Teachers to get promised bonuses

RALEIGH -- RALEIGH — Hundreds of teachers who were promised $1,000 bonuses to work in Wake County will still get their money even though the school district has discontinued the program.

The Wake school board had killed the $427,000 bonus program on July 15 to help fill a budget shortfall. But at the request of school administrators, the board agreed today to provide $300,000 to pay the bonuses to teachers who had signed contracts before the program was discontinued.

“It’s a matter of integrity and doing what we say we’re going to do,” said school board member Beverley Clark.

For several years, Wake has offered a one-time bonus of $1,000 to teachers who accepted positions in the hard-to-fill areas of special education, mathematics, science, English As A Second Language and foreign languages.

The hiring bonus is different from the bonus provided annually to teachers at schools that meet expectation on state exams.

But when county commissioners provided the school board with $36.2 million less than requested, the bonuses were among the programs that were discontinued.

The problem is that the bonus was heavily promoted by the school district at teacher job fairs. Administrators say numerous applicants accepted employment opportunities with the expectation of receiving the $1,000 bonus.

Maurice Boswell, the school district’s assistant superintendent for human resources, said bonuses had already been promised to 246 new teachers. He said asking for $300,000 will give them some flexibility to hire other teachers.

David Neter, the school district’s chief business officer, said the bonuses would be paid from the district’s rainy-day fund.

Even with today’s vote, the bonus program still would be over. It could put Wake at a competitive disadvantage with nearby school districts that offer signing bonuses for hard-to-fill positions.

For instance, the Johnston County school systems offers one-time signing bonuses of up to $2,500 for special education teachers.

“Ending the program hopefully won’t have a detrimental effect,” Neter said.