AFT summer volunteers help rebuild New Orleans

Almost 80 AFT members from across the country spent two weeks of their summer vacation cleaning and rebuilding in New Orleans. Union volunteers signed up for painting, landscaping, tutoring and building everything from new homes to a playground.

One of the first orders of business was painting the halls at Eleanor McMain High School, which reopened a year ago. If this school was in good enough shape to be opened, “I would hate to see the ones that weren’t,” says volunteer Dana O’Kelly Stewart, a field organizer from the United Teachers of Dade in Miami.

It wasn’t just the condition of McMain that surprised volunteers. “It was devastating when we went on the bus ride through the city,” says John Amato, a member of New York City’s United Federation of Teachers who works in Brooklyn. AFT volunteers were jarred by the spray paint that still branded houses nearly two years after Hurricane Katrina, indicating the number of dead.

The conditions are a “thousand times worse than I could have imagined. If I didn’t know, I would have thought the hurricane came through six months ago,” says Megan May, a member of the Great Falls (Mont.) Education Association, an NEA-AFT local. When she got the call for volunteers, she quit her summer job as a waitress and went.

Union Study: Heat inside school buses hits 116°

school bus drivers know how hot their buses can get, but it's not easy persuading officials to do anything about it.

So, the Caddo Federation of Teachers and Support Personnel in Shreveport, La., conducted a study to measure just how hot the buses become. Over three days starting Aug. 14, the first day of school, 11 Caddo drivers measured temperature and humidity ranges inside their buses three times a day.

What they found: Each day, temperatures in the buses spiked well over 100 degrees. The top reading was 116 degrees.

The union presented its findings to the school board as PSRP Reporter went to press. Caddo federation president Jackie Lansdale is calling on the district to push back the start of school.

AFT members weigh in on bus emergencies

An informal online poll of aft members suggests that a surprisingly low number of schools conduct emergency bus evacuation drills.

In more than 125 responses so far, 30 percent said their schools don’t conduct evacuation drills at all, while 22 percent said they conduct drills in the first month of school, 18 percent in the first two months and 17 percent in the first two weeks.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration guidance on student transportation recommends that students be instructed and drilled in safe riding practices, including bus evacuation, at least once per semester. Many states require these drills within the first week or two of the school year.

More than 50 Minneapolis children were aboard a school bus when the I-35W bridge collapsed on Aug. 1. An adult kicked out the rear emergency door and helped passengers off the bus after its 30-foot free fall crunched two vertebrae in the driver’s back.

To take part in the survey, go to www.aft.org/psrp and click on “Are Your Students Prepared for a Bus Emergency?”

N.Y. state support staff get permanent day

New york state now has a permanent recognition day for school-related professionals. Gov. Eliot Spitzer in late July signed into law the recognition day, set for the third Tuesday in November, which falls during American Education Week.

New York State United Teachers strongly supported the bill, which was approved by the state Legislature in June. Previously, the Legislature had to pass a recognition day every year. The law now provides permanent recognition (and a permanent place on the state calendar) for the thousands of education support personnel in the state.

Share your successes in school teamwork

Now’s the time to get in on the ground floor as our union begins preparing the second edition of “It Takes a Team: A Profile of Support Staff in American Education,” AFT research director Jewell Gould told members of the AFT PSRP program and policy council at their spring meeting.

Through personal stories and national data, the original 2002 study revealed the contributions of our school support staff, which the study called “the living infrastructure that makes public education possible.” The second chapter in this story will show how these key roles have evolved over the past five years.

To share your story of the everyday miracles our members accomplish as they work hard behind the scenes, contact AFT researcher Marie-Louise Caravatti, mcaravat@aft.org.

Congress votes to broaden kids’ healthcare coverage

In a victory for america’s children, the U.S.  Senate resoundingly joined the House on Aug. 2 in voting to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). The federal-state partnership insures children whose parents work but can’t afford health insurance.

Both parties mustered support to expand the program—by $50 billion in the House and $35 billion in the Senate—compared with President Bush’s request to increase it by $5 billion, which actually would reduce the number of children covered because of rising costs.

“Children have won a crucial victory today,” said AFT president Edward J. McElroy, adding that proper healthcare helps reduce students’ absences and increase their academic success.

The president has threatened to veto the bill.