June 16, 2015

 

Dear Colleagues,

It is regrettable that we have been unable to reach agreement with the district during our reopener negotiations for the 2015-16 school year. The main barrier to our reaching an agreement involved the longstanding issue of inequitable preparation time for our K-3 teachers. Despite our efforts to secure 30 minutes of guaranteed preparation time for the 2015-16 school year and 90 minutes of guaranteed preparation time for the 2016-17 school year, the district would not agree to safeguard this valuable time needed to prepare for instruction from mandatory collaboration meetings. The district wouldn’t even agree to give the K-3 teachers 2 substitute release days! We were willing to increase the elementary instructional minutes in order to allow for K-3 preparation time. By including “collaboration” meetings within the definition of conference/preparation time, the district could force K-3 teachers to forego valuable preparation time to work with your colleagues on Principal directed assignments, paperwork unrelated to instruction, and other directed tasks.

 

We have come to a critical point in Negotiations. Your voices have been heard! Thank you to those that have sent letters and emails stating your positions on the District’s proposals. The Team has represented all unit members through the proposals we have made to the District. The Team has yet to receive counter-proposals to most of the proposals that were presented, and have yet to receive any proposals we fully agree with. We continue the fight for a salary increase, an increased District contribution to medical benefits, and K-3 preparation time equity.

Dear N-MFT Members,

 

We just got out of another day of negotiations. During

today's session, N-MFT proposed the following: