By JENNIFER CLAISE
Staff Writer

After overwhelmingly rejecting the first offer, Manchester teachers approved a second union contract proposal – which contains some improvements for the teachers – at a packed meeting Monday, Nov. 8, Manchester education officials said.

The move is expected to end the “work-to-rule” job action that has been in effect since October, during which teachers have been working the hours required of them and no more.

For the city’s 1,300 teachers, who have been working without a contract since July, the new contract holds raises at 2 percent for each year of the three-year contract.

But changes from the first proposal include an easing of the transition for health-care benefits, and a preparation period for specialists at the elementary- education level.

Under the original proposal, teachers with a spouse who worked for the city would have lost the benefit of no premium cost-sharing for health insurance.

Under the new contract, the school district will pay for 75 percent of that premium costsharing over the life of the contract, after which the benefit will be scrapped.

The secret-ballot vote was held at the Wayfarer Inn in Bedford where Ellen Healy, president of the teachers’ union, said there was such a large turnout that some teachers left without voting. There were 1,000 chairs set up for the event.

Healy declined to discuss an exact vote total, but said the measure passed handily.

The Manchester Board of School Committee signed off on the contract after the meeting Nov. 8. It now awaits approval from the city’s Board of Mayor and Aldermen.

In October, Mayor Bob Baines urged the union to call off the “work-to-rule” job action, calling it “divisive” and harmful to students.

But Healy maintained there would be no impact to students, who could seek alternate times to receive extra help. Sports and extracurricular activities, which teachers are paid extra for, were not affected, Healy said.

School officials in Bedford, Hooksett, Candia and Auburn, whose high school students attend the city’s schools, said they were keeping an eye on the situation but had no power to control it.