Apples to Apples

Apples to Apples

Over the last two years, the RCEA has made a concerted effort to provide accurate salary data for Roanoke County and surrounding school divisions for our members so that they can draw fair and unbiased comparisons.

Over the same period, RCPS has produced an annual benefits statement which packages all of the benefits offered to our teachers by the county. According to the 2007-2008 statement, RCPS teachers received the following benefits: Salary, FICA Matching (7.65%), VRS Contribution (100%), 457 Investment Plan match up to $120 per year, Basic Term Life and AD&D Insurance Premium (100%), $9,790 or 78.5% of the Employee Health Care Premium (Dental Included?), Sick Leave, Personal Leave, and Partial-Pay personal Leave.

Our school board has made a point to support and promote their benefit package for employees. In the past two years, they have added the 457 match program where they will match up to $120 annually that an employee contributes to a Nationwide 457 investment account. Hopefully over time, this incentive to save will spur employees to take advantage of tax-deferred investment accounts. Currently, only about 18% of school employees take advantage of either 457 or 403B investment plans. Private sector investment account participation rates by employees are much higher.*

The VEA just released a report that compares the “Employer’s Cost of Salary Plus Certain Fringe Benefits for 2006-2007” between all school divisions across the state. Unfortunately due to the complexity of the data, this detailed information is not yet available for the 2007-2008 school year. As far as we can tell, the VEA study is a snapshot of teacher salary at step 10 on the local scale with the addition of family health insurance premiums, income protection, family dental, and the employee share of retirement. Leave and life insurance are not factored into the report.

Locally, the report shows that at step 10, Salem is the king of salary plus benefits by a wide margin. RCPS is a close third in the region just behind Botetourt and just ahead of Craig.

2006-2007 Salary Plus Benefits
	Step 10	Step 10	Step 10 Salary	Step 10 Salary
Locality	Salary	Salary Rank	Plus Benefits	Plus Benefits Rank
Bedford	36,676	95	44,138	92
Botetourt	41,519	32	47,938	51
Craig	38,279	71	46,992	63
Floyd	34,900	118	40,209	127
Franklin	36,100	102	41,505	119
Montgomery	36,844	91	44,105	93
Roanoke City	37,345	81	45,002	79
Roanoke County	38,450	69	47,790	56
Salem	40,640	39	49,552	37

We would very much enjoy seeing a comparison of all benefits offered to teachers across all steps on the salary scale in local school divisions. We would especially be interested in learning what type of retirement packages neighboring localities offer employees.

* “By contrast, the participation rate is 56 percent for workers between $20,000 and $40,000, and 70 percent for workers between $40,000 and $80,000.” 2004 http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba/ba495/