Gilroy
– Targeting the school district’s fledgling Accountability Plan,
the teachers union filed an unfair labor practice charge with a
state agency, claiming the district is requiring teachers to do
more work without negotiating compensation.
Gilroy – Targeting the school district’s fledgling Accountability Plan, the teachers union filed an unfair labor practice charge with a state agency, claiming the district is requiring teachers to do more work without negotiating compensation.
Superintendent Edwin Diaz, when told Wednesday morning the union had filed the charge, responded with disappointment and resolve.
“This could significantly alter how things go in this district,” he said. “I will not back off on this. This is too important for our kids.”
The Accountability Plan, based on seven guiding principles, is a blueprint intended to increase student achievement in the district. It is governed by a 21-member task force and draws on expertise from accountability specialist Douglas Reeves and consultants from the Stupski Foundation.
Diaz is adamant the district should not turn its back or loosen its grip on the plan, which he said is based on measures that are proven to advance student performance. Fully implementing the plan means some teachers will have to change their practices, Diaz said, adding that even before the plan, many teachers already were practicing many of the initiatives. The goal, though, is to get teachers districtwide to participate.
Examples of those initiatives include teachers meeting more often to look at student progress, creating lesson plans according to a new template, participating on committees and developing common assessments for their students. Schools are responsible for creating their own individual plans, and in November, the board approved each school’s plan.
“I don’t believe we will be able to make the type of improvement we need to make in this district without a well-structured accountability system,” Diaz said. “And frankly, I don’t think any school district will be able to make the kind of improvement we’re striving for without a well-structured accountability system.”
The charge, filed Tuesday with the California Public Employment Relations Board, is the result of extra work the plan requires teachers to complete, said Gilroy Teachers Association President Michelle Nelson. Many teachers already are overwhelmed with other responsibilities the district has forced upon them over the past few years, she said.
Nelson said she supports the ultimate goal of the Accountability Plan – to increase student achievement – but she thinks the district should take a step back, unload a few other teacher responsibilities, then implement the plan.
“The idea behind accountability is a good one. Where we’re coming from is, this is just one more thing the teachers have been asked to do,” Nelson said. “Then it’s another thing, then two more things, then it’s three more things. Every time I turn around, there’s another initiative.”
The district faced a similar charge last year as a result of Brownell Middle School coming under state sanction. The state required the school to implement a plan of reform, and GUSD had no power over increased teacher workload. The charge was withdrawn before it reached court, Diaz said.
The latest unfair labor charge comes in the midst of negotiations and has spurred dueling letters to all district teachers from both the union and district administration.
Last month, the union sent flyers to all teachers persuading them to “just say no” to the plan’s demands, if it meant more work and no compensation. Diaz responded by also sending a letter to all teachers stating he was aware the plan might present some challenges, but without implementing change, student improvement in the district would stagnate.
“I look forward to any and every opportunity to sit down and talk with you,” Diaz stated in the letter. “What I am not willing to do is allow a negative, adversarial culture to get in the way of meeting the needs of the students who attend our schools.”
The union last month presented the district with a list of general potential contract violations resulting from the plan. The problem with that list, Diaz said, is that it doesn’t specifically identify which schools and teachers are being taxed by the new responsibilities, and what specific tasks are adding more time to teachers’ days.
“Until we get some specifics, we can’t determine the amount of impact on teachers, if there is any,” Diaz said. “If there is an issue that has violated the contract in terms of time and responsibility, we need to know specifically where and how.”
With more than 500 teachers, Nelson said gathering such exact information for each grade level and school will take a significant amount of time, but she said she’s confident there is at least one potential contract violation present at each school.
There is a six-month window to file an unfair labor practice charge, and Nelson said she considered Nov. 18 – the date the board passed the school site plans – as the opening of that window. Traditional negotiations would have taken too long to solve the issue, she said.
“Before you know it, that window has passed,” she said, “and we’ve resolved nothing.”
