Board approves wage increases for starting teachers, co-curricular pay calculator and adds 1 FTE special education teacher

The Wisconsin Rapids School District board on April 14 approved Personnel Services Committee recommendations to raise the professional staff base wage for newly hired teachers, update co-curricular wage calculations, and add one full-time special education teacher position at Grove Elementary for the 2025–26 school year.

Bridal Oswald, introduced to the committee as Director of Human Resources, told the committee the adjustments were intended to keep district salaries competitive with local districts. The board approved raising the starting teacher base salary for teachers with no experience to $47,000 and setting the starting salary for teachers with a master's degree at $52,000, effective for the 2025–26 school year. The board also approved a new co-curricular base wage calculator using a $47,000 baseline to compute athletic and non-athletic co-curricular pay percentage rates.

Personnel action items PS1–PS9 were presented as a package covering listed support and professional staff appointments, resignations, retirements and other personnel actions. Among those items, the board approved the addition of a 1.0 FTE special education teacher at Grove Elementary to address increased caseloads due to transfers during the 2024–25 school year. The presenter said the surge in special education students had stretched existing staff's caseloads and driven the request for the additional position.

The committee and board approved the package motion; the motion carried with no recorded amendments. The personnel committee said administration will bring proposed hourly wage-scale adjustments to the board for approval in May 2025.

The board also noted that two new hires are Lincoln High School graduates and that administrators will continue work to finalize appointment and resignation records recorded in committee materials.