New Contract!

Everyone came out on Thursday night to vote to ratify our new contract. What a wonderful job our bargaining team did! We didn't get everything we asked for, but I think this is the best offer we were likely to see. It was gratifying to see the school board approve the contract. It's official.

What's in it? For most folks it was a 4%, 4%, 4%. Approximately 200 members (those at the top of the pay scale) got a 11.5-12% raise over the next three years. Everybody else got at least 12%. The raise structure was intended to help newer teachers more, but as Larry Ehnert pointed out, 11.5% of 70,000 is a lot more than 13% of $40,000. I'm somewhere in the (lower end of the) middle. My friends who've been teaching a long time aren't as thrilled, but I understand the reasoning behind the structure. It's going to make starting teacher salaries more comparable to those around the state. They also added an additional column past Masters + 36 credits that includes a national certification. The interesting thing is that if you have your masters and then get board certified, you jump over to that column. That's a big jump. It will restructure the way most of us think about acquiring our credits.

We get the "new" health insurance, which is the old health insurance with coverage options for singles, couples, & families. We kept our deductibles and they upped the max coverage from one million to two million. Prep time didn't change much. There is some new language that is supposed to help elementary teachers hold on to the prep time they are supposed to get. We are also now all committed to two evening events per year. (Most of us were going to them anyway.)

As for posting grades, the language is vague and relies on "professional judgement." Basically, you are supposed to post every two to three weeks, but there is no hard or fast rule. If the big essay project is going to take you longer than three weeks to get through grading, no one is going to flip. The team said they couldn't really argue that once every nine weeks was professional, and I can see their point. It's not fun to be told we have to post that often, but most of us do anyway.

SAS contracts (extra duties like coaching or sponsoring) changed a little. They raised the "hourly" rates each year and some activites/sports got moved up to a range with more hours. They created a range 8 with more hours, which most of the varsity sports moved into. The only thing that moved down was cheerleading, which didn't seem fair to me. I know how much time our cheerleading coach spends and she works really hard. Drama didn't move, (I'm a range 5, which is supposed to spend 150 hours...hah!) but since I get a contract per production, it works out fairly compared to other activities.

Well, now that the contract is all settled, we look forward to the elections. Check your candidates for their positions on education. Find out who's for getting rid of No Child Left Behind in Alaska. See who's for more (rather than less) funding for Fairbanks education. Vote for who will do right by Fairbanks children. FEA has a list of candidates they endorse. I know Joe Paskvan has a pretty pro-education stand, and Mike Kelly is about as anti-education as you can get. But don't take my word for it. Get out there and find out! Vote your conscience...just VOTE!

Thanks again to everyone who supported us, cheered us on, walked or stood with us. Whenever I got down, there was always someone there, reminding me why we do this. Thank you.

PS. Check out behsdrama.blogspot.com for our next production!

We may have done it!

So...I got my letter published....100+ comments so far...and all our hard work may just have payed off....

The district and the FEA bargaining team have reached a tentative agreement!
Now we just have to see if the membership will ratify it.
It includes:

• $1200 per cell and 2% increase in year one
• $600 per cell and 3% increase in year two
• 4% increase in year three
• access to the new health insurance
• a new column
• and more

See www.northstar.k12.ak.us for the full press release

I've been told this works out to approximately 4%, 4%, 4%, but I haven't done the math myself. If I understand it correctly, it may be giving a higher percent raise to lower paid teachers....(the flat raise) plus a % that everyone gets of their existing salary...but I'm not entirely sure.
In any case, it's a really good feeling to have the district come around and to feel like there's hope. Nobody wanted to strike...now we may not have to.
Hooray!

"The Teacher Who Made a Difference"

I'm tired of writing about bad news. I'd like some good news.
I'm asking readers to post their stories about "the teacher who made a difference" for them. No names are necessary. Just tell me about your favorite teacher and why they were amazing.

We all need happy stories once in awhile.

I'll go first.
In elementary school I had a music teacher (some of you may have had her too) who was wonderful. She was energetic, warm, loved kids, and was a little bit crazy. She'd decorate her whole room for halloween (the piano was a space ship), we played music note bingo for jawbreakers, and there was a box to request copies of songs we liked to sing. It may sound silly, but some of my favorite memories were in that room. I still remember what a half rest and a fermata look like, and I've never lost the love for music she instilled in me. I'm not a musician, but I can appreciate it, and I can sing in the shower. The most amazing thing was a field trip to her house. She lived with her mother and sisters, and they turned the house over to children for a day, with games and a barbeque, and we stopped at Dairy Queen on the way back. (Did I just date myself or what?) It was the highlight event of elementary school.

What an amazing woman, that she was willing to open her home to hordes of children, that she could instill music theory and appreciation in wiggling youngsters, and that I still remember her fondly after all these years. Thank you. You're part of the reason I teach.

Your turn.

Feeling the pressure?

Well, after many teachers showed up at the Oct. 7th school board meeting (I wasn't there...sigh) and took up the entire hour allotted to "community comments" I think the district is starting to feel the pressure. Friends told me that the school board members looked decidedly uncomfortable by the end of the meeting. It must have ruffled some feathers, because today Mike Fisher sent out a FOUR page explanation of the district's position to all teachers.

I'm not even sure that such a document is legal, since I know that they aren't supposed to pressure us in any way. Regardless, it was a document full of vague inaccuracies and "magic accounting". I know I'm still trying to figure out where some of these numbers are coming from, and I'm a math teacher.

My favorite had to be the completely unsubstantiated claim that "Individual teacher pay has generally outpaced inflation over the last ten years." Come again? Click the link on the side bar and plug in the last ten years. Inflation nationwide has been 34.41%.
The raises for the last ten years, you ask?
.5
2
0
2.5
2
2
2
2
2
2.5 (Thank you, Larry Ehnert)
The math teacher in me notes that the above adds up to 17.5%. I think that's about half.
To quote the play: "I wish you'd get your story straight, man."

On a positive note, thanks to the students (former and current) who also read this. Your support means more than you can know.

I sent it!

Thanks to Cheri, who provided vital editing, I submitted my letter to the editor. Now we wait and hope. I'm a little nervous, because I recognize that putting myself out there can invite personal attack. I just think it's too important to keep quiet. If we don't stand up for ourselves, who will?

I Voted!

Thanks to everyone who left comments! It's nice to know I'm not the only one feeling this way.

At the suggestion of a blogging friend of mine, I've added a "subscribe" button, so you can find out when WTFF has been updated. (And yes, I've been alerted to how "interesting" the initials are. Some may say it accurately describes the mood around here.)

I voted today! I hope you did too! FEA gave out a list of education-friendly candidates, and the "Proposition A & B" mess was confusing to anyone who hadn't read carefully. With any luck, the turnover on the school board and the impending Nov. 1 deadline for health plan enrollment will convince the district to reconsider. I have hope that they are coming around.

If you haven't read Christine Dyer's or Cheri Howards's letters to the editor on newsminer.com, I recommend them. (So does everyone else..Christine got over 120 comments and Cheri is at 48 and counting. Unfortunately, some were personal attacks on individual teachers, which I find reprehensible. There were a gratifying number, however, that were very supportive.) Ultimately, however, I can't help thinking that if someone hates teachers, I am unlikely to change their mind. That does not, however, mean I will quit talking. There are people who either don't know what's going on (unbelievable but true) or haven't decided yet how they feel. Mostly, we have to support each other.

It gets harder to get through the day as we read nasty comments on websites and in the news, when we hear Dr. Wagner say that her plan to make teachers feel valued is to come to our rooms and pin ribbons on us, when we know that ultimately this situation just hurts our kids. I just keep telling myself that there ARE people who care, people who value teachers and education, that what we do is important and rewarding.

My husband is a saint. (First, he married a teacher...crazy!) This weekend he planned a surprise birthday-scavenger hunt-party-thing for me. We went to the football game (Go Ravens!) and I had to go person to person gathering clues and doing silly things to get to the next step in the game, all culminating in a surprise party for me at the end. This was a huge, super-secret plot. Other teachers, staff members, parents, current and former students volunteered to help. The entire cheerleading team was involved. And while I don't relish the memory of singing "head-shoulders-knees-and toes" to the stadium fans, I do relish the memory of all the students in the stands cheering along with me, the many birthday wishes, the fact that all these people do support me as a teacher. The reason I mention it is to remind all the teachers who read this that our community values us. They are willing to invest their time and energy in expressing their support. Whenever I get down, I remember that most kids DO care. Parents and community members value what we do. We're there to make a difference in these kids' lives, and we DO.

For me, this weekend was a much-needed reminder.

Letter to the Editor

I've been trying to write a letter to the editor...but it always comes out way over the 350 word limit. I'm still trying to cut it. (Thanks to those who've tried to help!) I'm just too picky.
Here is the original, sans cuts. It says all the things I want to say.

Will Teach For Fuel

Let me introduce myself. I was born here, attended k-12 at borough schools, got my Bachelor's at UAF, and then went back for a 5th year to get my teaching certificate. I'm a teacher.

I work at a great school with amazing coworkers and wonderful kids. I love my job. I don't know very many people who get up in the morning and are excited to go to work. I guess I'm lucky. If I had wanted to make "big bucks", I'd have been an engineer, or a process tech, but I didn't. Teaching is a calling, not a job, and I felt called. I'm a teacher.

Sitting at Homecoming recently, watching my kids run the ball, cheer, parade their floats, I cheered, laughed, and shouted until I was hoarse. I wanted to be able to tell them on Monday "great pass", or "impressive half-time routine", or congratulate them on winning the float contest. I'm proud of them, and happy for them. Do I get paid for that time in the stands, freezing my tail off? No. That's not why I do it. It's part of being a teacher. Being there for the kids, so they can see you in the stands, cheering them on, is part of who we are as teachers. It's what we do. We educate, we support, we protect, and we encourage. One teacher, a woman I highly respect, walked out with one of the royalty nominees in place of her parents, who couldn't attend. We're teachers.

Problem is, I'm also a wife, a daughter, a granddaughter. I have obligations, responsibilities, and bills just like everyone else. I have to pay for heating fuel, pay my mortgage, my electricity, and the day will come when I may have to make the choice between doing what I love and heating my home. Please don't make me make that choice. The kids can only lose.

How? The Fairbanks North Star Borough School District has walked away from the negotiating table. We, the teachers, are working without a contract. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Consumer Price Index, what cost $100 last year costs $105.66 this year. (5.66% increase in one year) $100 in goods and services in 2006 will cost you $108.67 today. (8.67% increase over two years) We aren't even asking the district to cover the cost of inflation. I'd like to make the same amount next year in buying power that I did this year, not less. I can't imagine that anyone else would want anything different.

The district's first offer was zero for three years. If inflation stays the same (and it might go up), next year my salary would be worth 5.66% less than it was this year, and again the next, and again. My $100 this year would cost me $117.96 in three years. I can't afford that. The district's second offer was, according to a recent article in the News Miner, 4.25% spread across three years. Please understand why I can't afford 4.25% spread across three years...when my bills will cost 17.96% more. The math hurts.

We're all hurting. Inflation is killing all of us. I love my kids...the freshmen, the seniors, the little seventh graders who are so excited about school. Please don't force me to choose between them and my heating bill. Everybody loses.

Write your school board members and tell them you support fair pay for teachers.

Thank you,

Angela Chiment, teacher