Board authorizes staff to draft voluntary alternative pay schedule, with guardrails

At the end of the work session trustees authorized staff to draft a voluntary alternative pay-scale proposal that would exist alongside the district’s current salary schedule, with the board requesting a fiscal impact analysis, legal review and explicit guardrails.

Board President (Speaker 1) framed the matter as a tasker, not an action: staff will explore a modernized salary and professional-development structure “that rewards leadership and responsibility” and returns to the board with a concrete proposal and budget implications. The proposal language approved for study included a clear hold-harmless requirement so current employees would not be financially disadvantaged and an explicit restriction that the proposal not become a pay-for-performance model based on test scores.

Staff said they could return a draft proposal within a few weeks and that, if adopted, the option would be an addition to — not a replacement of — the current salary schedule. Board members asked how the change would interact with existing stipends (department heads, model-classroom teachers) and whether baseline criteria of effectiveness should be added; staff recommended sequencing the work with the district’s evaluation redesign rather than embedding evaluation thresholds in this initial tasker.

The board gave staff marching orders to draft the proposal, analyze fiscal and legal considerations and present a complete plan through the normal nonaction-to-action meeting cycle for subsequent public review and vote.