The Winthrop School Committee and the union representing the town’s teachers ratified their new three-year contracts, reached after nearly a year of negotiations.

The agreements are retroactive to last summer, providing annual raises of about 3 percent across four bargaining units covering teachers, specialized needs teaching assistants, secretaries and nurses.

The School Committee approved the four contracts unanimously on Monday. The members of the Winthrop Teachers Association voted overwhelmingly last week in favor, said Brian Donnelly, the union’s president.

Delayed payments

The average pay increases represent a gain from the 2 percent level of the previous three-year agreement. The nearly year-long delay in reaching the agreements means that the teachers and other union members will receive lump sum payments covering the first year of the increases.

The pay increases are on top of annual inflation adjustments, said Lisa Howard, superintendent of the Winthrop Public Schools.

In the contract talks, the town stuck to what it described as the limits of what it could afford, given that the schools represent more than $40 million of the town’s $68 million annual budget and that salaries are nearly three-quarters of the school share.

The union, though, achieved key aspects of what it described as its priorities, including relatively strong gains for two groups – those at the highest and lowest ends of the system’s pay scales.

Salary ranges

Among the 192 teachers in the union, the jumps in annual pay range from 2 percent for first-year teachers to 3.5 percent for the most experienced. And among the school system’s specialized needs teaching assistants, or ESPs, with annual salaries of about $21,000, the annual increases will range from 3 percent to 5 percent, plus a $500 bonus for those considered highly qualified.

The union division covering the system’s 11 secretaries will see annual increases of 3 percent to 4 percent. The nurses are largely paid as teachers if they have undergraduate degrees – a condition that is now mandatory, leaving only one nurse next year to be covered by the financial aspects of that unit’s contract, also at a 3 percent annual increase.

State data from before the agreement showed that Winthrop was well below the Massachusetts average on teacher salaries and per-student expenditures, and that the town places around the middle of the statewide averages or lower in student performance on the major state and college admissions tests.

The schools next need to reach a contract for the system’s 12 administrators, Ms Howard told the School Committee. The administrators had agreed previously to take a one-year contract to align themselves with the teachers on timing, and they probably will take about an hour to reach agreement on a new contract similar to that of the teachers, Ms Howard said.

Multiple benefits

The contract agreements with the Winthrop Teachers Association also included a series of other economic and non-economic gains across the four units. They included increased rights on family leave and support, new union member rights to participate in decisions in areas that include curriculum and school calendars, stricter timing rules for administrators to respond to worker concerns, and expanded rights of the union to communicate with its members, Ms Howard said.

One major element of those gains, the superintendent said, is parental leave. The teachers and other workers will now get their full salary for their first 10 days off after a child is born; an extension of the allowable use of sick time from eight weeks to 12; and the addition of five new sick days upon their return, she said.

The contract also expands the categories of affected people in the matter of bereavement absences, allows a 10 percent break on tuition for parent-workers who use the system’s preschool for their children, and clarified or added rules in areas that included payments for bilingual interpreting, and the establishment and use of bilingual job postings and new-hire orientation processes.

The Winthrop public school system held graduation ceremonies last Friday for 149 students.