ROEA Reporter

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Welcome Back!

I hope everyone had a relaxing and refreshing summer.  Along with Bertha Arribas, Barbara Pollis, Nila Wilson, and Jane Drake, I spent a week at the National Education Association convention in Washington, D.C. The theme of the convention was to do everything that we can to elect John Kerry as our next president in order to better fund public education, regain the respect for unionized teachers that has eroded under President Bush (remember Secretary of Education Rod Paige vilifying us as “terrorists?”), and fix the damaging features of the No Child Left Behind act.

Locally, the ROEA summer was involved with two important events.  At the end of last year, one of our special education teachers was charged by parents with violating the rights of their child in the course of her teaching. Under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, when charges are filed against a teacher, the county and state are obligated to investigate.  We learned that teachers do not have the right to be represented during a county or state IDEA investigation.  I found the idea that a governmental body could conduct a private investigation of a teacher to be disturbing.  As a result, I have talked with my state representative.  Additionally, I spoke about this at the convention and teacher representation during IDEA investigations is now part of the NEA’s national legislative goals. This means that the next time IDEA legislation is reviewed by Congress the NEA will lobby to include teacher representation during investigations and hearings.

The other significant summer event was the discharge of a third year probationary teacher.  Although school districts have the right to discharge probationary teachers without having to establish a reason for doing so, this discharge was particularly egregious in that the teacher, Robin Trembour, had two years of perfect year end evaluations and in her third year of teaching had two good observations.  In other words, the basis for the discharge was something other than her sound teaching skills. Many teachers have supported Robin with letters to the Administration and Board, and parents have attended Board meetings throughout the summer requesting that Robin be reinstated.  I wrote a letter to the Board requesting a hearing so Robin could have the opportunity to address what many of us believe to be false allegations by the principal.  As of this writing, the Board has refused all requests despite parent, student, and colleague accolades and support.  (At the Board meeting of 8/26/04, two Board members, Mr. Tyndell and Mrs. Wright, supported a motion for reinstatement; three Board members, Mr. Tyndell, Mrs. Wright, and Mr. Hartman supported a motion for a hearing, but four votes are needed for a majority.) 

The tenure act is unfair to probationary teachers—made even more so by the Administration’s and Board’s unwavering support for an obviously wrong decision by the principal.

In future negotiations, I hope we commit ourselves to developing a contractual process that protects probationary teachers from arbitrary decisions that are damaging to their careers.  Everyone who interacted with Robin, with the exception of the principal, thought of her as a great teacher, colleague, and contributor to the profession.  I have nothing but admiration for a young teacher who would just like to be back in her classroom, but instead is fighting for her integrity and fair treatment of teachers. 

I suppose that this is a somber welcome back message.  But if we can turn these problems into better protection for teachers, and if we can elect John Kerry president, I’ll be able to write a better one next year.

Sid

New Officers  

We’re starting the new year with four new ROEA officers. Marcia Rauschendorfer has been teaching science and math in Royal Oak  since 1986 and is currently at Kimball. For the past eight years she has served as ROEA secretary. Marcia’s  new Executive Vice President responsibilities will include representing the ROEA at Joint Committee meetings with Sid Kardon and Paul Chambers. She will report back to the AR’s on issues that are discussed in Joint Committee meetings. Sid will count on Marcia to take his place at ROEA and Board of Education meetings if he’s not able to attend.

Jennifer Jump teaches first, second and third grade at Longfellow. Jennifer grew up in Royal Oak and graduated from Dondero. She is beginning her tenth year of teaching in Royal Oak and would like to inform the newer teachers about all the great work the ROEA does so that they will want to be more involved. Jennifer is taking over the duties of Secretary. She will be responsible for writing minutes for General Meetings, RA meetings and Executive Board meetings.

Chris Baer is our new Program Vice President. She’s looking forward to organizing social events like the Retirement Party and Mid-Year Party. Julie of the “Love Boat” will be her role model. Additionally she will serve on the Curriculum Subcommittee. Chris teaches 5th grade at Upton. She was an RCRT at Whittier for eleven years and has also taught at Oakland and Parker.

As our new MEA Delegate Kara Daunt hopes to have an impact on educational law, especially No Child Left Behind legislation. Kara taught in Kalamazoo for four years and then attended law school for a year. She found that she prefers teaching to attending law school. Her involvement with the MEA will give her the opportunity to be involved in legislative activities. Currently she is teaching 4th Grade at Whittier

Contract Feature

Paid Leave

Paid Leave, often referred to as sick leave, includes different categories of use. Please refer to page 33 of the current contract for more information.  There are no changes in these areas in our new contract which you will receive soon.

All teachers receive 11 days of paid leave at the beginning of the school year. Days that are not used are carried forward to the following year. If, for example, a teacher uses 5 paid leave days this year, that teacher will have 17 days (11 new days plus 6 carryover days) available for the 2004-05 school year.

Paid leave days can be used for various reasons. The primary uses are your own illness or illness in the immediate family. If your child is ill, for example, you can use paid leave days to take care of your child. You can use as many days as you need for this purpose. The limitation on the number of leave days that can be utilized to care for a family member comes into effect for family members who do not reside with you or who are not your dependents. (A child at college is probably still your dependent and you could utilize as many paid leave days as necessary for their care since they would be an immediate family member.) If you are helping to care for an ill parent who lives in the area, you can have 3 paid leave days for this purpose. If the ill parent lives out of the area, 5 days of paid leave is available for their care.

Paid leave days are also used for the death of a family member (3 days for the metropolitan area; 5 days if the deceased is out of the area) and for personal business leave.

Personal Business Leave

Personal business leave is covered on page 36 of the contract.  The 3 days of personal business leave are part of the 11 paid leave days which are allotted annually.  Personal business days are not lost if unused. They are converted into accumulated sick leave days the following year.  The forms for personal business are in the school office.  You do not have to fill out a form for the discretionary day.  However, you should inform your principal that you will be using personal business leave.  Additionally, you must call your absence into the SEMS employee absence system.

Extended Illness or Health Conditions

If a teacher needs days beyond their accumulated days due to a long term illness or health condition, paid days can be drawn from the sick leave bank. The bank starts out the academic year with 325 days available to us as a group. 

After 15 days of an illness, health condition or need to care for a dependent, we are eligible to draw time from the Sick Leave Bank if we have exhausted our own paid leave time. (Due to the 15 day requirement of the bank, there could be a gap in coverage if a teacher doesn't have 15 accumulated leave days. In this event, the teacher can apply to the Joint Committee for consideration of full coverage due to a financial hardship.)

A typical example of drawing days from the Sick Leave Bank is for maternity. A teacher may have 20 days of accumulated leave and her doctor recommends 6 weeks (30 school days) for the post partum recovery period. The teacher would exhaust her 20 days of accumulated time and would then draw (upon application to the Bank) 10 days from the Sick Leave Bank. The entire period of recovery would then be covered in full.

Congratulations to scholarship winners!

Sudents awarded a ROEA  Family Member Scholarship are: Steven Conaton, David Flynn and Kristen Turner. Steven is the son of James Conaton and plans to attend Western Michigan University to earn a degree in music. David is the son of Linda Flynn. He plans to attend Michigan State to study political science. Kristen’s mother is Kathleen Michaels. Kristen will study Elementary Education at Michigan State.

In addition to Family Member Scholarships our members provide scholarships for graduates of Dondero and Kimball.

Rebecca Kirkman (Dondero) received a $1000 scholarship to attend  Hope College. Lisa Fletcher and Vaibhov Joshi (Kimball) were each awarded $500. Lisa will attend the University of Michigan and Vaibhov will attend Oakland Community College.

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