"Gates-Kane went on to say that all of the district employees are dedicated to their demanding jobs and are effective at all of them."

Teacher are great and are an asset, but to characterize them as ALL district employees are outstanding is disingenuous. There are great teachers, good teachers and some downright lousy ones. To not recognize that fact is to put all teachers in a bad light and gives their union little credibility.

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The translation of a fair contract is simply MORE MONEY. Their existing contract which is generous has to be viewed in light of our economy, the decrease in real family income, the highest tax rates in the nation, increasing costs for every commodity purchased, and the 2% cap. The teachers salaries make up the overwhelming majority of the budget. Granting them increases like they have had in the past would require elimination of programs, layoffs of younger teachers with little seniority, pay to play for sports and after school activities, and a whole bunch of other things. While I support teachers as a rule, to grant anything other than a 0% increase in the first year and maybe, at most, a 1% in the last two is irresponsible.

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How many of you have had raises in the past few years? Not many I would guess. The teachers are complaining that they now have to help pay the cost of some of the best medical insurance out there. How much do you pay into your employer provided insurance? How many of you get insurance for life for you and your entire family? The argument that they took lower pay in exchange for pension benefits and lifetime insurance is not valid. Look at the average salary of a
teacher in FRHSD. It is somewhere near $70-80,000 plus the at least $16-18,000 for family insurance coverage. It's time to be fiscally conservative and responsible.
IMr. Moses in a retired teacher and a member of the NJEA. I'm not saying that he would be biased but he shouldn't have a say as to the contract.

The only time you ever see this many teachers at a board meeting is when they have a new negotiation. Otherwise they are noticeably absent except when part of a presentation or award ceremony.
Their last contract was overly generous and when the economy tanked they were still getting theirs while many of us suffered and continue to suffer.
And where was the union when their leader and others took part in the Breyer State incident? Nothing stated there because teachers were also involved. One of them is suing the district for taking away her ill-gotten gains.
The teachers showing here only tell us what it's all about and it's certainly NOT for the children!

There is not a company out there that pays for family insurance for life. We pay an average of 500 a month for employer provided insurance.

this is the only way to get 1000 teachers together to care about education, what a farce, pay cut or leave!

these wacko's get family coverage for LIFE r u kidding me?????

they do

To all the previous responses...If teaching was so great, then why didn't you go into the field? After all, it seems that it's so lucrative everybody should try it.

15 year old babysitters get paid more per hour per child. Interesting society where we are disgusted with paying our teachers a good wage.

I did work in the private sector, most likely robbing you blind. After fifteen years of bonuses that are larger than my salary now, I decided to "give a little something back." It's not a typical public union response. It's the truth. And for your information, the private sector, while at times difficult, was nothing compared to the stress, demands and public hatred compared to my current job. If you let your ignorance and/or arrogance go for a second, maybe you'd know all this already.

Joe, what do you do for a living? Let's discuss why you're so valuable to public interests. Please include your benefit package and the last three year's salary. I'm willing to bet it's not a 0% increase.

BTW, my wife is a teacher.

Kevin, stop, STOP, please stop comparing the private sector and the public sector! Teaching is a demanding job, one of the most difficult that I have ever done, yes Kevin, been there done it. At the same time you only work 182 days a year for goodness sake stop whining! The benefits are unsustainable, period, end of story.

and there is no point even arguing with teachers anymore, the party is over, long live vouchers, your union finally put you on notice, the fat lady has sung.

rationalis, stop blowing smoke up your own ass, no one buys that, your the wealthiest state n the nation, more money BUYS better results....

yes a public school teacher, try harder on the assumption test next time

we don't care what you teachers want anymore, you simply don't get it! We want vouchers, you screwed us long enough now go see what competition is all about!

These comments are very disturbing on a number of levels...First, our country is falling further and further behind most other countries in all phases of educational acheievment levels. There have been many articles about employers unable to hire US citizens for high tech jobs because they just don't have the level of expertise that citizens of other countries have. After reading many of the comments here which denigrate the jobs teachers do, is it any wonder we are in the mess we have here. Those other countries respect the work of their teachers and pay them well. It's called an investment in the future. That future is represented by the children in our schools. All I read here is disrespect and we will end up getting what we pay for. During the Breyer St debacle, it was pathetic to see how few parents actually showed up at the meetings and even worse, how few in the community actually knew what was going on or even cared.

How can you, with a straight face, hire a teacher, right out of college with no experience and no background in subject matter and expect to achieve anything other then failure? Even the children recognize weak prey.

That's a good point also....Most of those other countries that are ahead of us have much higher standards for their teachers to begin with. Their curriculum is more structured and have less attention to athletics than we do....Again, the only time the school board meetings attracts a large attendence from parents is when football or cheerleading programs appear threatened.

there is absolutely no place in public education for football except for jocks and cheerleaders that never got it out of there system and yearn for their glory days.....

Higher teacher pay does not equal better performance.

If you believe what the unions are telling you, by defintion, the teachers will not do as good a job if they don't get what they want as opposed to if they get what they want.

The teacher who said that fire, police etc get lifetime medical is wrong. In Marlboro, there are no salaried or union positions that get post retirement health benefits. The fire and ambulance depts. are volunteer. The only ones who get paid are the Board of Fire Commissioners, why I don't know, but they do not get health benefits other than medical costs if injured in the line of duty.

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The whole push by teachers unions right now is to make up for them now having to help pay for their lifetime medical. Let's say a Marlboro teacher makes $80-85,000 for their 10 month job (most of them do). They now have to pay 1.5% of their salary for medical. That equals $1200-1275. It is tax deductible. I pay over $4800 and make about the same. The "we work hard" excuse is just that. Tell that to the guy who works in an unheated or cooled warehouse, industrial or construction job. Tell that to the retailer who stands for 8 hours a day and doesn't get "preparation". How about the salesman who is in and out of his car all day visiting his clients or the doctor who sees patients all day and knows that a whole bunch will never get better. You do not have the corner on hard work or even the moral high ground. You gave that up when you started using the "For the Children" nonsense.

@ Milton McC...you misundersand the new rules w/ regards to benefits. Teachers now have to pay an additional 1.5 % of their salary towards their pensions (it was 5.5% and is now 7%). In addition, the benefits package is a sliding scale beginning last year at around 8% of the total package and moving up to in the vicinity of 35% in three years. It's not an additional 1200 dollars or so, it's actually closer to 12000-14000. So by your very calculations, (since you make about the same) your burden is about 66% less moving forward.

@ Joe--I'm not even a teacher. I was simply pointing how factually inaccurate the previous response was. However, I will say that many teachers who I know were drawn to the profession instead of many other white collar professions, b/c of good benefits and job security. Now both are threatened. I can't pretend to really take a side b/c I can see both viewpoints, but it's very ignorant to villify them over factual innacuracies.