The superintendent of Fairfax County Public Schools hoped to give 6% raises across the board but says that likely will be scaled back to 3% after the county didn’t provide the funding she requested.
FCPS Superintendent Dr. Michelle Reid asked the county for the largest funding increase in history, according to Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairman Jeff McKay. She wanted an increase of more than $250 million to fund essential programs and provide the 6% pay raises.
The county gave the school district an extra $165 million, Reid told the school board.
“A focus of our budget proposal had been to catapult beginning teacher salaries and, again, the beginning masters teacher salaries to No. 1 in our region, however, as a result of the significantly lower than requested funding levels, our improvement in beginning salaries will be a bit more measured," Reid said.
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Local teacher unions say the county should have allocated the superintendent's request.
"If you really want to show that you're valuing your educators, valuing the people who work in the school system, then you need to fully fund us," Fairfax Education Association President Leslie Houston said.
The school district's budget isn't finalized, and McKay said in a statement to News4 that “it's up to the elected School Board now to prioritize its expenditures for the next year."
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School Board member Mateo Dunne seemed to agree, suggesting raises should be prioritized.
"I'm just trying to understand the 3% across the board,” he said. “It doesn't solve the problem."
The U.S. Department of Education estimates Virginia lost 0.7% of its public education staff this year after losing 3.5% in 2023.
"We have folks that are getting burned out of the profession,” Fairfax County Federation of Teachers President David Walrod said. “We have folks that are saying, 'I can't keep doing this.'"
The school board continues work on the budget this week.
The Fairfax County teacher union reps believe they're close to finalizing collective bargaining and believe that's the key to locking up better pay for school staff.
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