Salary Advancement Rules for Steps & Columns

Appendix A, Sections 2.00 and 4.00 in the union contract lay out how SDEA members advance to higher steps and columns on the salary schedules. These sections apply to teachers, counselors, nurses, and librarians. There are corollary sections in Appendices B, C, F, and G that apply to ECE, Military Science, SLP, and School Psychologist SDEA members. 

For most SDEA members, higher pay is tied to additional education and years of service. Columns on the salary schedule correspond to education levels attained, and steps correspond to years of service. The more education you attain, and the more time spent as an educator in SDUSD, means you get higher pay. 

Column Advancement

Generally speaking, any course work you take that is reasonably related to your assignment will be credited for column advancement purposes. The contract (in Appendix A, Section 2.021) states that any course that is “within the major or minor; reasonably related to the unit member’s District assignment; related to a potential future certificated assignment and posted as semester, quarter, or trimester units on an official transcript in the institution’s regular upper division or graduate course number series; or the nature of the course can be expected to provide a substantial increase in the unit member’s skill, knowledge or understanding of the District assignment” will grant you column advancement credit. The key is that the course work must be “reasonably related to [your] distinct assignment” or “potential future assignment,” or that it provides “ a substantial increase in the unit member’s skill, knowledge or understanding of the District assignment.” This has been interpreted to mean that the course work must be related to either a credential you hold, whether you are using it currently or not, or that the course work helps you with the methods and strategies you use in the classroom or in your daily work. 

This includes upper division or graduate courses; SDUSD-sponsored Professional Development; lower division, extension, continuing education, and travel courses; continuing education and professional development units (limited to these job classes: Audiologist, Counselor, Library Media Teacher, School Nurse, School Psychologist, and Speech-Language Pathologist); advanced degrees (such as a Masters or Ph.D.) in education or related to the credential area you hold; SDEA-sponsored Professional Development; becoming National Board Certified; getting professional degrees outside of education or the credential area you hold (note: not all degrees or certifications will be fully credited in these areas, and in some cases, only certain courses will count towards column advancement credit); and some types of summer work experience outside of summer school or teaching. In some cases, repeating a course you already took may grant you credit as well.  

The rules vary for each category, so check with HR prior to taking a course to ensure you will get credit, and read over these sections of the contract to become familiar with the rules for column advancement. In some cases, the joint SDEA/SDUSD Salary Evaluating Committee may have to get involved in approving the coursework beforehand (Appendix A, Section 5.00). 

Step Advancement

The rules for moving down the steps of the salary schedule are much simpler. Appendix A, Section 4.00 states that as long as you are in “paid status” for 75% of a school year (75% of one year is 138 of 184 workdays), you advance to the next step each year you work until you reach the top step (step 17; equivalent to 17 years of service). “Paid status” includes time spent on paid leave such as sick leave, both full and half pay, and on personal necessity leave, which is just converted sick leave. Certain types of other leaves, such as military leave, sabbaticals, exchange leaves, professional study leave, or leave to go work as an approved consultant for another governmental agency, will also grant salary advancement credit. Unpaid leaves do not count towards step advancement credit. And finally, any time a part-time employee works at least 138 days over two school years, they can combine those two years of service for credit to advance one step on the salary schedule. For employees on 186 or 191 base calendar years (Nurses and School Psychs), the 75% threshold will be a higher number of days (139.5 and 143.25 respectively). Some ECE teachers also work up to 248 days, so you will have to run a simple calculation to find out what 75% of your work year is. Again, check the contract for specifics.  

As a final note, some probationary employees will recall that there is a similar “75%” rule under state law. The law states that if you are physically present for 75% of the total number of work days in each work year while you are on probation, you advance to the next year of probation, and then on to permanent status. This statutory rule about advancing from one employment status to another is different from the contractual rule about salary step advancement. The statutory rule is about passing probation and changing your employment status from probationary to permanent, while the contractual rule is about getting paid more as you gain more teaching experience. The key takeaway is that the statutory rule does not count any time you spend on leave as credit towards time served at work, while the contractual rule gives you credit for salary advancement purposes while you are on some types of leave. The two rules operate under different enabling documents (Education Code versus the SDEA/SDUSD contract), and should not be conflated.  

SOURCE: SDEA Contract, Appendices A, B, C, F & G