ATR issue burning up the digital mediasphere & ATR chapter petition deadline nears

The cause of an elected chapter for ATR representatives is gaining recognition.

Recently the NYC Educator blog discussed the plight of how the UFT denies elected representatives of their own rank in the teachers union, "Mary Ahern on ATRs and UFT Elections".

And James Eterno discussed the issue at length at the ICEUFT blog. His article was timed with ATRs' appeal to the national teachers federation, the AFT, president Randi Weingarten, in "ATR ELECTION APPEAL SENT TO AFT PRESIDENT WEINGARTEN". The teachers union and the federation must stand on principle, not their bureaucratic self-interest.

Please sign the petition for ATR chapter representation. Here's the URL address for downloading a physical copy of the petition. 
No dues without authentic representation! The June 8, 2015 chapter petition deadline is approaching.

Sign the petition for full ATR representation rights in the UFT

As you see from the ICEUFT blog ATRs are struggling for democratic representation rights with our own chapter and our own official chapter leaders and delegates in the UFT. 
Read at ATR ELECTION APPEAL SENT TO AFT PRESIDENT WEINGARTEN on how James Eterno and other ATRs sent a formal appeal to president Weingarten for a chapter after the UFT dismissed the chapter request.

We have been rebuffed after several official appeal attempts going back three years. Here's James Eterno's report from March 24.
UFT Snubs ATRS Again in Chapter Elections; Complaint Has Been Filed with Federal Department of Labor
Please sign the petition to the UFT for ATR representation rights.

( Here is the address for the online petition itself:

Sign a petition for a chapter for ATR members )


Here is the blog posting at the MORE caucus web site:
Petition for the Creation of a UFT Chapter for ATRs


The following petition for our ATR brothers and sisters will be submitted at the June Delegate Assembly - please sign and share!

Petition for the Creation of a UFT Chapter for ATRs:

ATRs have been prime staff casualties of school closures, which are driven largely by high-stakes test scores; the Bloomberg-era Fair Funding Formula continues to be a disincentive against principals' hiring ATRs; the position state in itself is illegitimate and unacceptable: the ATR status is created simply to break tenure and seniority; as ATRs are overwhelmingly over the age of 45, the placing of teachers in this position is age discrimination;

Absent Teacher Reserve teachers, guidance counselors, social workers, and other excessed NYC DOE employees are denied the right to representatives from within their own ranks; they can only vote for chapter representatives if they happen to be working in a school with an election during their rotation assignment;

Denying ATRs their own representatives violates the principle of no dues without representation.

Whereas, the ATR position has now been embedded in the UFT contract in Section 16 of the 2014 DOE-UFT contract, therefore be it Resolved, that the UFT will immediately create a Functional Chapter to represent the interests of ATRs, Leave Replacement Teachers and Provisional Teachers, with borough-level proportionality.

We UFT members ask president Mulgrew for his pledge to create these chapters.

And here's the URL address for downloading a physical copy of the petition. http://morecaucusnyc.org/?attachment_id=4137

ATRs need your help for an elected chapter, at the UFT Executive Board, Monday night

James Eterno and others will make the essential points stressing the need for ATRs to have their own UFT chapter, ATRs, being now distinctively institutionalized in Article 16 of the contract that the UFT agreed to with the NYC DOE last spring.

We need your assistance on Monday night from 5:30 pm-6:30 pm.  If you can be at 52 Broadway in Manhattan on the second floor, Absent Teacher Reserves and Leave Replacement Teachers would appreciate your support.

Absent Teacher Reserves and Leave Replacement Teachers have been asking for an ATR Chapter to represent our unique interests for a long time now.  We have filed a complaint with the UFT Executive Board concerning the Chapter Election process.  ATRs are being compelled to vote and run for office at schools we are just passing through in May and might know nothing about instead of being permitted to vote for our own ATR representatives.

Our letter of protest is on the ICE blog as is a summary of the UFT response.

http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/2015/04/absent-teacher-reserve-leave-replacemnt.html

http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/2015/05/uft-executive-board-will-officially.html

On Monday May 4, the UFT Executive Board will officially respond to our complaint.  

ATRs need your support. 

We can appeal to the AFT and the US Department of Labor so the Executive Board won't be the final word.