Pueblo City Students Deserve Quality Schools

We have great public schools in Pueblo, but we are not giving schools the resources they need for every child to succeed. Pueblo students deserve quality schools and our primary goal is to ensure that there is a qualified teacher and paraprofessional in front of every student in Pueblo City Schools.

To be sure that we can attract and retain high quality educators to Pueblo, our district leadership must make decisions that will allow educators to support their families and contribute to our communities. We should respect educators as the professionals they are – professionals we trust with our children’s futures.

Currently, the turnover rate for teachers in Pueblo City Schools is 20% and we are struggling to fill open teaching positions. We are losing quality educators to other districts at an alarming rate and are having a hard time attracting new, qualified teachers.

It Since 2006 teacher salaries in Pueblo District 60 have increased by 12.08% but the Consumer Price Index (Cost of Living Adjustment or inflation) in Colorado has increased by 28.81%. To add insult to injury since 2012 employee health insurance costs have increased by 70.4%.

Our students deserve a stable teaching force and therefore we must ensure that Pueblo City Schools is a great place for teaching and learning.

Most Pueblo educators have lived in Pueblo our entire lives. We love living and working here, and we want to stay here. We are committed to making our school district better.

Educators have not made the decision to strike lightly. However, we are fed up with district leadership that consistently disrespects educators and our community. As educators, we know better than anyone what our students need and how the decisions made by leadership have negatively impacted our students.

We call on our school board to reverse their decision to reject the neutral 3rd party’s recommendation and immediately:

1.       Provide a 2% cost of living increase to all teachers retroactive to September 1, 2017

2.       Provide a 2.5% cost of living increase to all paraprofessionals retroactive to September 1, 2017

3.       Provide step increase to paraprofessionals as outlined in their collective bargaining agreement.

4.       Provide the monthly $30 per person health insurance increase from January 1, 2018 to June 30, 2018.

5.       Respect educator and community voice in decision making that impacts our classrooms and students.

The fate of our community lies in the hands of three school board members who have the ability and the obligation to do the right thing. Pueblo City Schools District 60 School Board President Barb Clementi, School Board Member Bobby Gonzales, and School Board Member Frank Latino need to prioritize our classrooms. The school board’s duty is to ensure students, teachers and other educators have the resources they need, not to spend those resources away from the classroom.

Please support us by emailing the Pueblo City district leadership.

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