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The Coffee County Board of Education approved compensation adjustments for several of its employee categories, including teachers, supervisors, assistant principals and bus drivers during its regular meeting March 13.

Board members voted 8-0 to approve an updated teacher salary schedule that Director of Schools Dr. Charles Lawson said will be better for both teachers and the district alike.

Lawson said following the meeting that under the old pay scale, a teacher in the first 25 years of their career would receive a “step increase” and any percentage raise the Board of Education approved for its employees. If for whatever reason the district was not able to budget for a percentage increase, employees would still receive their step increase.

“The problem with the old pay scale was the inconsistencies,” Lawson said. “If you had a bachelor’s degree there was one year that the step increase was as small as $288 but in another place in the pay scale it was as big as $908.”

“I could find no discernable mathematical pattern to explain what was happening,” he added.

Under the new teacher salary schedule approved by the Board of Education, Coffee County teachers with a bachelor’s degree would receive an annual step increase of $700 if they are within the first 25 years of their career.

“Obviously as time goes on that step is going to get bigger,” Lawson said. “If we give a 5% raise, then that step goes from $700 to $735 dollars the next year. Those things happen but at least it is a consistent step.”

The Board of Education voted to approve the new teacher salary schedule in a way that it could partially implemented over time, or all at once, depending on what available funding permits.

According to meeting notes from the Feb. 21 Compensation Committee meeting, it is expected the move to the new pay scale would cost $798,000.

Lawson said that while the new pay scale is beneficial to all district teachers, it is most beneficial to the most experienced teachers.

“When you compare our pay scale to let’s say Tullahoma, we are competitive at the front end at years one and two and that kind of thing, but we are not nearly as competitive at years 20 through 25,” he said. “So not only did it provide us some consistency, it also gave us some more competitiveness in our more experienced positions.”

Lawson said bringing that number up for the district’s most experienced teachers is important because retirement is based on the highest five consecutive years of pay.

“We have to keep the beginning salary as high as we can so we can attract employees coming out of college, but the higher it is at the back end of your pay scale, that helps our employees while they are working, but that also helps them throughout a 20 or 30 year retirement because it is based on their highest five,” Lawson said.

During the meeting, Board members also unanimously approved changes to compensation for district supervisors, assistant principals, nurses and classified employees.