LR schools, teachers union to resume contract talks
Leaders of the Little Rock School District and its employee union will resume 2018-19 contract talks Monday, a week after Arkansas Education Commissioner Johnny Key asked for concessions on teacher employment protections in 22 schools that received D and F ratings.
Little Rock Superintendent Mike Poore on Friday announced the timing for reopening the talks. He declined to say whether there is likely to be an extension of the Wednesday expiration date for the 2017-18 contract or “professional negotiated agreement” for teachers and support staff in the event negotiations aren’t completed early in the week.
Key on Monday rejected the tentative agreement that was reached Oct. 3 by teams representing the school district and the Little Rock Education Association union, which is the bargaining agent for all district teachers and non-administrative support staff.
Acting as the school board in the state-controlled school system of 23,368 students and 40 campuses, Key directed Poore to add a provision to any agreement with the union stating support from both parties for a waiver of the Arkansas Teacher Fair Dismissal Act and the Public School Employee Fair Hearing Act in the district’s D- and F-rated schools.
Such a waiver would make it easier and quicker to fire an employee identified as performing poorly in the affected schools.
Key said he would ask the state Board of Education to approve the waiver next month. He cited insufficient academic progress as the reason.
Under Act 930 of 2017, the state Board of Education has the authority to waive laws regarding teacher dismissal for school districts that have been placed in the Level 5 - Intensive Support category.
‘“As a district in that category, LRSD needs this greater flexibility to make staffing changes in struggling schools than what the Professional Negotiated Agreement currently allows,” Key wrote last week.
The current agreement and the newly rejected tentative agreement specifically call for the district to adhere to the state employee protection laws.
EXTENSION POSSIBLE
In an interview with reporters earlier this week, Key did not rule out an extension of the current contract’s expiration date nor did he rule out a modification of the waiver language that he proposed.
In the days after Key’s directive, members of the Little Rock Education Association voted to return to negotiations but they have also done some informational picketing before and after school calling for the preservation of the employment protection laws in the lowest-performing schools.
Little Rock Education Association President Teresa Knapp Gordon said Friday that a waiver from the state law would be for an entire district even if it is initially applied in a limited number of schools.
Friday’s planning by Poore and Gordon for the resumption of negotiations occurred the day after the district’s Community Advisory Board members offered varied reactions to the possibility of a waiver of the Teacher Fair Dismissal Act in selected schools.
The seven-member advisory board, which makes recommendations to Key on matters related to the district, heard reports on 2017 and 2018 interim test results for a sample of the D- and F-rated schools. In response to questions, district testing coordinator Danyelle Cummings described at least some of the results as being “about the same” from year to year.
FIRING TIMELINE
Jordan Eason of the district’s personnel department walked the advisory board through the multiple steps and monthslong timeline for firing a poorly performing teacher. Those steps include a principal’s observation of a teacher at work, a write-up of the areas for improvement, and a one-toone meeting with the teacher to detail and show evidence of the problem areas, as well as hear any explanations from the teacher.
That could be followed with a formal letter to the teacher saying that an improvement plan is needed. At a subsequent meeting, an improvement plan could be developed collaboratively.
If the teacher accepts the improvement plan and the resources provided to the employee, the plan would go into effect. If the employee doesn’t accept the plan, the employee is responsible for remedying the deficiencies on his own.
There are two phases of the improvement plan: a 30-day awareness phase and 40-day assistance phase. All together, the process can be three-plus months or longer, Eason said, if meetings have to be rescheduled or absences occur.
Melanie Fox, an advisory board member and a school board member from 2006 to 2012, expressed frustration at the lack of improved student achievement — despite multiple programs and interventions that were meant to help.
She also said she had personally witnessed a principal devote about a third of her work year to firing an ineffective first-grade teacher.
“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Fox said, adding that she supported a state waiver of the Teacher Fair Dismissal Act for schools with Ds and Fs.
She acknowledged that the D- and F-rated schools are challenged with students who come from low-income families but there are other schools with the same student enrollment that received B and C letter grades from the state.
The letter grades are based on student results and improvement on the state mandated ACT Aspire tests in third through 10th grades, as well as on other factors including graduation rates, student attendance, proficiency in reading and science and college entrance exam scores.
“We have had program and initiatives and they have kind of all failed on implementation, supposedly,” Fox said. “Research will tell you that the best thing you can do to move the needle or educate a kid is have a great teacher in front of them.
“I want to make sure we do — whether it is raising salaries or applying for these waivers — whatever we can to recruit and get good teachers in front of these kids,” she said. “That’s my goal now. I’m tired of all the programs. I want teachers who are effective in our classrooms for our kids.”
WAIVER FOR QUICK CHANGES
Board Chairman Jeff Wood said he favored the waiver as an opportunity to give principals an opportunity to make quick changes in failing schools while at the same time the district streamlines its number of campuses. That could generate as much as $5 million in operation savings that can be invested in teacher salary increases.
Wood said the state is holding the district accountable and the district must trust its principals to discern whether teachers are ineffective or there is some other factor at play.
Anthony Hampton, another advisory board member, said he would “go to bat for teachers all day long” because they are called on to be counselors, mentors, and even act as parents to students when all they weren’t to college for was to learn to teach.
“No teacher I believe wants to see a child fail,” Hampton said.” No parent intentionally wants their child to fail. It happens. We are human and flawed.”
He said that teachers is being blamed and, with the waiver, could be left without a recourse or appeal to make their voices heard. He called it a disservice to not represent teachers along with everyone else.
Board member Michael Mason said parents and community employers must be made to see how important it is that students get a good education for the well-being of the community. He also said Ds and Fs are not acceptable.
A Cloverdale teacher, who refused to spell her name, spoke from the audience in defense of the hard-working teachers at her school who love what they do. She urged the advisory board to visit the campus.
“We are doing the best we can with the students we have,” she said.
Gordon said Friday that about 60 percent of teachers are dues-paying members of the association, with some having their dues withheld from their paychecks and others having their dues automatically withdrawn from bank accounts. District records show that about 52 percent, or 995 of the district’s 1,917, teachers have their association dues withheld from their paychecks.