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       Teacher pay scales and the need to address the gap between Buchanan County and other areas of the state were discussed last Monday during a meeting of the Buchanan County School Board.
       Buchanan Education Association President Edgar Childress asked board members to consider career earnings for teachers with 30 years experience and to address that in developing a salary proposal for the 2006-2007 academic year.
        Additionally, he spoke to the board about the drug testing policy now under development, asking that the board remember, as he and others had been told by their high school Principal B.T. Quillen at graduation "not to burn down the house just to get rid of the rats."
       He reminded board members that under the policy manual now in place, every employee can be tested based on probable cause, although apparently, that section of the policy manual, he said, has not been used.
        He asked the board to issue a statement regarding the reason for the policy under development, due to some misconceptions he said which exist as to the reasoning. The board took no action.
       He also asked them to consider what would happen if a teacher woke up with a head cold, took an over the counter medication and then learned it was his or her day to be tested.
        "You don’t want to ruin the reputations of hard working innocent teachers," Childress said. "It’s just a comment and a thought."
        Childress also told board members that educators had expressed concern about the board’s action last month to reinstate a student suspended on an alleged gun policy violation.
        He said feedback the BEA had received on the action indicated concern that the board was not supporting staff on the front lines.
       In other action, Childress handed out a Virginia Education Association research sheet showing Buchanan County ranks 129 out of 132 school divisions with a career earnings rate for 30-year teachers of $1.14 million. Dickenson ranks at the bottom at 132 with $1.09 million; Russell, at 128 at $1.15 million’ and Tazewell, at 114 at $1.20 million. Arlington, in Northern Virginia, ranks at the top of the scale at $2.12 million.
      Childress also handed out information on benchmark year salaries for Buchanan, Dickenson, Russell and Tazewell counties for both bachelor’s degreed and master’s degreed teachers.