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New Trier extends Yonke’s term to 2016
Updated: July 2, 2012 12:18PM
New Trier High School District 203 Superintendent Linda Yonke has agreed to remain at the helm through mid 2016 under a deal struck June 4.
Her prior contract was set to expire in mid 2014.
Yonke will receive a six percent raise for each of the next two years, boosting her salary from $271,211 to $287,483 for the 2012-13 year and to $304,732 for the 2013-14 year. The contract extension freezes her pay the final two years of the contract, according to Associate Superintendent Donald Goers.
She also receives a $500-a-month car allowance, for an additional $6,000 a year.
In voting to extend the contract, board member Peter Fischer noted the district is losing many high-level administrators to retirement. “This is not the time to change the entire administrative staff,” said Fischer, noting the extension will allow Yonke to choose a successor to Goers, who is set to leave in 2013. She’ll also be able to help with the superintendent search and groom internal candidates for the position, he said.
“I think it makes perfect sense for the district,” Fischer said.
Concurred President Alan Dolinko, “We are losing a ton of talent right now. It is a lot of talent and a lot of institutional history.”
Yonke served two years as New Trier’s assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction before she was named in 2006 to succeed Henry Bangser as superintendent. Bangser received a series of pay boosts near the end of his tenure that boosted his final pay to $346,000. Bangser, who is currently superintendent of schools in Ojai, California, draws a pension of about $270,000 a year from the Teachers’ Retirement System.
Late-career pay boosts over six percent are no longer allowed unless local school districts pick up the additional pension costs associated with larger increases.
