Executive Committee meeting

Your Executive Committee will be meeting at 4 p.m. on 8/29, at Leavenworth HS room 206.  This meeting is open to any members who may want to attend.  Its purpose is to plan LNEA activities for the upcoming school year, plan the agenda for the first Association Representative meeting, discuss an election to bring on at least one more alternate delegate to the KNEA Representative Assembly in the spring, and discuss events reported by members.

Dear Teachers,

As of the end of the day on July 31, 2012, more than half of teachers in USD 453 had voted, and overwhelmingly you voted in favor of the new negotiated agreement.  Dr. Crane informed me this morning that the Board of Education ratified the Teachers Agreement last night with a 6-0 vote.  (Loyal Torkelson was absent.)  It's such a good feeling to have this accomplished before we return to work!

Your representatives during negotations were me, Dennis Dickson, Linda Schukman, Bryan Walker, Robin Crim, Michelle Smalls, Betty Sigle, Kay Smith, and Ruth Striggow.

Be sure to vote today for candidates who will support fair funding for Kansas schools!

Ginger Riddle

Please support legislators who support kids!

Welcome back to a new school year! If you followed the Kansas legislature last year, you know that KNEA's advocacy made a huge difference in some of the proposals that were made and blocked others that would not have been good for students and teachers. 

There are still representatives in our state government who want radical budget changes that would slash education funding and KPERS.  They could have their way if more like-minded legislators are elected.  PLEASE support the candidates who will make responsible choices on behalf of schoolchildren in Kansas.

Click here for Kansas House candidates who support education.
Click here for Kansas Senate candidates who support education.

Contact us if you didn't get the email that allows you to vote

Please contact us at lneanews@gmail.com if you are a continuing teacher in USD453, employed under the negotiated agreement, and did not get the email from SurveyMonkey allowing you to vote.  We can also help if you need that message sent to an alternate address.

Negotiations Summary

Here is our summary of all the changes made to the negotiated agreement for 2012-13. We feel good about the final agreement, and recommend ratification. We will be sending you an email with your opportunity to vote as soon as we can. Since all currently employed teachers get to vote, our mailing list has to be verified first. We are also waiting for a copy of the new agreement and will forward that to you when we get it. If you have questions or comments, please post them here or email us at lneanews@gmail.com.

First, a quick summary:

· Retained binding arbitration of grievances.

· Got rid of the “double dock” of leave days adjacent to negotiated holidays

· Got pay or leave days for people whose assignment is changed after July 15

· Retained workdays

· Began work toward a compacted salary schedule that will maximize teacher career earnings. No longer will each position in the salary schedule be determined by a percentage of a low base salary. The salary schedule will be restructured every year to ensure as fair a distribution of increases as possible. We will hold informational sessions to explain more about why this multi-year process is important and beneficial to teachers and the district.

· Base pay for supplemental has been raised slightly. Pay for cafeteria supervision and district committee work was raised to $15/hour. Additional pay was added for elementary yearbook sponsors and a video productions sponsor.

· Be watching your email for your ballot from SurveyMonkey. (We'll send another message to this address when it goes out, just in case your junk mail filter catches it.)

Below are more detailed explanations for each of the items opened for negotiations and how they ended up.

Article 3: Duration. The contract is a two-year contract except for money items and calendar. All items will remain as is through the end of 2013-14, except Vertical and Lateral Movement, Salary, Fringe Benefits, and Calendar.

Article 5: Contract Year. The contract year remains at 186 days.

Article 6: Duty Day. We retained full-length workdays at the end of 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd quarters and 1-1/2 days at the beginning and ½ day at the end of the school year. For Parent Conferences, all buildings will be on the following schedule: Wednesday will be a school day, followed by conferences from 4-8 (Secondary) or 5-9 (Elementary). On Thursday all buildings will have conferences 9-5 with a 1-hour break. Friday will be a day off.

Article 10: Grievance Procedure. We retained the right to binding arbitration.

Article 12: Assignment and Transfer. All teachers must be notified of their teaching assignment for the next year by the 3^rdFriday in May. It must be specific as to grade level for elementary and specific to the classes to be taught for secondary.

A change to that assignment that occurs after July 15 will result in either 3 professional leave days or at the teacher’s choice, pay for 3 days at the rate of $124 per day (the sub pay rate). Any combination of leave and pay may be determined upon mutual agreement of the building administrator and teacher.

Article 19: Leave. No more restriction for taking leave adjacent to a negotiated holiday. Some outdated verbiage restricting paternity and adoption leave was also deleted.

Article 24: Vertical Movement. Vertical movement on the salary schedule will occur this year. (Lateral movement was not opened for negotiation, so that will also occur.)

Article 26: Salary. The salary schedule was restructured. No longer is each position in the salary schedule determined by a percentage of a low base salary. Restructuring will occur again every year for a while, to ensure as fair a distribution of increases as possible. You won’t see a lot of differences yet, but over the next few years, we expect some major changes will occur. We will hold informational sessions to explain more about why this multi-year process is important and beneficial to teachers and the district. For now, the rows will be renumbered (both the previous and the future numbers are listed in the schedule below). The lines about an embedded amount have been deleted from the agreement, since they no longer apply. The reference to MHT has been changed to SIT. Base pay for supplemental has been raised slightly to $28000. Pay for cafeteria supervision and district committee work was raised to $15/hour. Additional pay was added for elementary yearbook sponsors and a video productions sponsor. Also, the district proposed raising supplemental stipends for JROTC activities. Many of the extracurricular jobs at all levels are underpaid relative to other districts, so we proposed an audit of the supplemental salary scale. The district will be conducting this over the course of 2012-13 in preparation for the next negotiations.   Here are links to the new salary schedule and the new supplemental schedule (in two separate pages).

https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B7nN_3ILwmhIRTNXUHlaS2VkYTQ
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B7nN_3ILwmhIb0R0WHktM2JwSVk
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B7nN_3ILwmhIbHNWOWdjWHB5ZWs

Article 27: Fringe. We’re sorry to report that there is no increase in fringe benefits.

Article 30: Calendar. For 2012-13, the non-working days are

· September 3 Labor Day

· November 12 Veteran’s day

· November 21-23 Thanksgiving

· December 24-January 1 Winter Break

· January 21 Martin Luther King Day

· February 18 Presidents’Day

· March 18-22 Spring Break

· March 29 Non-working Day (Good Friday)

· April 29 Makeup day for inclement weather exceeding two days; otherwise off.

· May 27 Memorial Day

For 2013-14, non-working days are

· September 2 Labor Day

· November 11 Veteran’s day

· November 27-29 Thanksgiving

· December 23-January 2 Winter Break

· January 20 Martin Luther King Day

· February 17 Presidents’Day

· March 17-21 Spring Break

· April 18 Non-working Day (Good Friday)

· April 28 Makeup day for inclement weather exceeding two days; otherwise off.

· May 26 Memorial Day

Out-of-district Special Education teachers – if assigned full time to a district that has more than 186 days, the director can establish a 186-day calendar or pay additional compensation at 1/186 of the teacher’s salary per day for each additional contract day worked. For teachers working in a district where contract days are fewer than 186 days, the director can establish a 186-day calendar.

Article 31: Evaluation. The evaluation instruments are no longer part of the negotiated agreement. This means that administration has the right to change that instrument without negotiating it. The processwhich must be used IS dictated by the negotiated agreement, and has not changed. The article has been reordered to a more logical structure.

Out of district special education teachers may be evaluated with the instrument of the district to which they are assigned, but the administrator must follow the process outlined in our negotiated agreement. This guarantees that administrators actually visit for a minimum length of time for formal classroom observations and hold face-to-face discussions regarding the final evaluation, establishes time limits between formal observation and conference, a time limit between the final observation and the summative evaluation, and an orientation to the process.

Article 33: Resignation Incentive (known as Early Retirement). The board proposed ending this provision earlier than planned, but we will keep the current sunset dates. The cash incentive ends June 30, 2015, and the health benefit incentive ends June 30, 2025.

Local Teacher Robin Crim Represents our Profession in Washington, D.C.

Education leaders from across Kansas just returned from an intensive week in Washington, D.C. consisting of workshops, policy discussions, and action items to help ensure that every child has access to a great public school education.  Among the 130 Kansas NEA delegates to the Annual Meeting and Representative Assembly (RA) of the National Education Association was LNEA's own co-President Robin Crim. 

The 2012 NEA RA featured a host of workshops providing the latest research on successful programs to end bullying, implement more rigorous teacher evaluation systems, and the most promising innovations for school-wide improvement of student learning... through teacher-led professional development.  KNEA members have long benefited from their training, "BullyProof," and are now adding "Bully-Free - It Starts With Me" to their repertoire of safe-school strategies.

NEA President Dennis Van Roekel continued to press for genuine school improvement, calling on delegates to "lead a movement for new academic standards... define the multiple measures of professional practice and evidence of student learning."  Delegates answered the call with several new business items adopted to uphold outstanding professional practice and to ensure that fair tax structure provides the resources needed to sustain both quality schools and stronger communities.

Delegates celebrated both the Fourth of July and excellence in policy and professional practice throughout their lengthy days of business:

*    National Teacher of the Year Rebecca Mieliwocki drew rousing applause noting that "great teachers design exciting, relevant lessons that set kids up for success."  Referring to a counterproductive focus on standardized testing, Ms. Mieliwocky lamented that these tests "limit us to a very narrow set of parameters, and I want more for my students because the world they'll be forced to find work in will demand more from them."

*    Delegates saw promise for better public policy as Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton was recognized as the Outstanding Governor of the Year.  A former teacher, Governor Dayton stood with educators and community leaders in Minnesota to increase education funding in 2011-2012, creating one of the most positive business environments in the nation.

*    Other visitors to the NEA RA offered encouragement and hope to delegates.  National Education Support Professional of the Year, Judy Near, energized the crowd highlighting her role as a Health Tech in ensuring that our students are ready to learn; and finally, Vice President Joe Biden was joined by Dr. Jill Biden, a community college professor AND his spouse, as they praised the dedication and important work of all educators from pre-K through graduate school.

After two grueling days of negotiations, we're well on our way to a new agreement with the Board of Education, at least on the non-money items.  (Money items have not yet been discussed--next meeting is July 10 at 9 a.m. at the district office.)  Here's a summary of what has been discussed so far.  Note that negotiations are ongoing, so changes in any of these items are still possible.  We'd appreciate your feedback! Since we represent all the teachers of Leavenworth at the bargaining table, we'd like to know what you think.  Just email us at lneanews@gmail.com.

Parent-Teacher Conferences:  The district wanted to eliminate the alternating schedule of the last two years and hold professional development on Fridays initially, but we have tentatively settled on holding conferences Wednesday evenings and Thursdays with a day off for teachers and students on Friday.

Grievance Procedure:  The district wants to eliminate level 4 (binding arbitration) from the agreement, and make the board of education's decision the final say.  The teacher team wants to keep binding arbitration as a last resort (it has been used twice in 30 years, by the way), and return the Association's right to file a grievance on behalf of a teacher or teachers. This is still being negotiated.

Assignment and Transfer: The teachers proposed a standard number of days to be given to teachers who are reassigned at the last minute, in order to move and potentially prepare to teach a different level or subject, or payment to teachers who do this work on their own time.  So far the district has agreed to 3 days of leave time to prepare, but has not agreed to compensate teachers who do the work over a weekend or cancel their vacation plans to prepare.  We have proposed 5 days or compensation or a combination of the two.  In order to make this possible, we have agreed to delay the date (now May 1) by which teachers are notified what they will teach in the next year.  We have also agreed to allow the district to post vacancies for only 7 days instead of 14, before they are filled. 
Leave Policy:  Double-dock days are no more! (At least, that is our tentative agreement.)  We had hoped to change the minimum leave reduction to 1 hour so that teachers who schedule their appointments very early or very late in the day would not have to take an entire half-day off and to start a leave pool for teachers similar to the one classified staff have, but we have abandoned those requests in favor of getting rid of double-dock days.
Calendar:  The district's initial proposal cut workdays at the end of the first and third quarters to 1/2 day, but in their most recent proposal those have been returned to a full day.  For special education teachers working in districts that have a calendar longer than Leavenworth's, we have added language that will allow the district to prorate their pay so that they don't have to choose between working for free or missing student contact time or professional development that their building colleagues are receiving.  Some of you will be disappointed that the teacher workday after the winter holiday in 2013-14 will be on a Friday, but that will prevent students from missing more than two weeks of school.

Evaluation:   The district's first few proposals stripped this article down to what is required by statute and removed the actual evaluation tool from our agreement so that it can be altered unilaterally by the district.  Since we now have a well-researched and valid teacher evaluation system tailored to our needs by a hard-working committee that included evaluators and evaluatees, there have been some long discussions about various elements of the current procedures.  Some of the questions that have been discussed...What is a reasonable maximum amount of time that should elapse between an observation and the meeting between administrator and teacher?  How long should it take until the teacher's summative evaluation is delivered?
In the district's most recent proposal, they returned to language that is closer to the current language.  However, they still want to remove the evaluation tool from the appendix, which would mean they could change it at will.  Some changes they mentioned in discussion are understandable and supported by your comments in our survey, since the forms don't fit well for some teaching positions. However, they also mentioned changing the forms to fit individual buildings and we have concerns about the efficacy and efficiency of having scores of different evaluation forms.  They propose to share these with the Association two weeks before they start using them and give us the opportunity to provide feedback. 

Other changes they have proposed in Evaluation:  making permanent the out-of-district sped teachers being evaluated by non-USD453 staff, changing school days to calendar days for deadlines, removal of a minimum length of time for a formal observation, addition of a statement that informal observations can be used in the summative eval, requiring only written AND/OR verbal feedback after an observation, and the addition of a section on the evaluation instrument. 
Resignation Incentive (Early Retirement):  Initially the district wanted to end the compensation piece of this article in 2013 instead of 2015 and end the contribution to health insurance in 2020 instead of 2025.  We expressed serious concerns that teachers considering early retirement in 2014 and 2015 would already have done their retirement planning and the district listened.  This request has been dropped in their recent proposals.
So there you have it, a short and sweet summary of what has happened so far.  Keep in mind that agreement we may have reached on any of these items is tentative until the process is over.  As far as salary, we are hoping to restructure our salary schedule into what is often referred to as a "compacted salary schedule."  This is a method that we (and KNEA) believe maximizes the annual growth of career level teacher salaries and total salary over the long run.

After a board member resigned, the school district asked to cancel the first two negotiating sessions.  That means our first real bargaining sessions won't occur until June 21 and 22.

Our Leavenworth NEA negotiating team has been planning and organizing for the upcoming bargain of the 2012-13 contract.  We have met with KNEA reps and have developed a great plan by which to achieve our desired goals, with the help and assistance of our members.

LNEA has provided numerous dates to the Board for potential bargaining sessions over the next several weeks.  We will let you know when they schedule a meeting with us, so you can attend if you want to be fully informed.

You should know that the Board has made the decision to move away from the “interest based” approach to bargaining and chosen to hire an out-of-state attorney to bargain the contract on behalf of the Leavenworth community.  It is the goal of LNEA not to lose sight of our primary interests – the teachers and students they serve! Our Association is committed to keeping dialogue open regarding the contract, our schools, our students and our community without capitulating to uninformed demands that sometimes surface during the “traditional’ or adversarial process.

For your information, parts of the contract to be negotiated each year must be “opened,” either by the Board or by our team.  We opened the articles:

• Article 3, Duration – sets the beginning and ending dates that the negotiated agreement will be in effect.  It is usually July 1 of a given year to June 30 of the following year.
• Article 5, Contract Year – sets the number of contract days a teachers is expected to work during a given school year
• Article 6, Duty Day – defines such issues as the duty free lunch, the length of planning time, the parameters for parent conferences and faculty meetings, etc.
• Article 19, Leave Policy – sets the rules for taking leave during the school year
• Article 26, Salary Schedule – sets the salary schedule, including supplemental payments, for a given school year
• Article 27, Fringe Benefits - sets the amount of money the district will contribute to an employee’s health insurance policy; it also lists other benefits available to teachers, but that are not partially (or fully) paid by the district
• Article 30, School Calendar – lists the negotiated holidays and work days for the current school year as well as the ensuing year
• Article 31, Evaluation Procedure – sets the parameters for evaluation in the district.  In our district, both the tool and the procedure are included in the negotiated agreement
• Article 33, Early Retirement/Resignation Incentive Program – defines the benefits of early retirement

The Board opened some of the same sections: Articles 3, 6, 26, 30, 31 & 33, but also these articles:
• Article 10, Grievance Procedure – defines the procedure for grieving a violation of the negotiated agreement; it currently includes binding arbitration (by a neutral party)
• Article 24 – Vertical Movement on the Salary Schedule – sets the rules for movement on the pay scale regarding the number of years experience a teacher has
LNEA is committed to keeping you informed, and will do so through our blog and through email, and we will rely upon your support.  Please, please contact us with your suggestions and questions!

The blog address is: http://lneanews.blogspot.com/

Check this blog for news – also watch for email updates to come to your school email account.  If you add lneanews@gmail.com to your address book, this should ensure those messages do not go to your junk mail folder.

Barnes & Noble Stores Celebrate Educators with Spring Educator Appreciation Week April 14th - April 22nd

I got this email from Barnes and Noble today and wanted to share, in case you're interested. If you don't have one already, you can get a B&N Educator Discount Card by showing your teacher ID at a Barnes & Noble store.

Dear Educators,

As a part of the Educator Appreciation Week celebration, the Zona Rosa Barnes & Noble store will host its reception on Saturday, April 14, 2012 at noon. The event will feature a Grant Writing Seminar where we will be reviewing Deborah Koch’s How To Say It: Grantwriting, Write Proposal That Grantmakers Want to Fund. We will be offering you tips on how to bring literacy related technology into the classroom. Educators are asked to RSVP at Crm2184@bn.com . Helping us further celebrate Spring Educator Week, members of the Philharmonia of Greater Kansas City will be performing throughout the afternoon starting at 2:00 PM.

Educators who shop at Barnes & Noble during Educator Appreciation Week will receive a 25% discount on personal and classroom purchases, a 10% discount on DVDs and music, a chance to win a $500 Barnes & Noble gift card or one NOOK Tablet. Educators must present a valid Barnes & Noble Educators Discount Card to receive the discounts. *

We are very excited to offer you a special discount on any NOOK® eReader of your choice during our Educator Appreciation Days, April 14th-22nd. Stop by our NOOK counter and see which award-winning NOOK® is right for you. You’ll receive a 20% discount on our black & white NOOK Simple Touch, a 20% on our gorgeous NOOK Color or NOOK Tablet 16G, and a 15% discount on the newest edition -- NOOK Tablet 8G. The offer is good from April 14th-22nd in-store and online, limit one device per customer.

Over the past year, Barnes & Noble has expanded its educational sections and the majority of Barnes & Noble stores now offer either a B&N@ School or Educational Toys & Games section. Both sections provide educators and parents with a convenient in store and online one-stop shopping experience and feature exciting new teaching tools and games that make learning fun and engaging.

KNEA Election Time

It's that time again. Members should receive a ballot for electronic voting by email. If you don't, please email us right away at lneanews@gmail.com. Candidate position statements are available here:

Statewide Delegates

Secretary Treasurer Candidates:

Tim Knoles and Sherri Schwanz.

Up for National RA Delegate is our own Robin Crim!

My message to state senator Kelly Kultala today:

Thank you for voting YES on HB 2200.

If HB 2634 should come to you, I hope you will vote NO and help convince other senators to do likewise. Please let the Department of Education do its job in formulating a new evaluation system for the state rather than legislating one. The KEEP being piloted now was designed with all the stakeholders involved, and I have no doubt it will be a big improvement on anything that might be legislated.

Further, if districts are permitted to come up with their own evaluation system, it should definitely be negotiable. Just as we don't want insurance companies making medical decisions or evaluating physicians on purely financial rationale and without input from doctors, we should not have elected school boards making teacher evaluation procedure decisions without educator input.

Ginger Riddle

House Bill 2634 was passed out of the Education Committee but with drastic amendments that make it palatable. Here is the reply that Representative Goodman sent today to all those who emailed her while the bill was in committee.

From Jana Goodman
To Ginger Riddle

The education committee recently voted HB 2634 out of committee favorable for passage. The bill was drastically cut and reworked in committee:

• The section on alternative teacher certification was eliminated.
• Multiple measures of student growth and achievement, as determined by the state board, must be used to evaluate teachers.
• The requirement that a teacher rated as "ineffective" must be automatically terminated was removed.
• The current mentor teacher program was reinstated.
• The section that removed evaluations from collective bargaining negotiations was amended.
• The provision placing the burden of proof on the teacher to show effectiveness was removed.

Attached is a copy of the current version of the bill, as amended in committee. The next step is for the bill to be debated in the House Chamber. This is the link to the bill on the Kansas Legislative Information System, so you can follow the bill's status: http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2011_12/measures/hb2634/

Thank you for your thoughtful input.

Please feel free to contact me at any time.

Representative Jana Goodman
Kansas House District
41410 South Broadway, Leavenworth, Kansas 66048
(913) 547-0565

Get up, dress up, show up, speak up.

On February 17, LNEA leaders received an email from KNEA with details of the bill (House Bill 2634) being considered by the Education Committee for the Kansas House of Representatives.

My email to Representative Goodman was one of about 400 she received. Here it is, FYI.

Feb 20

Dear Representative Goodman,

I am completely dismayed by what I have read about HB 2634. Commissioner DeBacker and a lot of Kansas educators have been working together to develop the Kansas Educator Evaluation Protocol to meet the federal government's requirements, and they have gone about it in a methodical, logical manner. It is being field-tested already! It seems counterproductive, even chaotic, to impose another system on educators at this point in time.

I'm even more aghast at the proposed amendment that forces a teacher to prove he or she is effective if it should come to the point of a due process hearing. I concede that there are ineffective teachers who should find another work, but there are also ineffective administrators in at least the same proportions! It is very unfair--even counter to our American system of justice--to put the burden of proof on the teacher. Administrators should have to do their jobs and document those things that they say make a teacher ineffective! You wouldn't ask doctors to prove to a jury that they did everything right from start to finish; instead, in the U.S., we ask someone who accuses a doctor of malpractice to prove the doctor did something wrong!

Finally, I believe strongly that all students deserve to have teachers who not only know the curriculum they are teaching, but also how to teach it. For a doctor, knowledge of anatomy is not enough to do surgery! We need practioners who have learned the procedures and have done supervised practice. As I understand it, an amendment recently adopted would allow untrained, untested teachers to practice on our students.

Please vote NO on HB 2634.
Ginger Riddle