Vote No! Updated 5/2 with the details on raises.

So we finally have it folks, a proposed new UFT contract.  I have to be honest, I was really optimistic on this one.  I think de Blasio is a decent human being, and we have been out a contract for so so long that things had to get better right?  Wrong.  While the UFT is already spinning this as a huge win for its members, and I see many excited folks on social media, on close examination this seems like a very weak deal.  Here are the highlights that the UFT put out earlier today.  Upon close examination most are not highlights at all.

TEACHER PAY: Updated with the most recent info from ICEUFT
UFT members in the new contract will get the 4 % + 4% salary increases that other city workers unions received back in 2009 and 2010, but we won't see the money until 2015-2020.

For the seven years from 2011 to 2018, where the UFT will set the pattern for raises that other city unions will now follow, we will be getting a total of 10% in raises for seven years plus a $1,000 signing bonus.  That works out to less than 1.5% per year.

Specifically, this is how the CFO crunched the numbers:

2009-2010 = 4% raise
2010-2011 = 4% raise
2011-2012 = 0% raise but we will get a $1,000 signing bonus if we ratify the contract.
Nov 2012- April 2013 = 0% raise
May 1, 2013 = 1% raise
May 1, 2014 = 1% raise
May 1, 2015 = 1% raise
May 1, 2016 = 1% raise
May 1, 2017 = 2.5% raise
May 1, 2018 = 3.0% raise
Total: 18% (compounded it will be a little more)

For those of you expecting to go back in the fall and at least have the 4%+4% added to your pay, forget it.

The 4 % + 4% that other unions received in 2009-10 will not be added to our pay until the increases kick in one year at a time starting in 2015.  Here is how the 8% will be added in:

May 1, 2015 = 2%
May 1, 2016 = 2%
May 1, 2017 = 2%
May 1, 2018 = 2%

All we get added to our salaries now if we ratify is 1% for 2013 followed by 1% for 2014 and the $1,000 bonus.

The 8% won't be added to our salaries fully until 2018 and the retroactive money the city owes us since 2009 won't be coming soon either.  Here is the schedule for the retroactive payments:

October 1, 2015- 12.5% lump sum
October 1, 2016 - Nothing
October 1, 2017 - 12.5% lump sum
October 1, 2018 - 25% lump sum
October 1, 2019 - 25% lump sum
October 1, 2020 - 25% lump sum

We will not be made "whole" for Bloomberg denying us the raises that other city unions got 5 years ago until 2020.  

This seems to be the big highlight for everyone but let's think about what we are really getting.  After the 4 + 4 for 09/10, we get 1.3% a year over 7 years (below the rate of inflation).  Just think about how much your rent has gone up in the past few years alone.  This is the awful pattern we are setting for every other union in the city, who are by all reports (rightfully) outraged that we would agree to this. UPDATE: It has been brought to my attention that I may have been misreading part of this.  Not only are we not going to get the back pay until 2015-2020, but the step increases that go with that as well.  So for all of use foolishly thinking that at the very least we would be making about 10% more than we do now this September were wrong. In fact we will only be making about 2% more, and we won't see the rest of that money for years and years to come.

TEACHER EVALUATION

The new contract clarifies and simplifies the evaluation process. Evaluations will now be focused on 8 components instead of the current 22.

Under the current system, teachers in grades or subjects not covered by tests can be evaluated in part on schoolwide measures that include results for many students they do not teach.  Under the new contract, teachers in non-tested subjects or grades will have the option to be evaluated on the results of students they actually teach.

The union and the DOE will work to expand the available assessments. 

All this basically does is lighten the load on administrators.  Will we be observed fewer times?  Will our evaluations still be tied to our students' test scores?  Will we still have to waste 4+ days a year giving ridiculous MOSL exams?

ATRS

Under the new contract, the DOE is obliged after Oct. 15 to send an ATR to any school in the district/borough with a vacancy in the teacher’s license area. The principal retains the discretion to keep the teacher or return him or her to the ATR pool.

This is probably the most egregious part of it all.  While the UFT is not "highlighting" this, apparently once these ATRS are dumped by the Principal, which according to the Chancellor can be in as soon as "one day" after they are assigned,  the city can move to terminate them in a 3020 hearing.  Call me cynical, but this certainly looks like the ATRS were sold out, and that there will be mass firings in the coming years.

ADDITIONAL PROFESSIONAL TIME

The union’s 2005 contract lengthened the school day by 2.5 hours each week, or 150 minutes.

The proposed contract reconfigures the 2.5 hours added to the week in 2005, and recovers an additional 80 minutes each month by eliminating a number of faculty meetings and conferences.

Under the new contact – unless a school votes for an alternative — an 80-minute block of time on Mondays will be devoted to school-based professional development and a 35-minute period every Tuesday for professional work, such as collaboration between teachers across subjects or grades. The remainder of the repurposed time will be used for parent contact (see below).

All I can say is, that this sounds like it will turn out to be an absolute mess.  I honestly have never met one teacher who thinks the solution to the educational crisis is less time with students and more time in PD.  In fact, I know a lot of teachers who save up their sick days just to call out on Brooklyn/Queens day.  I am all for meaningful PD, but 90% of PD I have ever attended is anything but meaningful, and it certainly seems a lot less meaningful then tutoring struggling students.

ADDITIONAL PARENT VOICE

The agreement creates a 40-minute period every Tuesday for teachers to reach out to parents by email, letter, telephone or face-to-face meetings. Teachers can also use this time to create newsletters, school or class websites or other strategies to increase contact between parents and teachers.

It increases the length of the parent-teacher conferences from 2.5 to 3 hours and doubles the number of evening parent-teacher conferences from 2 to 4 each school year. Evening conference will be held in September, November, March and May.

The first part of this actually does not seem like such a bad idea.  If I had built in time every week specifically for parent outreach I believe I would do more or it.  I also won't complain about the second part since parents have a right to get involved in their child's education.  It does seem kind of like a waste to do this at all levels though, since the vast majority of high school parents don't attend parent teacher conferences to begin with.

NEW FLEXIBILITY FOR SELECTED SCHOOLS

The new contract provides a mechanism for schools to innovate by seeking exemptions to certain Chancellor’s Regulations or UFT contract provisions that could result in initiatives such as a different school day and year; greater teacher voice in hiring decisions; or wider variations in how a school day is laid out.

A joint DOE-UFT panel will review proposals and select up to 200 schools for the program.  For a school to participate, the principal and 65% of UFT staff in the building must agree to the proposal.

I honestly was stunned when I read this.  Did the UFT actually just agree to turn 10% of the schools in NYC into pseudo charter schools?  Why would any public school teacher vote to take away their own contract provisions?  I doubt many (if any) schools will sign up for this, but once you make changes like this it will be very hard to go back.  Besides, schools already have the SBO provision and can make minor tweaks to the contract (including work day) if they like.  I honestly only see this ending very badly.

CURRICULUM  VS. PAPERWORK

The agreement obligates the Department of Education to provide all educators in core subjects with appropriate curriculum.

It also includes new rules to reduce excessive paperwork, including the creation of duplicative and unnecessary electronic records.

Another silly clause.  The DOE should have always been obligated to provide curriculum, but even if they do the likelihood that it is good curriculum is slim.  The only way I see this working, is if the city pays teams of teachers to come in over the summer and develop curriculum together.  Anyone who has used EngageNY or Pearson ReadyGen knows just how much most provided curriculum is worth.   As for excessive paper work, this is already (supposedly) protected in our current contract.  However, I have never seen a successful "excessive paperwork" grievance and I doubt this will change a thing.

TEACHER LEADERSHIP

The proposed contract includes leadership positions that will allow teachers to remain connected to the classroom while still expanding their reach. “Model Teachers” will be empowered to work with teachers in their own school to improve instruction by opening up their classrooms to their colleagues. “Teacher Ambassadors” will be paired with a sister school for a year to share and develop best academic practices. Both posts pay $7,500 a year on top of salary.

“Master Teachers” will be responsible for sharing best practices in their school and reviewing its impact on student achievement. The post pays $20,000 a year on top of salary.

Finally, this is the biggest change in the entire contract.  I would like to see the details of these proposals before I give major comments, but it seems like these gigs always cost a lot of money and have little results in improving student outcomes. From what I have seen generally, these jobs end up being hundreds of extra hours of work that are not worth the extra pay.  If you want to do more to develop curriculum, or work with other teachers, there are plenty of per session opportunities at both the school and city level that can earn a teacher a few thousand extra dollars over the course of a year, and if you want to be an administrator you might as well just become an administrator.

The bottom line here, is that the money is not nearly as good as it sounds (or the UFT is spinning it), and there are a lot of give backs, and proposals which I am very very skeptical about.  Maybe I will change my mind once I read all the find print, but as of right now I plan to vote no on this contract.  If de Blasio is really a labor friendly mayor I think we could have done far better than this, and it is worth holding out for a better deal.

It Is Civic Engagement Time!

Yesterday was a rare bright spot for education in the state of New York.  The State Senate and Assembly have both officially called for a two year moratorium on using Common Core aligned exams to make "high stakes decisions".  These high stakes decisions include promotion and middle/high school acceptance for students, ratings/job security/tenure decisions for teachers, and decisions regarding closures/expansion/co locations for schools (although in NYC at least that last part may be on hold for a while.)  If you have not been paying attention, this potentially major move from the state legislator, comes after dozens of hearings around the state where outraged parents and teachers expressed their concern about this issue.  To provide further context, students in grades 3-8 were forced to take these exams across the state last spring (which brought many of them to tears and made others physically sick) and only about 30% of them passed.  This was mainly due to the fact that the test were rushed and neither teachers or students had time to prepare.  In fact Common Core Curriculum was not even made available to teachers until this summer (months after the tests had been given), and even now the curriculum is not complete. There is currently no curriculum for 10th-12th grade ELA or Math, despite the fact that 10th graders are scheduled to take the Common Core Geometry Regents next year, and the Common Core ELA Regents the following year.

Any logical person can see that administering Common Core exams before Common Core curriculum has been released is putting the cart before the horse, but many don't understand just how damaging these tests are. 70% of children around the state were told by the State Education Department that they were failures. These kids were likely prepped to death, and then had to spend days on exams that they had no chance of passing or even completing.  Before the exams were even administered the SED knew that these kids would fail, so why give these exams at all?  My best guess is that they thought these exams would further, not set back their agenda.  They believed that when kids all across the state, even in high preforming suburbs, failed these tests their parents would call for teachers to be fired and schools to be closed or privatized.  The SED thought parents would realize they were wrong all along and that their children need these exams/standards/reforms if they want to succeed in life.  Well unfortunately for John King and Merryl Tisch parents are lot smarter than they thought and knew these exams were a sham.

Up until this point King and Tisch have stuck by these reforms, and Cuomo has remained silent and procrastinated (which is his way of giving them his full support while keeping his approval rating up).  The legislator is giving The Board of Regents a little more time to make a decision before going ahead with their moratorium, but it is clear to all educators that The Board of Regents have no intention of making any changes.  That was made clear by the abysmal ELA Regents Exam complete with harder cut scores that was given last month.  That test (which put tremendous strain on my students, and led to more student anxiety than I have seen in years) was clearly the Board of Regents going full speed ahead with their agenda. At least a dozen of my students (who I know for sure should have score in the 80's or 90's) ended up with scores of 71-74.  Since 75 is the score required to be deemed college ready, I am sure that SED will eventually use this to point out a need for high standards.  Other students failed the exam outright and are missing out on 5 months of reading British Literature and college level writing assignments to sit in a Regents Prep course. Clearly they are making no real attempts at change and will do whatever it takes to keep up this illusion that the students in our state are failing and that only their reforms will save us.  To John King and Merryl Tisch our students are just acceptable collateral damage in furthering their awful agenda.  An agenda that they will not let up on until every classroom is a test prep factory complete with all the expensive Person textbooks and blending learning programs in the world and run by a cheap non unionized teacher.

If there was ever a time to get involved and push back it is now.  The longer the legislator takes to act, the more likely we see these test in the spring, and the more likely we see teachers fired and students left back over them.  The best thing you can do is call or write to your state senator and assembly person asking them to support the moratorium.  While a two year moratorium does not go far enough in my opinion, it is a great start towards pushing back the tide of reform, and taking back the public schools for the students and teachers of New York State.  Below this post is a copy of the letter I sent to my State Senator Marty Golden, as well as my Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis.  (I will also be calling both of their offices).


Dear Senator Golden,

I am writing to you today as a very concerned constituent.  I am asking that you join Senators Skelos, Klein, and Flanagan in supporting the two year moratorium on high stakes tied to Common Core testing.  As a proud New York City public school teacher, I have seen damage done by these tests first hand.  Everyday I see anxiety on my students faces caused by their Regents exams, and the look that my 9th graders give when I mention the Common Core exams they took last year (and will be taking in Algebra this year) is heartbreaking.  These tests are developmentally inappropriate and cause unnecessary anxiety among parents, teachers, and especially students.  Any educator with any experience knows that you should never give an exam that 70% of students are unprepared for.  The State Education Department has not even finished rolling out Common Core curriculum, and yet teachers will be fired over these exams, and students left back. Since it is clear that neither State Education Commissioner John King, or Regents Chair Tisch plan to do anything about this issue, it is up to the legislator to enact a law immediately before any more damage is done. Please support the moratorium that your colleagues proposed as it is an extremely important issue to myself and many of your other constituents.

Thank you in advance for your support,

-A Concerned Educator