub committee not take action on the other rate pending a discussion of the full board on Thursday.
