Latest Update from SPS on Teacher Contract Negotiations - NO SCHOOL ON TUESDAY
Update: From SPS' Negotiation page, a long chart of the timeline of events and issues put forth. Interesting reading.
end of update
West Seattle Blog Tweet:
District is studying new SEA offer, but NO SCHOOL TOMORROW, per district @ 3 pm briefing.
More from the West Seattle Blog:
Because of the strike’s length, spokesperson Stacy Howard says, there’ll be some turnaround time whenever the strike finally ends.
She is discussing a few other points such as special education – the topic of a demonstration here earlier in the day.
As for “the strike impacts on the calendar” – the three snow days on the calendar will be used, for starters, one midyear, two at the end of the school year – “all additional makeup days” will be determined once the strike is over. Possible ideas: Saturdays, and/or part of the mid-winter break (which was scheduled for five days this year – alternating years have shorter breaks).
Re: graduation days – Seniors are required to be in school 175 days before graduation, so graduation dates might have to change.
As reported here yesterday, middle-school athletic events are postponed. High-school practices and games “continue to go on as usual – a lot of those employees are in different unions or not in unions at all,” says Howard.
She says that by the time this news conference is over, the district expects to have a “timeline” posted online from negotiations to date.
end of update
West Seattle Blog Tweet:
District is studying new SEA offer, but NO SCHOOL TOMORROW, per district @ 3 pm briefing.
More from the West Seattle Blog:
Because of the strike’s length, spokesperson Stacy Howard says, there’ll be some turnaround time whenever the strike finally ends.
She is discussing a few other points such as special education – the topic of a demonstration here earlier in the day.
As for “the strike impacts on the calendar” – the three snow days on the calendar will be used, for starters, one midyear, two at the end of the school year – “all additional makeup days” will be determined once the strike is over. Possible ideas: Saturdays, and/or part of the mid-winter break (which was scheduled for five days this year – alternating years have shorter breaks).
Re: graduation days – Seniors are required to be in school 175 days before graduation, so graduation dates might have to change.
As reported here yesterday, middle-school athletic events are postponed. High-school practices and games “continue to go on as usual – a lot of those employees are in different unions or not in unions at all,” says Howard.
She says that by the time this news conference is over, the district expects to have a “timeline” posted online from negotiations to date.
Comments
reader47
Marie
Mag mom
PR Mom
- Grade 5 Mom.
Insanity wins
-MoreInfoPLZ
there are some awfully big time gaps on that chart that SPS put out - not the least is this: "June 23 - July 23: Per SEA request, bargaining is suspended." Wait. SEA asked to suspend talks for an entire month?????!!! That is fascinating and troubling at the same time. At this point, I don't think either side is being entirely forthright.....
reader47
-Sped volunteer
Marie
-MoreInfoPRETTYPLZ
If you don't understand the dueling pay raises, go to the post on Teacher Pay a little down the page and visit that blog. Once you understand it a bit more, forget about it and focus on the other issues. It's a distraction at this point. I don't think there's a single teacher who wants to sacrifice the other issues for more pay.
NEmom
I have not had one teacher say - here or in person -that the money was the thing. All teachers truly want is to be supported in their classrooms, with appropriate supports.
I relate to the comment that OUR TEACHERS care about our students -- but SEA cares more about its own power .
It's enough to make a person cynical, almost.
and parents! Community! Your support is amazing! Thank you so much for recognizing that we are truly fighting for all of our kids. We know it's inconvenient. We will win this together!
Just Striker
I don't see that SEA cares more about its own power. These are difficult issues and go very deep with all of us. As I've said before, my own issues are planning time, more attention to elementary and sped ratios. Also, attention to OTs, PTs and SLPs. Things are becoming transparent that many of us didn't realize.
I want them to push with as much strength and "power" as they can muster. I don't even understand such a comment. It's been over two decades since teachers stood up for themselves. Parents are standing up for teachers and kids. To think this is all about power for SEA - how do you think they would benefit from such a move. Besides, I am SEA.
SPS execs will be getting their full paychecks on October 1st, while teachers & parents take the hit. On the other side of the table, the SEA has called the district's bluff with their own, all the while being goaded on by WEA/NEA leadership (who will also be receiving full paychecks come 10/1, and don't forget that many of these friendly state & national-level union consultants are pulling in as much or more than the SPS execs in question). Can you blame the minions at the Stanford Center for getting while the getting is good? That's bureaucracy, and always has been. No use getting worked up over it. Whatever they can't stuff in their pockets without drawing too much attention falls down to us at the schools. The SAEOP/ESA workload issues, along with recess, testing, and commensurate salaries, are casualties of a carefully and intentionally crafted system designed to allow many hands into the pot before it's passed down to the district level. If SPS received "appropriate" funding, we'd simply be getting more scraps from the masters' table. Much effort has been made to shift the blame to the WA Legislature, but they're just one step up on the salmon ladder of corruption, with their own pockets to fill and their own masters to beg.
And let's not forget that we're fighting over scraps. Most of the pie has been carved off before we're ever allowed to fight over the crumbs. The proposed percentages being tossed back and forth only cover the relatively small portion of our salaries that are paid directly through SPS funds (as opposed to state level funding or levies). The SPS bargaining teams' salaries with their "staggering" six digits are nothing compared to the greater forces at work. Add another four or five digits, and then we see where the deals are really being made. Pearson, ETS, and the rest of the education-industrial complex couldn't give a flip about who "wins" this pissing match, because they get paid either way. All of this social & political pandering is just smoke & mirrors, intended to distract us long enough that we forget who really deserves our anger.
Let's just cut this baby down the middle and get the kids & teachers back into the classrooms where they belong. Let the SEA leadership strut away from the table with their collective head held high & tail between their legs. Let SPS get back to business as usual. And let my colleagues & me get back to what we do best, building the revolution one young mind at a time.
-Rook
Speddie
North by NW
-Rare Commenter
And n, what gives you the impression that I don't want to fight back? Every year I send 27+ little sparks out into the world, sustained by the hope that one of them will set it on fire. Teachers have had their hand in countless social & political revolutions, rarely demanding or receiving credit for cultivating the ideas & ideals that result in massive cultural shifts. We are the single greatest subversive force in the history of human civilization, which perhaps is why we are so vilified by those whose power is threatened by such changes.
-Rook
He said the SEA always wanted to strike. He has connections to the negotiating team and said that the district had been trying to meet with the SEA all summer but they stonewalled. He thought the SEA was intentionally asking for more than the district could ever provide. And that the SEA was manipulating it's membership by playing up the "disrespect" card and saying the district never tried to bargain over the summer when that was not true.
Furthermore, he accused the SEA of having taking a bunch of money in a grant from the national level union group in exchange for their assurance that they would be going on strike if the national (or state?) union group told them to.
I asked the obvious question - Why? He said it was all a political game regarding McLeary money. The state or national union wants to force the issue with the legislature and they want to make sure that, since everybody is lining up with ways to spend the money once the check gets written, the McLeary money will go to the union membership. The higher union powers picked Seattle because we would tolerate it. That is, the district is very unpopular and they think the people of Seattle provide their best place to find people who will support a long strike with (currently) impossible union demands and still blame the district no matter what happens. All of this will result so much frustration that everyone from every side will be pissed at Legislature and they will go into special session and give the Union exactly what they want at the state level.
He was pissed because he felt like the teachers and the kids were being used as pawns that that anybody in the union who questions the party line is brutally shut down and shunned. And because nobody who is bargaining is supposed to talk about what is actually happening, the SEA can lie about what is happening to get their membership fired up and feeling even more disrespected so they won't look at the offers rationally. He said it was a game plan from a political book Whats Wrong With Kansas.
What seemed crazy a week ago to me seems more realistic now. Can anyone confirm if the SEA took national money that other unions didn't get? Can any other part be confirmed or denied? Can we just get our kids back in school?
NE DAD
And anyone who speaks out against these (secret) union plots is "brutally shut down and shunned"? By who? Rank and file?
Though I DO wish there had been a paper ballot at strike vote. While it sounded like it was unanimous, and doubtless, it seems, almost everybody wanted to authorize a strike, it certainly shut down naysayers. They could have said nay, if they were brave, but it would have been intimidating, I'm sure.
But it ended at what, 7:30? and I'm sure people figured a voice vote would carry it so everybody could go home. From all accounts it was pretty clear that the vast majority wanted to vote to strike.
The union drumming up the feelings of disrespect? No, it appears that the district has been working on that for at least a decade now.
Nope.
I did not have a very good impression of the SEA president after the last contract vote, so I came into this one with considerable skepticism. However, the fact that we've got 38 people on the bargaining team from across the district & numerous job fields ALL on the same page erased my doubts about the story of this summer's negotiations. The ones that I've worked with (in the classroom) have struck me as thoughtful, honest people, and even now they aren't using any inflammatory rhetoric or name-calling when they talk about the district & the process. They just want to get this done, and they don't feel like they've had equal investment from the other side of the table until things got to the point of crisis.
It's also worth noting that yes, Seattle's schools are demonstrably underfunded. I'm not sure how the SEA deciding to fight for better funding translates into the sort of scheme you're suggesting.
That is why many folks home school. Off the rails educators ready to brainwash young minds into parroting their ideas. We don't need teachers with agendas. There is no way for parents to screen your activism. There is no way for parents to choose teachers here. Scary.
Are you familiar with the biblical baby splitting verses? Makes a parent sick to think of it. The real mother demures to keep the child whole. That's love. Your baby splitting does make you sound bitter. How is that for feedback.
West
I have talked to a real live person on the SEA negotiating team whom I have known for many years. This person combines the roles of teacher, parent, and real life person -- not someone who would intentionally drive the car over a cliff. This person was sincerely upset by the lack of productive negotiations on the SPS side over the course of the summer, not to mention the last minute add-on demand of extra time without extra pay.
So, rest easy, no need to spin that one further.
NE Mom
Opposite experience, long time friend of member of the SPS team. I am blown away about the claims being made about the SPS team. The link posted at the top of the page as an update is pretty consistent to what I have hear all spring/summer. Including that the extended student day was presented by Tolley back before school even ended for the 14-15 year and that a whole month of bargains was lost because SEA wanted to take a break. Maybe we all need to check the rhetoric and ask for real proof.
-SWWS
But students will have, what, forty teachers in 12 years, right? I suggest it benefits students to have a variety of REAL people in front of them, so they can be exposed to a variety of adult perspectives, both good and, yes, bad, and learn to think critically about what these adults think about.
NOT that teachers should be actively advocating for one side or another....but it slips out, sometimes....
And I'm curious as to how one would CHOOSE their teachers on a regular basis. You write that you can't do it "here"; where COULD you? Maybe a REQUEST at elementary, and for specific electives, etc in MS and HS....but you do understand how difficult it is to schedule 1500 students into six periods with seventy five or so teachers, I hope! : )
n- On a similar note, no part of the baby was thrown out. Solomon proposed that each side get exactly half of what they wanted, mostly so that everybody could just get on with it and he could get back to writing songs for his many, many wives.
NE DAD- Haters gonna hate. Many folks will reject evidence as "conspiracy theory" out of simple ego. "If that was really going on, I'd know about it," and that sort of self-affirming recursive nonsense. The sad truth is that this has been done right under our noses, and has been going on for nigh 50 years. No one likes to feel like they've been had. Some can't process the confused anger, and so dismiss it out of hand; others learn from their mistakes and seek to help others learn as well. Keep fighting the good fight.
-Rook
Because most of the teachers I know LOVE to teach. Really, really love being a teacher and all this testing and arguing and piling on just gets in the way.
Curious
If this whole experience teaches people anything, it's that they shouldn't expect to get the full story on ANYTHING from television news. Knapp could be the bestest hero ever, or he could be the author of all of the district's troubles, or he could be anything in between, and you'd never know it from a segment on television.
They're not trying to inform you. They're trying to sell commercials. They do that by keeping you outraged, keeping you afraid, and keeping you in front of the television.
The Seattle Education Association has reached a tentative contract agreement with the Seattle School Board, but the strike will continue until the SEA board and representative assembly review the agreement later today and decide whether to recommend approval to the SEA membership or continue striking.
SEA members should report to their picket locations today beginning at 8:30 am. SEA picket captains will provide more information to SEA members regarding next steps.
HP
- follow the money
Probably less of a fan of the union as an organization for long term reasons no need to go into, but I do enjoy the great majority of my colleagues and there's truth to the "teachers are the union". I intermittently joined the strike but more so out of my constant frustration with my personal interactions with the JSC (a few are really good/dedicated) than union loyalty.
For me and many others we don't need some type of national union conspiracy. We barely avoided a strike 2 years ago with the hope that things would get better in our day to day interactions with the district. They didn't and that is so frequently our personal and regular experience. It doesn't take outside manipulation by some national union to antagonize us to central admin as they manage to do that on their own on way too regular a basis. The Super and JSC leadership has to change its modus operandi if they want to truly improve education, support their teachers and avoid situations like this which (in the end) nobody really looks good. Some fun rah rah unity moments, but there's better ways to get that.
This strike was the result of years of neglect and abuse on a daily basis... not because somebody tricked the bargaining team this summer. I'm also not saying that there wasn't any messaging by individuals on the team... individuals are individuals and with 40 I realize personalities and inclinations maybe weren't all left at the door, but as a team I can place a reasonable amount of trust in their professionalism as I think we got a decent deal. If the JSC worked more cooperatively on a day to day basis even an attempted manipulation wouldn't work.
Would the union leaders like to find ways to take credit for McCleary. Probably. But truth be told a lot of SEA members are almost as annoyed with SEA leadership as the district. Indeed, I'm worried about a pretty raucous Sunday meeting to ratify the TA.
Not Conspiracy