JAY – School Committee members and the Jay Education Association have settled a contract dispute over education technicians’ wages and health insurance contributions.

The agreement gives education technicians a 3 percent increase during each of the 2007-08 and 2008-09 school years and requires them to pay more for health insurance.

Representatives of both parties say the three-year contract, with one year already of it already gone, is fair.

They have been locked in contract negotiations since 2006 with education technicians working under an agreement that expired June 30, 2006.

The wage increase will be retroactive four months to the beginning of this school year and be paid in a lump sum, School Committee Chairwoman Mary Redmond-Luce said Sunday, while education technicians will need to pay the additional insurance carried over the remaining pay periods for the 2006-2007 school year, Redmond-Luce said.

Under the pact, education technicians will pay 11 percent of their annual health insurance costs in 2007-08 and 12 percent in 2008-09, she said.

The contract expires on June 30, 2009.

The amount of health insurance contribution puts the education technician bargaining unit in the same ball park as other personnel contracts, Redmond-Luce said.

“I think it’s a fair contract and I’m glad its settled,” Redmond-Luce said. “I think it moves everyone of our employees into a similar contract.”

“The negotiation team put a lot of time and effort into settling this contract dispute,” ed tech negotiation team Co-Chairwoman Debby Lemire said Sunday. “It was a very long process and we were pleased to be able to finally offer our membership a reasonable contract. I am very satisfied with our new contract.”

In other business Thursday night, School Committee members did not approve re-admitting a student to school but rather extended his suspension to be re-evaluated at the March 6 meeting, Redmond-Luce said.

The middle school student was accused of making a bomb threat at the middle school in October and was suspended then for 10 days by the school principal, then given a longer suspension by the School Committee to be re-evaluated on Jan. 3.

In another matter, the committee voted to use $4,000 from an academic reserve account to help with the middle school Lego Team’s trip to Georgia for national competition in April. Half of the money will be used for students and other half will help support chaperones, Redmond-Luce said.

“Even with the money given by the committee Rob Taylor stated that the six members of the Lego league team will still need to do considerable fundraising for all six students to be able to go,” she said.

The board also extended Superintendent Robert Wall’s contract one year, to 2011.

There “are many reasons for this, including the fact that while Jay is in the process of consolidation we want an educational leader that can take us through the process and if Jay does consolidate, there will be enough work in the initial stages of consolidation to justify the contract,” Redmond-Luce said.