NYCDOE & UFT up to same BS: job crumbs at best for ATRs

So, it's the end of the summer and the same thing has happened:

Earlier in August the NYC Department of Education shut off the open market transfer for a few days and then reopened it. (The farce of the transfer system is addressed here.)

The DOE has held a number of job fairs over the summer and it has not informed actually licensed and experienced teachers (teachers in the Absent Teacher Reserve - ATR) of these job fairs. The job fairs in the last weeks of the month have positions in the hard to staff schools and in the harder to fill licenses: science, special education.

The DOE has the gall, once again, to hire inexperienced newbies over the ATRs who wish to actually teach as they had done for years, before Randi Weingarten gave up the seniority transfer in 2005 (referred to here) and the United Federation of Teachers got teachers to go along with this.

The UFT challenges none of this; and it goes by the same script that it is up ATRs to get a job, when everyone knows that salary is what keeps them from being considered. Adding insult to injuries is that the UFT also crows about 3,000 new teachers being added to the teaching force. (Really, they are happy about adding 3,000 people who will pay dues; so the union actually has an incentive for the city to add newbies into jobs that experienced teachers could have.)

Forget about the line that the NYCDOE/UFT uses: that ATRs won't factor into raising average teacher salary in the school budget. Admins are smart. They know that whatever good budget arrangement that exists this year could be turned around in a future contract. They know that the formula could change three years down the road and the school will have to pay for the more expensive teacher. So, the school administration plays it safe and continues to go for the new, inexperienced teacher. This is why teachers with many years in the system will not get picked up by schools.

Of course, there is an age factor here: the ATRs tend to be over 35 years of age; most: over 50 years old. The newer teachers are in their early or mid-20s.

As to teachers in the reserve that will be placed into positions as opposed to just being assigned to schools in September: the DOE waits until the last possible moment, less than a week before school starts, to inform teachers of which school they will be assigned to. Furthermore, the notice omits information as to which topics they will be teaching. Memo to admins from people that actually teach in the classroom: different grades mean different curricula. Contrast this with other teachers who are informed at the end of June as to what their program will be. All of this means hastier preparation in the days before students return to the classroom.

All of these practices under De Blasio and Carranza are no different from Bloomberg, Klein and Walcott. Actually, some practices are worse under Carranza: giving insanely inflated raises to top administration. Several high level admins got raises ranging from 15 percent to 35 percent --compare this to the two to three percent salary raise in the last teachers contract. There was news last Saturday that there are now 36 administrators earning over $200,000 per year, a greater than 50 percent increase over the number of DOE admins earning that kind of salary in the last fiscal year. So, if the city has the money to give administration favorites, then why isn't this money given instead to the teachers who are in the classrooms?  The NYCDOE/UFT cannot in good name continue to go by the script that there is no money for reverting to the teacher unit system (pre Fair School Funding) when it spends this kind of money.

The UFT needs actually advocate for its members: it needs to press the city to go back to the system that worked in the past: valuing experience. The union needs to give preference to the ATRs, not to the inexperienced.

Six basic questions that neither Farina nor Mulgrew have had the sense to address about the coming closures of 3 Brooklyn schools

Now that three (3) "troubled schools" in Brooklyn will be closing next year for "under performance and under enrollment", why hasn't anyone put this complex question to

FARINA and MULGREW...

1) Where do these teachers go when they are excessed??

2)  If they will be placed, how can they be placed when there are over 

     1,500 ATRs still waiting for placement?

3)  If these teachers are leaving the "closing" schools for other placements in

     "vacancies", will ATRs be placed in that "coverage" (provisional positions)

      when the school officially closes?

4)   How can the ATR pool go down when the DOE/UFT is creating this cycle?

5)   During an election year, will anyone address this "dark secret"?

6)   Who will acquire the available space when the schools are closed - 

      charter or the other public school?

If these questions are already answered, and the newspapers haven't put 2+2 together for the QUANDARY that will arise in 2016-17, then this dilemma is not addressed in some plausible way!!

Keep in mind, the next salary increase happens in MAY 2016 and many of our ATRs are reaching salary levels that are going beyond the compensatory levels within school budgets. (Despite Principals being told, it's not coming from their budgets unless over the allotted "average teacher salary in the bldg) This will definitely put a major strain upon hiring any ATRs for 2016-17 budget levels. For example, those teacher reaching 15 yrs are now prime targets for being "over budget and over age" and the most senior teacher in some schools will be 13yrs, if that!!  Hence, where do these teachers start to find positions especially when majority of positions are not on the DOE website or advertised as expected.

Why is the ATR pool still growing under deBlasio? Plus some questions ahead of the upcoming UFT ATR meetings

What's happening with the growing ATR pool?

It is unconfirmed that the Absent Teacher Reserve Pool has grown to as many as 4,000. What is driving the increasing number of excessed DOE staff? Despite the end of Bloomberg era closures, the growth of new schools and the growth of charters continues. As newer schools grow, taking more students, more classrooms, more teachers, existing schools lose students, lose space and lose staff. For those not in the know, the ATR pool includes guidance counselors (colloquially called ACRs, as they number in the hundreds), social workers, psychologists, librarians, besides strictly instructional staff. And by the way, the UFT has failed to unionize or demand that the DOE permanently hire various professionals such as part-time or itinerant nurses and guidance counselors. The UFT tolerates this privatized staffing, euphemistically called "service providers."

The DOE/UFT tell us that people are leaving the ATR pool. The DOE and the UFT both play the same numbers games, not giving us straight numbers about the ATR pool.

Members need to ask the UFT directly:

--How many people have been appointed from the pool, into schools?  That is, how many people have truly, permanently, left the ACR/ATR pool?

--How many people are filling a maternity or illness leave position?

--How many people are are in a position only for a semester or only for the current academic year?

--Given that the Fair School Funding formula, also known as the Fair Student Funding formula, has been the reason that principals themselves cite for not permanently placing or hiring staff out of the pool, why is the UFT not aggressively fighting the Fair School Funding formula?
--Why is the UFT not fighting for an amendment to the contract to bring seniority rights into hiring practices?

--Why is the UFT not fighting the well-known practice of DOE administrators to hire new staff over members of the Absent Teacher Reserve?

Does the UFT really want all ATRs to attend their meetings?

New excessing will occur in October, as class registers stabilize, after schools have accounted for student attendance patterns. According to the DOE's arcane excessing guidelines the excessing is concentrated in batches of staff in certain licenses, for example, a school can be found compelled to excess three teachers because of declined enrollment. As a result schools, can lose vital staff such as special education teachers, librarians or guidance counselors.

The timing of the meetings at the end of September and very early in October is not the best for the excessed staff. Many teachers and other DOE staff across the city will lose their positions in schools and will enter the ATR pool, yet they will not be introduced to the DOE's protocols for ATRs, as they would receive in the official UFT meetings for ATRs.

Here again are the official ATR meetings that the UFT has scheduled for the next two weeks:

Note that many of the meetings conflict with DOE staff obligations at schools. The 2014 contract introduced new obligations for teachers and other staff to stay late at schools. At most schools these dates fall on Mondays and Tuesdays. 

We hope that your year is off to a good start. As promised, we are contacting you to let you know that the UFT will be holding informational meetings for ATRs in the coming weeks. Whether you are new to the ATR pool or not, we want to make sure you have the opportunity to ask questions and get answers.

Here are the dates and locations. Note the changed dates and times, since the announcements earlier this week, following complaints:

Queens

• Date: originally, Monday, Sept. 28. Rescheduled to Wednesday, Sept. 30, due to complaints about Sept. 28 falling on Sukhot (the UFT has not shared this change thru mass email; details and of this change have spread by word of mouth)
• Time: 4–6 p.m.
• Location: UFT Queens borough office at 97-77 Queens Blvd. Directions »

Bronx

• Date: Monday, Sept. 28, still, despite = Sukhot
• Time: 4:30–6 p.m. Note the later start time, but not the later finishing time.
• Location: UFT Bronx borough office at 2500 Halsey St. Directions »

Manhattan

• Date: Thursday, Oct. 1
• Time: 4–6 p.m.
• Location: UFT headquarters at 52 Broadway Directions »

Staten Island

• Date: Thursday, Oct. 1
• Time: 4–6 p.m.
• Location: UFT Staten Island borough office at 4456 Amboy Road Directions »

Brooklyn

• Date: Monday, Oct. 5, difficult for many teachers because 2014 contract compels teachers to stay late on two days, usually Monday and Tuesday; and at many schools faculty conferences (a late day, UFT brass, in case you didn't know) fall on the first Monday of the month
• Time: 4:30–6 p.m. Later starting time, but original finishing time, asinthe Bronx meetings.
• Location: UFT Brooklyn borough office at 335 Adams St. Directions »

"First They Came" by an excessed teacher

This gem needs no introduction.

They came for the Ed Evaluators, but I was not an Ed Evaluator so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Home Economics Teachers, but I was not a Home Economics Teacher so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Shop Teachers, but I was not a Shop Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Reading Teachers, but I was not a Reading Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Literacy Coaches, but I was not a Literacy Coach so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Librarians, but I was not a Librarian so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Bi-Lingual Teachers, but I was not a Bi-Lingual Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Business Teachers, but I was not a Business Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Drama Teachers, but I was not a Drama Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Art Teachers, but I was not an Art Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Band Teachers, but I was not a Band Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Phys Ed Teachers, but I was not a Phys Ed Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Computer Teachers, but I was not a Computer Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Physics Teachers, but I was not a Physics Teacher so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Chemistry Teachers, but I was not a Chemistry Teacher so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Foreign Language Teachers, but I was not a Foreign Language Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Dance Teachers, but I was not a Dance Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Music Teachers, but I was not a Music Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Common Branch Teachers teaching in middle school, but I was not a Common Branch Teacher teaching in middle school so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Guidance Counselors, but I was not a Guidance Counselor so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Social Workers, but I was not a Social Worker so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Older Teachers, but I was not an Older Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for the Minority Teachers, but I was not a Minority Teacher so I did not speak out.

Then they came for me, the regularly assigned teacher --and THERE WAS NO ONE LEFT TO SPEAK FOR ME AND IT WAS TOO LATE.

Just Vote No on the UFT Contract that makes ATRs Harijans!

MORE's new flyer on Voting No on the Contract

"Be happy you have a job" -- The true national trends in teacher displacement and placement

The main phrase that we're told over and over is "Be happy that you have a job. Everywhere else, teachers in your position lose their job in a few months." Not true. Actually, cities such as Chicago and Washington, D.C., are more the exception to the rule, as we see in a very informative webpage. The percentage that dismiss displaced teachers, "ATRs" in the New York City Department of Education, is quite low. And it is also revealing that in most places seniority protects displaced teachers. In New York City it works against displaced staff, as the group of ACRs and ATRs is blatantly lopsided against older, longer tenured staff.

The article is from a site which is targeted towards administrators, the National Council on Teacher Quality, nctq.org. The article, "Tr3 Trends: Teacher Excessing and Placement", from the site, surveys 114 districts, including Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, New York City, Washington D.C., and smaller districts such as Little Rock. It doesn't address the issue of evaluation of teachers while out of the classroom in an excessed status. Notice that in other cities seniority protects senior teachers in other cities, yet New York City is one place where seniority works as a penalty against teachers.

The contrast of better situations for excessed teachers in other cities suggests that we should be armed with this knowledge as the NYC DOE and the UFT move forward with contract negotiations as well as negotiations over ATR status.

These patterns can be overlapping and include:
1. districts that use performance and other factors in deciding whether to retain teachers
2. districts that lay off teachers
3. districts that hire without consideration of seniority (27% of the survey), includes Chicago, Dallas, Fort Worth, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York.
4. apparently, LA & NYC are two of seven districts that place teachers in sub work pools until they are placed in a school.
5. 34 districts (29.8% of the survey, and including Jacksonville, Pittsburgh, St. Paul and St. Louis) have the district assign the teachers back into schools.
6. four districts (including Cleveland, Las Vegas, Little Rock and Spokane) allow teachers to choose positions based on seniority.
7. only six districts are in the worst category: five districts lay-off teachers or place them on un-paid leave (this includes Chicago teachers after 10 months); another, Washington, D.C. gives options of resignation, buy-out or eventual termination after a year if the teacher is unable to find a job.
8. about half the surveyed districts (65 of 114) do not address the issue of what to do with teachers that cannot find jobs.

Here's the article, Tr3 Trends: Teacher Excessing and Placement. Go to the original page link, for the charts on the teacher displacement and assignment trends.

PDQ: Pretty Darn Quick Blog
Tr3 Trends: Teacher Excessing and Placement

03/28/2013

In this month's Tr3 Trends, we take a look at teacher excessing: what factors determine which teachers to excess, how excessed teachers are assigned to schools, and what happens to excessed teachers who cannot find new assignments. 

But first, what is excessing and how is excessing different from a layoff? 

Excessing is the shifting of teachers from one school to another that results from a school reducing the size of its faculty due to a drop in student enrollment, a change in budget, programmatic changes, or because the school is being closed, redesigned or phased out.  Unlike being laid off, teachers who are excessed are still employees of the district and, in most cases, are still entitled to a teaching position at a school, but just not the same school that they left.

We've analyzed scores of excessing policies in districts' contracts and board policies.  Here are the trends that stand out:

In over half of Tr3 districts, seniority is the primary factor considered in excessing decisions.  

Only five districts--Denver, Douglas County (CO), Cypress-Fairbanks (TX), New Orleans, and Louisiana Recovery District--use performance to select teachers to excess without considering seniority.  Three districts--Wake County (NC), Baltimore County, and St. Louis--only consider the best interests and needs of the school or district.  Many districts look at a variety of factors when making excessing decisions. Washington, D.C., for example, uses a rubric with four different factors, of which seniority can only account for up to 10%. 

The "other factors" districts use to make excessing decisions run the gamut from diversity factors to extracurricular responsibilities.

We also looked at how excessed teachers were matched with new placements.

In about a third of the districts, principals or other site-based administrators choose which excessed teachers to hire, as opposed to being placed on the basis of seniority status or assigned by the district's HR office.

Thirty-one out of the 114 districts in our database use "mutual consent" to hire excessed teachers, which allows principals to interview and hire teachers of their choosing without regard to seniority. Los Angeles, New York, Miami-Dade, Chicago, Dallas, Fort Worth, and Minneapolis all use this approach.

Duval County (FL), St. Paul, Sacramento, St. Louis, and Pittsburgh are a few of the districts in which Human Resources places excessed teachers in schools without seeking input from the principal--at least according to the teachers' contract.
 
In Cleveland, Clark County (NV), Spokane, and Little Rock, teachers are allowed to choose placements based on their seniority.
 
In only six districts in our database, teachers are exited out of the school system--via layoffs, unpaid leave, early retirement, or buyouts--if they are excessed and then unable to secure a new assignment.  In most districts, excessing does not lead to layoffs. 

The six districts include Clark County (NV) and Manchester (NH), which lay off teachers unable to find positions after they are excessed.  These districts' contracts do not specify how long teachers have before they are laid off.

Little Rock, Chicago, and Douglas County (CO) give teachers temporary assignments (in Little Rock they serve as substitutes) and then if they are still unable to find permanent positions, they are laid off or placed on unpaid leave.  In Chicago, teachers have 10 months to find a position and in Douglas they have 12 months.  Little Rock's contract does not specify how long teachers have to find a position.

In Washington, D.C. excessed teachers unable to find placements are given three options:

• They can immediately receive a $25,000 buyout,
• They can elect early retirement, or
• They can accept a year-long temporary assignment and continue looking for a position.  If they cannot find another position within that year they will be laid off.