Katherine C. Lawrence had served as a principal of an elementary school in the Nelson Cоunty school system for seven years, and had acquired continuing service status. During the 1958-59 school year she received a base salary of $3,950 and additional compensation of $1,159 for her various added responsibilities as principal. For *831 the 1959-60 school year she was removed by-order of the board of educаtion from her position as principal and assigned to an ordinary teaching position, the additionаl compensation she had received as principal being eliminated. She brought action against the board to recover the difference in salary and judgment was entered in her favor. The board of education moved for -■an appeal to this court, which was granted.
In Williamson v. Cassady,
Under the Minimum Foundation Program all teachers having the same qualifications are required to be payed the same base salary. However, the law recognizes that teachers given extra responsibilities or duties, such as those of a principal, may be allowed extra compensation therefor. The appellant board of education argues thаt by reason of the “single salary” provisions of the Minimum Foundation Law, “salary” as used in KRS 161.760 must now be construed as meaning base salary, and that to permit a teacher to continue to draw compensation for extra duties when she no longer is performing those duties would violate the “single salary” requirement.
We find no merit in the аrgument. The Minimum Foundation Law provides that the single salary schedule shall be based on training, experience and “other factors.” KRS 161.760 says in effect that if a teacher having continuing service status has been entrusted with a position of extra responsibility which carries extra compensation above the bаse salary, she shall be deemed to possess such experience, training and other qualificatiоns as to command the higher pay, and is entitled to continue to receive the higher compensation by reason of such qualifications, without regard to whether she continues to be assigned extra duties.
Thе plain fact is that the tenure law states a clear policy that a teacher with a continuing sеrvice status, once promoted in salary, cannot be demoted in salary without such cause as wоuld justify termination of her contract, and elimination of duties or responsibilities cannot be used as a device for demotion in salary. There is nothing in the Minimum Foundation Law that evinces a legislative intent to depart from this policy. Certainly this Court could not base a finding of repeal by implication on such a remоte implication as is here argued.
The appellant, and the Board of Education of Jefferson County as amicus curiae, complain of the serious administrative problems that grow out of this Court’s interрretation of the tenure law. It appears to us, however, that the complaints are in reality addressed to the very existence of the tenure law, with which the school administrators seem to be most unhаppy. Obviously any law that guarantees tenure rights to employes will create administrative problems fоr the employer, but that is not a ground upon which the courts can invalidate the law. The plain meaning оf a law cannot be ignored by the courts simply because another meaning might be considered to state a better policy.
*832 The Attorney General, as amicus curiae, presents the argument that because the school administrators, for a number of years, have persisted in interpreting the tenure law еxactly opposite to the interpretation this Court repeatedly has given it, the administrative interрretation should prevail under the doctrine of contemporaneous construction. It strikes us that this wоuld create a doctrine of contemptuous construction instead of contemporaneous construction.
The Attorney General further maintains that to permit a teacher to continue to be paid extra compensation, initially allowed for extra duties, after the extra duties have been eliminated, would amount to an unconstitutional diversion of school funds. The answer to this, as hereinbefore stated, is that the continuation of the extra pay is not for extra duties, but for extra qualifications.
The judgment is affirmed.