Beverly school committee raises canceling vacation weeks, delaying graduation amid teacher strike
BEVERLY - As classes were canceled in Beverly for a sixth day due to the North Shore teacher strike, the school committee is now publicly weighing how students will make up the missed learning time.
Massachusetts law requires students to spend at least 180 days in class, and it's not clear yet when the strike will end.
"Unfortunately, our options are limited and may involve canceling some or all of February or April vacation weeks, delaying graduation or weekend school," school committee president Rachael Abell said in a statement. "We are telling you this in the interest of transparency."
After an 11-day teacher strike in Newton earlier this year, the district scrapped February vacation week to make up for the lost time in class.
Parents are hoping it doesn't reach that point in Beverly.
"It's really challenging. We're both working parents. I had to take the day off today, trying to help support the other working parents so we're just taking turns watching each other's kids and trying to make this work," Beverly mother Jessica Spear said.
Beverly teachers strike negotiations
The school committee and Beverly Teachers Association issued dueling statements Monday on the state of negotiations. The union wants better pay, paid family leave and more funding for paraprofessionals, while the school committee says "there is not enough money to accomplish everything that the BTA is demanding."
"We just learned that the union summarily rejected all of the proposals we sent to them yesterday afternoon," Abell said. "We need counter proposals from them to move forward and we will continue waiting for them to join us and negotiate."
The union, meanwhile, said more than 1,000 people turned out Monday for a march from the middle school to the high school in support of the teachers. They say the mayor and school committee have rejected their ideas for a compromise.
"Given the overwhelming support we've been receiving from the community, it's clear the politicians have a bigger strategy that has nothing to do with our schools," BTA co-president Andrea Sherman said in a statement. "They want to break us. . . We won't stop until we fix our schools."
"It's just really sad. It's made me lose a lot of faith in our school committee and our mayor," Spear said.