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American Teacher February 2004--News & Trends
AFT taps new technology for growth, political clout
AFT taps new technology for growth, political clout The smart use of technology and the Internet is increasingly central to the political and organizing success of the AFT as the union maps out its strategy for growth and gears up for the 2004 election campaign. Technology is “one of the most important tools, if not the most important tool, we have to strengthen the union,” AFT secretary-treasurer Edward J. McElroy told participants at the opening session of the union’s Information Technology Conference in Washington, D.C., in December. Facing a hostile environment at the White House and in Congress, he noted, the union’s ability to use technology to work smarter and communicate with members and potential members is essential, especially in organizing and political action. That point was reiterated by keynote speaker Jim Carroll, a futurist and expert in innovation and trends, who noted that because of technology and the connectivity it has brought, “union activism is changing in the 21st century.” Unions are “learning to harness the power of technology” as a resource that supports and informs members and provides services they need, he added. Today’s political landscape—from state budget crises, the Bush tax cuts, the attack on overtime rights and Medicare “reform” that is a windfall for HMOs and the drug companies—makes mobilizing members more urgent than ever. Mobilization methods include targeted e-mail lobbying campaigns, greater use of electronic newsletters and messages, accurate membership records for mailing and phone-banking, and the ability to interact quickly with members and nonmembers to influence decision-makers. The gathering of more than 160 participants—including 25 “teams” of AFT elected leaders and technical staff—reflected the growing acknowledgment among affiliates that technology is an essential part of what they do. The conference focused both on current and new technology resources the AFT can provide to affiliates. Significantly, all these resources can be accessed through a Web site, demonstrating the growing role of the Internet as the engine for the union’s communications efforts. This has enabled the AFT and the AFL-CIO to give even the smallest AFT affiliate access to powerful software programs and resources simply by logging on to the Internet. “We have come a long way since our first conference, but our challenges are greater,” noted Charles Stunson, director of the AFT information technology department, which hosted the conference. “While I applaud our success, we must renew our efforts to help AFT affiliates employ leading-edge technology as a tool to energize our staffs and programs.”
Teacher quality report wins measured praise While far from perfect, a new blue-ribbon report on quality in teaching sends a strong call for moving the profession beyond outmoded industrial models of compensation and recognition, says AFT president Sandra Feldman. A member of the commission that authored the report, Teaching at Risk: A Call to Action, Feldman provided key input into shaping many of its recommendations, including those calling for competitive compensation for teachers and robust systems of professional development and preparation. The final document, she says in an addendum to the report, could help spur needed changes in the profession. “The stalemate in improving teachers’ compensation and professional roles must be broken and dramatic improvement made, and generally along the lines of the recommendations in this report.” However, the AFT president also voiced a number of important caveats about the recommendations made by the Teaching Commission, which issued the report. In particular, Feldman expressed disappointment about the report’s too-enthusiastic support for performance-based pay for individual teachers, given the lack of research about the effectiveness of this approach. She also cited as problem areas the report’s less-than-exhaustive treatment of career tracks and other nontraditional recognition systems, and its less-than-realistic portrait of all building principals as instructional leaders. “Based on my years of experience with the real world of schools and school systems,” Feldman said, “some of the report’s proposals stem more from hope than evidence. “Nevertheless the report is a major contribution toward moving forward the agenda of increasing teacher compensation, professionalism and quality.” The commission was established and chaired by former IBM head Louis V. Gerstner Jr. Other commission members included: former governors James B. Hunt, Roy E. Barnes and Frank Keating; former Education Secretary Richard W. Riley; Barbara Bush; Ellen Condliffe Lagemann, dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education; and superintendents Arlene Ackerman of San Francisco and Beverly Hall of Atlanta.
UTD wins substantial pay raises for teachers, other staff Teachers and other school employees in Dade County, Fla., will receive their first pay raise since 2001 as the result of a new contract between the United Teachers of Dade (UTD) and the school district. UTD members approved the agreement in November, with an impressive 90 percent turning out to vote. The contract adds two salary steps that will provide teachers with at least a $500 raise and more than $7,000 in some cases. It also substantially reduces employees’ health insurance costs. The step increase for the 2002-03 school year is retroactive to Aug. 21, while employees received the step for the current school year on Jan. 2. The agreement runs through 2006 but includes a provision allowing for new salary negotiations each year, which UTD administrator Mark Richard has indicated the union plans to pursue. The new contract is a big victory for UTD, which won a much larger package of pay increases than the school board had been offering during negotiations. UTD members had turned out in large numbers to protest the lack of progress in negotiations. The union represents about 19,000 teachers and 10,000 paraprofessionals and clerical staff. “This represents not only a victory for all teachers but is clear evidence that our union is back leading the fight to protect educators and public education,” says Georgeanna Vagias, a teacher at North Dade Middle School. Pam Sturrup, who works in the district’s attendance services office, says the contract is a good one for support staff, as well. “This is critical because all of us play an important role in the delivery of education to our children.” The contract is just the latest sign of progress in rebuilding UTD, which has been operating under AFT administratorship since May 2003. As Richard reports, “We lowered dues, reduced staff, put teachers and support staff in charge of committees and brought about a level of unprecedented activism.”
Contract battle ends with new Chicago agreement Chicago Teachers Union members have a new contract—which addresses key concerns that had prompted educators to reject a previous tentative agreement. The new pact, announced Nov. 11 after a marathon bargaining session and approved by members one week later, ended the threat of a strike in the nation’s third largest school district. Members had rejected an earlier tentative agreement in October, and the union’s House of Delegates followed with a strike vote recommendation to members. To break the stalemate, the CTU bargaining team focused its final efforts around three major concerns members had voiced prior to rejecting the first deal: the length of the contract, higher employee healthcare costs and provisions for an extended workday. The new contract shortens the agreement from five to four years and trims the employee share of increases in healthcare premiums, co-pays and prescription drugs. It also shortens by five minutes the extended workday provisions in the first tentative agreement. The final agreement is a 15-minute extension of the workday. The extra time would be a “wash,” however, because a seven-day reduction in the academic year also is built into the new deal. The CTU bargaining team also was able to win new provisions not included the first time around, such as annual bonuses for paraprofessionals totaling $900 over the life of the contract and new financial incentives for educators at the top of the pay scale. The parties achieved a new contract that “addresses the major concerns of our members, addresses some additional key working condition issues, and includes several educational quality provisions,” reported CTU president Deborah Lynch, who is also an AFT vice president. “CTU members were determined to do whatever it took to achieve a good agreement and showed that determination in the House of Delegates’ strike vote recommendation, on the informational picket lines, and with outreach efforts to community and civic groups on our issues.” The new contract won approval by a 15,104 to 12,599 vote, which was a significant shift from October, when educators rejected the first tentative agreement by a 6-4 ratio. “This union has sent a powerful message of strength, determination and unity that has sent shock waves throughout the board of education and the entire city,” said Lynch.
Clearing the air in schools San Francisco school nurse Barbara Headman can’t cure the students who come to her with asthma, but she’s doing what she can to prevent others from getting the disease. Shortly after joining the staff at Marshall Elementary School, Headman found out about a United Educators of San Francisco/AFT program that trains members to recognize the air quality problems that can lead to students and school staff coming down with asthma and other diseases. “When I came on board [at Marshall] I noticed that there was a high number of asthmatic students,” Headman recalls. In addition to having asthma attacks during the school day, many of these students were often absent from school because of the illness, she says. The AFT offers training that assists locals and members in improving the indoor environmental quality in their districts’ schools. Following her initial AFT training, Headman, a member of the United Educators of San Francisco, led a “walk-through” inspection in the three schools to which she is assigned. It resulted in cleaner air ducts and a filter exchange in all three buildings. Too little attention has been paid to air quality in some schools, particularly those in urban areas, says Darryl Alexander, who heads up the national AFT health and safety program. “It’s our members and their students who are most adversely affected by the bad conditions inside some schools—mold triggering asthma attacks and kids falling asleep because there isn’t enough fresh air,” Alexander says. Supported by a grant from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the AFT program equips members to evaluate the air quality in their schools. This past October, Headman and 25 other AFT members went to Washington, D.C., to attend the EPA Tools for School symposium. “We want to give leaders and members the skills to work with their superintendents of schools and school boards on the development of better policies regarding indoor air quality,” Alexander says. Policies related to building renovations, pesticide application and mold removal are among those that affect the air quality in and around a school, she points out. Headman says the training also has equipped her to reach out to students, parents and other teachers, and educate them about what can trigger asthma attacks both at school and at home. “As a school nurse, I understand the serious nature of even mild asthma,” Headman says. “It doesn’t take a severe case of asthma to kill you.”
Oklahoma City local waging fight against privatization Proposals to contract out school support services are nothing new in districts across the country. But a plan to contract out a district’s entire array of services to one general contractor, as some school board members in Oklahoma City want to do, would be privatization on an entirely new scale. The privatization proposal is being pushed hardest by school board chair Cliff Hudson, who is CEO of the Sonic fast-food drive-in chain. What’s unique about the plan is that the district would hire one overall contractor to manage the services, and that contractor could then subcontract out services to any number of other companies. “This is one of the most serious proposals to contract out services that I’ve ever seen,” says Nancy Van Meter, who monitors such efforts through the AFT privatization center. “I am very concerned this could be a model for other districts.” The school board had been scheduled to vote on the plan in November, but that vote is now on hold, in large part because of some serious questions the Oklahoma City Federation of Classified Employees raised about the proposal and about business ties among key players. AFT research revealed that Hudson’s company has business ties to Sodexho, which has submitted a bid for the contract. It turns out that the two companies signed an agreement last year to open Sonics in Sodexho-run facilities around the country. In a press conference calling on Hudson to resign, local union president and AFT vice president David Gray said the board chair showed “complete disdain for his fellow school board members and the people of Oklahoma City. The school board should end its misguided effort to contract out the jobs of honest, hardworking school employees.” Union activists and community supporters later held an informational picket in front of Sonic’s new headquarters in Oklahoma City. In addition to publicizing information about Hudson’s conflict of interest, the union has educated board members and the public about numerous problems that have arisen with private contractors in other districts, including hiring convicted sex offenders because of lax background checks and cutting corners on food safety. The union campaign has mobilized members and brought together allies across the community. “We’re doing everything we can to stop this,” Gray says.
NAEP math scores post impressive gains Solid gains in mathematics achievement stole the show when results of the 2003 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) were announced late last year. The latest scores from NAEP, often labeled “the nation’s report card,” reveal math gains for fourth- and eighth-graders at the basic, proficient and advanced levels. More than three-quarters of fourth-graders and 68 percent of eighth-graders performed at or above the basic level in math, up significantly from 2000 results. Also improved was the percentage of students performing at the rigorous “proficient” level: Almost one-third of both fourth- and eighth-graders met this tough benchmark. The progress shows the power of mathematics standards developed by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and is evidence of effective implementation of those standards, said NCTM president Johnnie Lott. He cautioned that much work remains to be done, however, particularly when it comes to closing the achievement gap between key subgroups, such as minority students and children in poverty. The percentage of black, Hispanic, American Indian and Alaskan Native students achieving math proficiency lagged significantly behind percentages posted by white and Asian students at both the fourth- and eighth-grade levels, and “that gap must be eliminated,” Lott said. NAEP results in reading also show room for continued improvement. The average fourth-grade score in reading was not measurably different from results in 2002 or 1992, although the 2003 averages included a higher percentage of special needs students participating in NAEP. And although the overall averages remained flat, the percentage of fourth-grade students reading at or above the proficient level has increased during the past decade. At the eighth-grade level, the percentage of students at or above basic levels and proficient levels increased over the past decade, although results in 2003 were flat compared to the prior year. Standards in math were more quickly embraced and adopted than those in reading, which for several years stimulated a “reading wars” debate that has subsided only recently thanks to widely disseminated research about best practices. If history with mathematics is any indication, reading achievement scores may post healthy gains in future years as more and more school districts adopt and implement research-proven methods.
Broward teachers fight for a contract Teachers in Broward County, Fla., have used a variety of strategies in their efforts to achieve a contract agreement that includes decent salary increases and affordable health insurance. In December 2003, a large group of Broward Teachers Union (BTU) members protested outside a school board meeting, which ended with the board members reversing an earlier decision to give themselves 10 percent raises. Before the holiday break, BTU members also conducted a “work to the rule” protest in which they declined to take part in unpaid activities outside the regular school day. The union and district have been negotiating for several months without reaching an agreement.
Healthcare benefits are top trouble spot in bargaining As employers put more pressure on employees to bear a greater portion of healthcare costs, AFT locals now are being challenged to minimize this cost-sharing and ensure that quality healthcare remains available to members. AFT researchers Jewell Gould and John Abraham have warned union affiliates of the increasing difficulty that many negotiators are facing to maintain healthcare benefits. Gould and Abraham provided insights and strategies for participants at the union’s state federation presidents’ conference this past fall. Until the early 1990s, there was a “social covenant” that employers would pay all or most of the cost of premiums for both single and family healthcare coverage, but that notion is quickly disappearing, said Abraham. Today, employees routinely are asked to pay part of their premiums and to accept ever-growing co-payments and deductibles. “Every employer is also trying to get rid of retiree healthcare coverage and to get rid of family coverage,” he added. Healthcare coverage is already among the top negotiating trouble spots for AFT affiliates, said Gould and Abraham, and because there is often extreme pressure by members not to change their healthcare benefits, the union ends up accepting higher cost-sharing and/or giving up wage increases just to maintain benefits. The speakers urged AFT local leaders to monitor healthcare trends in their districts or regions and look at both short-term and long-term strategies to keep costs down. “Don’t assume that your [employer’s] Human Resources department is on top of this,” Abraham warned. One of the newest proposals from employers is to offer a “health reimbursement account,” also known as “consumer-driven healthcare,” Abraham explained. In such an account, a very high deductible—$3,000, for example—is set, and each employee is given a certain amount, perhaps $1,000, to spend on any legitimate healthcare cost. After the employee exhausts that $1,000, however, he or she must pay out of pocket for the next $2,000 in costs. The twist on this, however, is that employers will allow any unspent amount of the $1,000 stipend to “roll over” to the next year, creating a strong incentive for the employee to limit his or her use of healthcare services. “Existing arrangements encourage employees to seek medical care as quickly as possible in order to find the problem and get it cured,” noted Abraham. “Consumer-driven plans discourage people from seeking care for fear that they may need their stipend to offset costs in the future.” Even as union negotiators struggle to respond to the demands for more cost-sharing, they also must ensure that members’ access to quality healthcare is not compromised, said Ann Twomey, an AFT vice president and member of AFT Healthcare’s program and policy council. “The discussion has to talk about quality care, including the number of nurses for each patient,” she said. The nurse-to-patient staffing ratio is rapidly becoming a top issue for AFT Healthcare as hospitals focus more resources on marketing and profitability instead of patient care, she said. To respond to the healthcare crisis, locals have been urged to create healthcare committees to monitor these issues and to ensure that quality and access are maintained for members, Gould and Abraham reported.
AFT members fight for nursing home quality Placing a loved one in a nursing home should never be an act of faith. Families have every right to expect that their relatives will be guaranteed the highest quality of care at these facilities, and a group of AFT members in Colorado is working to ensure that this guarantee isn’t broken. Kevin Nelson, a surveyor and complaint investigator for the health facilities division of the Colorado department of health, is among the many AFT members who have put their professional reputations on the line to make sure that nursing home care is all it should be. The job of a nursing home inspector is crucial, Nelson says, because the problems can be grave, even life-threatening, and affect one of the most vulnerable segments of society. And he’s seen it all: from nursing home residents suffering from acute dehydration to patients trapped in bedrails. “Lately, the complaints have been less the ‘cold food’ type and more the gross neglect ‘they killed my mother type,’” Nelson says. The job of a nursing home inspector involves long hours, extended time away from home and family—and an altogether new set of headaches in recent years. Several inspectors have been personally maligned by nursing home owners—their motives and professionalism impugned—when they report problems at facilities. The problem has been particularly acute for inspectors who respond to specific complaints lodged against facilities, perhaps because “there is an awareness by nursing home providers and their lawyers that we give them the hardest time,” Nelson speculates. Recently, nursing home inspectors have been working through their AFT affiliate, the Colorado Federation of Public Employees, to protect the integrity of the inspection process—to make it more open and accessible to the public. That’s a big safeguard against problems uncovered by inspectors ultimately being “solved” by nursing home providers (who have a powerful lobby in the state) making informal phone calls to public officials. It’s a major step not only to protect nursing home inspectors from unfair attacks but also to protect the valuable work these AFT members do. “There are lots of 60-hour weeks, a lot of overtime and weekends, and family lives are affected [but] professionalism keeps regulators going,” Nelson says. It’s a great example of “working through government to improve conditions for the vulnerable,” he adds.
Boston teachers, union press contract battle The Boston Teachers Union is turning up the heat on Mayor Thomas M. Menino to take a leadership role in ending a contract dispute that has dragged on since the summer. In mid-December, members of the AFT affiliate voted unanimously to picket Menino’s 2004 state of the city address. Joining them in the protest were members of all 32 unions representing city workers—all of whom are working without a contract despite an earlier statement from Menino in which he said he wanted negotiations to conclude in late 2003. Pay is at the heart of the dispute for BTU members. The city has refused to budget from its offer of a 1 percent pay increase—a proposal the union and its members have called both paltry and offensive. Teachers also are demanding smaller class sizes and compensation for three additional professional development days to be added to the schedule. An aggressive community outreach effort has been the union’s response to negotiations that broke down Oct. 15. BTU members have set up regular informational picketing at schools throughout the city as part of its “Work for Fairness” campaign and have sent letters to parents explaining why picketing is necessary. As part of the campaign, members also have withdrawn from any voluntary uncompensated activities at school that do not directly affect teaching and learning. “It is our hope that the picketing, as part of the Work for Fairness campaign, helps drives home the point that the city has to begin negotiating in earnest with us,” says Boston Teachers Union president Richard Stutman. “We are determined to obtain a fair and equitable contract.”
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American Federation of Teachers, AFL•CIO - 555 New Jersey Avenue, NW - Washington, DC 20001 Copyright by the American Federation of Teachers, AFL•CIO. All
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