photo by: Josie Heimsoth/Journal-World

Lawrence Education Association members and negotiations staff present to school board members on Tuesday, May 26, 2026.

Lawrence school board members approved new labor agreements Tuesday that significantly raise the pay for teachers and support staff while adding millions in compensation and benefit costs for the district.

The agreement for education support professionals, or ESPs, included a significant increase to hourly wages. The starting hourly wage for ESP employees – including paraprofessionals, custodians and office staff – will rise from $15.46 to $20 per hour, along with additional raises across multiple classifications and position reclassifications into higher pay levels.

These changes increased the salary pool for ESPs by 11.87% for 2026-2027, totaling about $2.48 million, with the district’s total cost estimated approximately $2.68 million including employer costs like retirement contributions, payroll taxes and insurance costs.

As the Journal-World reported, this increase comes after the Lawrence Education Association has been advocating for a living wage for ESPs for years. Last September, over 140 people stood outside the Lawrence school district offices prior to a school board meeting urging higher pay.

“This was hundreds of hours of work for many, many months,” Superintendent Jeanice Swift said. ” … We achieved a milestone tonight, (but) it is only one step of this hard work.”

In addition, for certified staff, the 2026-2027 agreement with the LEA raised the base salary for teachers and other certified employees by $6,217, bringing the starting salary to $51,000. The agreement guarantees at least a $3,000 raise for all full-time certified staff, depending on years of experience and credentials.

The certified salary pool will increase by 8.32%, totaling about $4.62 million, with the district’s total cost estimated at roughly $5 million after employer expenses.

“While LEA celebrates the wins of this contract, the team also recognizes there is still work that needs to be accomplished to continue improving educator’s working conditions,” Josh Spradlin, co-leading negotiator for certified negotiations, said. “While we’ve made big gains with making our starting salary, we also recognize that there are still salary cells that are not competitive throughout the matrix.”

Spradlin said he hopes there will be more discussions at next year’s meetings.

Both agreements include stronger safety language allowing proactive intervention during unsafe situations, reimbursement for damaged personal medical devices and expanded leave protections for employees injured by students or patrons. The contract adds Indigenous Peoples’ Day as a paid holiday and establishes eligibility rules for summer holiday pay for qualifying employees.

The agreements will implement health insurance changes as the district prepares to move from a fully insured medical plan to a self-funded model with stop-loss coverage because of a projected 32% premium increase, as the Journal-World reported.

District officials said employees would continue using the same Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas provider network and similar coverage structure. A new employer-paid Core PPO plan will be available for full-time employees, while optional upgraded plans can be purchased by employees.

Board member Matt Lancaster said when the conversations initially started for certified employees, staff really wanted to hit $50,000 as the starting salary.

“The fact that we were able to do more than that was really something special,” Lancaster said. “And that took a lot of pain and sacrifice from the side of the district, and a lot of advocacy and conversation on the side of employees.”

Board member Shannon Kimball said this work happened because district staff, board members and negotiations staff all aligned in their priorities for staff compensation.

“From being in this spot for as long as I have, this is a milestone to celebrate,” Kimball said. ” … It’s the kind of transformational change in the way that we do business that we are just beginning to really achieve and see. It’s been years in the making to being able to do this tonight.”

The board members also approved a 2.91% increase to the administrative salary pool on Tuesday. When additional employer expenses are included, the total estimated cost to the district for administrative compensation rises by about $219,000.

IN OTHER BUSINESS, BOARD MEMBERS:

• Discussed the proposed school meal price increases for the 2026-2027 school year. The changes include a $0.15 increase to paid student lunch prices and a $0.10 increase in paid student breakfast prices.

For elementary school students, lunches are proposed to cost $3.25. Middle school lunches would be priced at $3.45, and high school lunch meals would cost $3.50. Elementary school breakfasts would be priced at $2.20, and middle school breakfasts would cost $2.30. High school breakfast meals would total $2.35.

The reduced-price meals would remain at $0.30 for breakfast and $0.40 for lunch for all students. In addition, the students who qualify for free meals would continue to receive meals at no cost.

There will also be a 10-cent increase to adult meal costs. Adult meal prices for the 2026-2027 school year will be $5.25 for lunch and $3.20 for breakfast.

District staff said the reasoning for the proposed increases was due to a gap between paid meal revenue and the cost of providing meals. Since 2023, production costs – including labor, food, milk, supplies, equipment, and repairs – have outpaced the paid student meal price increases.

Board members will be voting on the meal price increases at the next board meeting on June 6.

• Purchased 35 Dell laptops for classroom labs and supporting infrastructure from Dell Technologies, in an amount not to exceed $100,000. The district’s computer labs are in need of updated devices as the existing equipment is reaching end-of-life and does not meet the requirements for instructional and operational needs, the agenda said.

• Purchased four vending machines from Venducation at a cost of $18,275 per machine, totaling $73,100. The vending machines will go to the new Choice Campus at Centennial.

With the limited staffing resources and unique class schedules affiliated with the program, it’s unfeasible to serve school meals in a traditional manner, the agenda said. District staff wanted to purchase the machines which will be stocked with breakfasts and lunches as well as other snack items and beverages. The machines are linked to students’ meal accounts, meaning a student that qualifies for free meals can use their account to get a free breakfast and lunch each day.

• Accepted a bid from Amazon totaling $62,550 for elementary school supplies, such as binders, folders, highlighters, glue sticks, facial tissues and antibacterial wipes.

• Approved the four-year purchase of AssessPrep for the 2026-2027 through 2029-2030 school years, to be paid annually in the amount of $61,754. AssessPrep supports common formative and interim assessments, rubric-based performance tasks, online and paper-based testing, and real-time reporting tools that help teachers and administrators monitor student progress toward grade-level standards.

• Purchased HighScope PreK Curriculum – a research-based early childhood curriculum approved by the Kansas State Department of Education – in the amount of $40,424. The curriculum supports students’ cognitive, language, literacy, social-emotional, and physical development through exploration, intentional play, and adult-child interactions.

• Approved Gordan CPA firm to perform a financial audit for the 2025-2026 school year ending June 30. An independent audit of school district finances is required every year under state statute and in compliance with the single audit requirement for federal funds.

Gordon CPA firm has conducted the audit for the last three years, and this year’s fee is $26,885 for the audit plus $2,800 for each major program audited as part of the single audit. The district often has two major programs in the single audit, so the estimated total for this service is $32,485.