FLEMING ISLAND, Fla. -- Clay County board members has voted down a contract that would have given its teachers a $500 pay raise to teachers with more than 27 years experience.

Members voted 4 to1 against ratifying the contract that 92 percent of its teachers voted for.

Many believed the raises were a done deal, since the teachers had already reached a tentative agreement with the board.

Seventh-grade teacher Helenda Feuerborn was in tears after the vote. "I just don't know how they say no to people who come in and do this every day from their heart", she said.

But the People's Tea Party stepped in and said the $1.7 million was too expensive for the county to do that.

The 7th Annual AP® Report to the Nation, released today by the College Board, reports that 22.3 percent of Florida’s public high school class of 2010 completed high school having succeeded on Advanced Placement Program® (AP) Exams — up from 13.5 percent in 2001, and exceeding the national average of 16.9 percent. Additionally, more Florida students from the class of 2010 (33,712) scored 3 or higher on an AP Exam — the score typically needed to qualify for advanced placement in colleges and universities — than even participated in AP nearly a decade ago (24,536).

Clink, clank, clunk!  That’s the sound more than 300,000 students throughout North Florida will soon hear as they pour their pocket change into collection jars to support Olive Garden’s 17th-annual Pasta for Pennies program benefiting The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s (LLS) School & Youth campaign.  Last year, Olive Garden’s Pasta for Pennies collected $6.1 million nationally, bringing the total amount donated since the program’s inception to more than $53 million.