SEA Advocacy Alert – December 10, 2009
Topic: Collective Bargaining Under Attack!
(And the State Budget isn’t looking good, either.)
Dear SEA Members,
Where to begin? It has been a challenging week for public education. This is a rather long Alert, and it contains important information, so please bear with me.
Collective Bargaining Under Attack – Action Needed!
As mentioned in this week’s SEA President’s Report, our right to negotiate local contracts is under attack. While bargaining can be challenging, stop for a moment to think about what it would be like if SEA were no longer able to negotiate with the District. If, instead, local school boards and superintendents decided on the work we must do, but negotiations were done on a statewide level.
If all school districts were the same - or if we had one statewide school district - that would probably make sense. But every district is different, operated by a different School Board and Superintendent, and with students whose needs are different. WE VALUE LOCAL CONTROL OF OUR SCHOOL DISTRICTS, AND WE VALUE LOCAL COLLECTIVE BARGAINING. What would statewide collective bargaining look like? There is no specific proposal, but it could likely mean:
- Top-down dictates on everything-- an increased bureaucratization of our schools as we would be forced to comply with more State-imposed rules. An elimination or reduction of creative local responses to local questions and problems.
- No ability to impact local working conditions: hours of work, curriculum, duties, class sizes, calendar, professional development, shared decision-making.
- No ability to ensure that educators in more expensive areas get higher salaries via our TRI pay. Although this could be negotiated statewide, there is no assurance that it would be.
One attack on local bargaining came from the State Board of Education (SBE). For three years, the Board has been working on a bill that would allow the state to intervene in chronically low-performing schools. Under current proposals, the SBE plan would allow the state to override local collective bargaining and prevent our members from having a voice in important decisions about their schools. As you know, we support efforts to turn around struggling schools and believe that for intervention programs to be successful, school staff must be included in the decision-making process. Please click here to send an email to urge SBE members to protect local decision-making and collective bargaining as they draft school accountability legislation.
Another attack came from the Quality Education Council (QEC), which was authorized by HB 2261 to oversee its enactment. QEC members passed a surprise amendment last Tuesday that could completely eliminate our right to bargain locally if it is passed by the Legislature. It suggests: “Examine transferring local collective bargaining to the state, including all matters pertaining to compensation, benefits, and employment terms and conditions.”
We are thankful to Representatives Sullivan, Maxwell, Priest and Dammeier for voting against this amendment. However, the following political leaders voted in favor of the amendment and against the bargaining rights of all K-12 employees, not just teachers:
- Randy Dorn, Superintendent of Public Instruction
- Mary Jean Ryan, State Board of Education Chair
- Stephen Rushing, Professional Educator Standards Board Chair
- Jane Gutting, ESD 105 Superintendent
- Bette Hyde, Department of Early Learning Director
- Senator Curtis King, 14th District
- Senator Joseph Zarelli, 18th District
- Senator Eric Oemig, 45th District
On December 15 – next Tuesday, the QEC is scheduled to vote on its draft final report. We must urge these leaders to remove this amendment from their final report. Please send an email from your home computer and email address no later than this weekend to express your support for local collective bargaining. Just cut and paste the list of addresses below into your “To” line. The email will go to all members of the QEC for whom I have email addresses. A few talking points are:
- “Local collective bargaining is essential to the ability of schools, school districts, and employees to collaborate and create local solutions to local issues.”
- Give an example of something in our contract that is beneficial to your students (a great example might be High-Impact/Inclusion funds and how your school uses them).
- “Please do not vote to eliminate local collective bargaining!”
Here’s the list:
chopp.frank@leg.wa.gov; sullivan.pat@leg.wa.gov; priest.skip@leg.wa.gov; dammeier.bruce@leg.wa.gov; king.curtis@leg.wa.gov; oemig.eric@leg.wa.gov; zarelli.joseph@leg.wa.gov; mcauliffe.rosemary@leg.wa.gov; maxwell.marcie@leg.wa.gov; jane.gutting@esd105.org. MaryJean.Ryan@Seattle.Gov; sbe.ryan@k12.wa.us; bette.hyde@del.wa.gov; Randy.Dorn@k12.wa.us
State Budget – Action Needed!
The Governor released her draft supplemental state budget yesterday, and as expected, it was grim. It proposes $408 million in cuts to K-12 education and another $370 million to Higher Education. On the chopping block are: the remaining I-728 funds, K-4 staff enhancement/class size reduction funding, the remaining Learning Improvement Day, levy equalization, and highly capable/gifted funding, among others. Human Services was also slashed by $850 million, which would affect many of our students and families.
The Governor was clear that she only presented this budget because by law she is required to propose a balanced budget that contains no additional revenue. However, this budget, if enacted, would be devastating to public education and result in the loss of thousands of educator jobs. Please send a message before winter break to the Governor and our State Legislators, urging them to find revenue solutions in order to avoid these damaging cuts!
And finally….
I know this is asking you to send three emails, and that is a lot – but there is a lot at stake!
Please be sure to send the QEC email right away – no later than this weekend.
The SBE and state budget emails can be done any time over the next week or so.
As always, please let me know if you have any questions, and thanks for all you do to advocate for yourselves, your colleagues, and your students!
Elizabeth
P.S. – Remember that all political advocacy must be done on your own time, using your own computer and home email address. I know you know this, but a reminder never hurts.
--
Elizabeth Beck
President, Shoreline Education Association
Vote YES for Shoreline Schools!