In its 35 year history, the Rochester Association of Paraprofessionals (RAP)—currently about 700 members strong—has never had a teacher assistant among its ranks, even though many teacher aide members were doing work that qualified them for teacher assistant status. Until now, that is. RAP president Margie Brumfield says that making sure many of her members—well over 200 are qualified, she believes—get that job upgrade has been “her baby” during the few years she has headed the union.

Last year, for the first time, Brumfield and the union got the superintendent to agree to classify about 40 of her members who worked with autistic students as teaching assistants, but the district wanted only that limited number. RAP has worked hard to get the superintendent to agree to greatly expand the total of teaching assistants for the current school year, and expects positive results.

From a financial standpoint, the upgrade means an immediate raise of $3 per hour over their current salary. But just as important, it means properly recognizing employees who, in many cases, have been doing the work of a teaching assistant for years.

The strong advocacy for her members on the teaching assistant issue carries over to a general push by Brumfield to make sure Rochester paraprofessionals and their union are known, involved and respected throughout the district. The union has been through some ups and downs in recent years. At one point, the previous leadership broke the union’s ties with the AFT teacher affiliate in the district, but Brumfield and others worked to reaffiliate the union—which is now a separate paraprofessionals union—with the AFT and to restore good relationships with the teachers local. “We want all the support we can get from a larger, stronger union,” says Brumfield, who is also a member of the AFT’s PSRP program and policy council and the Education Support Professionals chair of the New York State United Teachers.

She likes to repeat what she tells her members: “We are a standalone union, but we don’t stand alone.”

In September, arbitrator Elliott H. Goldstein ordered SIPI to reinstate (with back pay, benefits and seniority) the 20 staff members and instructors who were laid off in spring 2005. IEF estimates the award at upward of
$1 million. “I am grateful that we had a union. [Reinstatement] wouldn’t have happened otherwise,” says Shaw, who is looking forward to returning to her job as a residence specialist.

SIPI, a two-year community college for Native Americans, said that the reduction in force (RIF) was a budgetary necessity.

But Goldstein didn’t buy management’s argument. He questioned the fact that following the RIF, the community college hired 14 new staff, at higher salaries, who basically performed the same jobs as those who were laid off. Moreover, Goldstein found that SIPI violated the collective bargaining agreement and did not use “a fair and uniform set of procedures” to determine who would be laid off.

“We think this is an important victory,” says IEF president Pat Carr. “People do need unions to look out for them and to protect their rights.”

IEF field representative Susan Sandoval says there is more to the case than a reduction in force.

One of the key architects of the layoff was a contractor who testified under oath that SIPI had paid him more than $50,000 in fees for his services.

“We took issue with SIPI for doing this [at the same time] they said the layoffs were necessary because of a budget deficit,” Sandoval says. “The same services [provided by the contractor] to SIPI were available through the Office of Personnel Management for free.”

Nurses protest potential loss of union protections

The labor movement is gearing up to fight a National Labor Relations Board decision that opens the door for employers to strip health professionals of their right to union protection. Handed down in October, the ruling on a group of cases, known together as Kentucky River, says employers can label workers “supervisors” if the workers assign another employee to a particular location, to work at a certain time or to perform a significant task. They also may be called supervisors if they are held accountable for the tasks they assign. One of the benefits of union membership, healthcare professionals say, is protection from retaliation when they raise concerns. “Employers now have a road map for excluding workers from a union,” says AFT vice president Candice Owley, chair of AFT Healthcare. “Nurses have been patients’ most reliable advocates, and this decision could silence their ability to speak out about workplace problems.” Bruce Corkum, below, a registered nurse at Kaiser Permanente in Portland, Ore., spoke out against the ruling at a rally organized by the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals.