The district has informed teachers at Oak Grove Middle School that they will provide an additional two and a half hours of instruction every week next year with no additional pay. They are being ordered to provide more instructional time than teachers at any other middle school, more than than they spent this year, and more time than required by the contract. This additional instructional time has been imposed on top of the excessive amount of time required for meetings, reports, and observations that are demanded at a much higher level from Oak Grove teachers than at any other middle school.
We cannot stand by and allow this abuse to happen. Does anyone have any ideas about how we can support our colleagues at Oak Grove?
9 comments:
Get the CTA involved. It's the only way.
Was their a vote by the teachers? The district cannot just lengthen the workday.
The vote was between working one and a half extra hours per week and two and a half extra hours per week - so teaches boycotted the vote. The MDEA Bargaining Team met with the district and proposed a way to calculate how much extra these teachers should be paid. The district failed to acknowledge that they had violated the contract. MDEA is filing an unfair practice charge. While the legal battles are being fought in courts, we need a way to show our solidarity with the teachers of Oak Grove. If this had happened at your school, what would you want the other teachers in the district to do?
Something is missing in this story. Are we being told that some past morning someone just decided that the teachers have to teach an hour and half more on some random whim?
How does this work?
Are the kids kept after school?
What is being taught?
Some details are missing in the story.
Edi,
Here are more details:
Oak Grove is "Program Improvement School," which means that their scores on the state tests have not improved enough to meet state guidelines. A team of advisors from the State Department of Education instructed the school administrator to increase the number of minutes of instruction that the students receive in certain core subjects, like Math and English. The school and district administrators decided that the best way to meet that goal to the keep the students and the teachers at school longer. This means a longer workday for the teachers with no additional pay.
There are other ways to meet the state requirements without increasing the teacher work day or incurring extra costs. I do not know why the school district chose the option.
Seems fairly simple to me. The contract that MDEA has states pretty specifically what the work hours are. If they don't renegotiate that for this site, or at all, then teachers should leave when their site time is up. Work to Rule should be the standard at that school.
Am I missing something?
OK so now I have a little better idea...so the entire school is being kept open an extra hour and a half.
And the Parents are OK on this or do they not have a choice?
Or is it just some kids that are being given the extra attention?
My kids and my Grandkid #1 went to Oak Grove by the way.
On another topic, but one that effects teachers (or, rather, former teachers) at Oak Grove... Does anyone know how someone on 10 pay should report wages when filing for unemployment?
To calculate your weekly pay, start with your annual salary (if your are on 10 pay, take your monthly salary and multiply by 10).
Next, divide your annual pay by 183and then multiply by five to get your weekly pay for the year.
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