Maryland school district cuts summer pay for athletic directors

June 29, 2018 / Athletic Administration
A school board in northeastern Maryland recently voted to decrease the salary for all of the district’s athletic directors during the summer months.

According to The Baltimore Sun, the Harford County Board of Education voted on June 11 to reduce the summer pay rate for athletic directors by 25 percent to $120 daily. The change was one of several reductions recommended by the superintendent to bring expenditures in balance with revenue.

One board member tried to restore the athletic director’s summer pay to its prior level, but the proposal was rejected by the full board.

In a letter to the newspaper, one resident expressed their disappointment in the decision. From the letter:

What about scheduling games throughout the year, hiring and interviewing new coaches, coming into school to get equipment, getting fields ready for the season, working on transportation of buses to get the athletes to and from other schools, working with the athletic trainers, getting medical kits resupplied, making sure coaches of all sports are ready for their season, and any other day to day behind the scene work that the athletic director does at any given time?

During the school year, athletic directors work longer hours and get paid less than some coaches per season. They also teach two classes during the day, which no other neighboring county does. They are left with very little time to actually get their work done without any assistant like many other counties have.

The board and superintendent seem a bit tone deaf here. At Coach & Athletic Director, we write often about how supervisors and the community often don’t understand the full scope of an athletic director’s job, and this is a prime example. The work doesn’t end when school lets out, but now those athletic directors will have to do the same work for less pay.

The article doesn’t specify the number of athletic directors in the district. According to the Harford County Public Schools website, the district has 10 high schools and nine middle schools.

Click here to read more from The Baltimore Sun.


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