http://www.nea.org/oklahoma

Negotiators from the Riverview School District and R EA are already hard at work on our next contract. The REA Bargaining Team reports that progress is being made due to a “preferred solutions” approach in which each side presents its best ideas and seeks common ground. Following are some highlights from the daylong, Monday, May 13 session:

● The sides signed seven tentative agreements that dealt with language changes and updates in the contract;

● There was discussion on updating the contract to reflect current practices around payroll deductions;

● Compensation discussions and preferred solutions are on the back burner until the legislature sets a salary table during the special session that started this week;

● Both sides shared ideas about time, and how to best use this limited resource to meet student needs and to maximize teacher collaboration and prep time. The conversation included use of early release days; the REA team presented a preferred solution aimed at protecting planning time for teachers.

The next session, set for Friday, May 24, is to include discussion around special education issues in the district.

Two neighboring districts (Bellevue and Lake Washington) have already reached tentative agreements and will vote on them in coming weeks, giving our team the opportunity to look at possible changes in comparable districts’ contracts.

The REA Bargaining Team and the district have begun talks to develop a framework for upcoming contract negotiations.
The team is using this guiding philosophy as they discuss how increased workload demands have impacted Riverview us: The demands on educators have grown to an unsustainable level.
The REA and district teams met for two half-day sessions on April 19 and 26 to discuss preliminary issues, calendars, time commitments, and timelines for negotiations, which can be adjusted as needed. Currently, sessions are on the calendar for May, June, July, and August.
Both sides presented and listened to the other’s issues, revealing a number of overlapping concerns, such as the time required to do our jobs and the new evaluation model. In the talks, both sides sought to clarify positions and concerns to gain a better understanding of the issues.
This week, the Bargaining Team is continuing to discuss special education issues with REA members and with Mark Anderson, a recognized expert in our state on this issue.
Thank you to the Bargaining Support Team for providing lunches and healthy snacks. Also, thank you for the flower planter, which we intend to take to the meetings. Your time and efforts have very much been appreciated.

The bargaining team is in search of a note taker for each of the bargaining sessions. If you are interested in the opportunity please contact Janet Laverne.

Information provided by Riverview Education Association
Questions/Comments can be directed to the Bargaining Team: REAnegotiation2013@gmail.com

April 2013                  

Thank you to everyone who participated in the online survey and one of the pre-bargaining listening sessions. Bargaining updates will be sent throughout the spring and summer to keep you informed about issues and progress as the new contract is negotiated.

WE HAVE ALSO CREATED A CLOSED FACEBOOK PAGE TO SUPPORT THE BARGAIN: REA Bargain 2013.  Search for it on Facebook and request to be added. Bargaining Updates will be posted here as well.

Below are some of the concerns REA members have asked to be addressed at the table:

• Riverview educators work hard to support student success, yet expectations are continuously on the rise.  The new evaluation system and Common Core Standards will require much more work and time from each teacher.  There is not enough planning time dedicated to what we need to accomplish in order to do our jobs. 

• We need and deserve a competitive pay and insurance benefits package.   

• The furlough days, in exchange for cuts in our pay, should not be continued.

• Class sizes are a concern.  Students deserve their teachers’ time and attention.  Our most vulnerable students need support to assure their success. 

As your REA Bargaining Team continues to compile and assess the input, we will keep you informed. REA bargaining Team members also will be meeting with Special Education staff to learn more about the issues of concern that they have.

Your REA Bargaining Team met with the District’s Bargaining Team for joint training, laid out some expectations along with hopes and concerns about this bargaining session and looked at calendars to set aside time to negotiate.

Information provided by Riverview Education Association

Questions/Comments can be directed to the Bargaining Team:  REAnegotiation2013@gmail.com

Overall, the proposed two-year budget spends $33.2 billion for the two year period, which represents about a 6% increase in spending over the 2011-13 budget. On the other hand, the state forecasts $32.8 billion in (near) General Fund-State revenue which prompted the no new revenue budget to resort to the funding shifts from the capital budget and other funds to accommodate the new spending.

Higher Education:

The Senate’s 2013-15 budget proposal assumes no increase in resident undergraduate tuition rates for the two-year period. It purports to provide nearly $78 million overall in additional funds for core academic functions at the various institutions, however these funds will be netted against an expectation that each institution can gain yet even more “administrative efficiencies” and are not adequate to covering what could have been gained through further tuition increases. The amount for each institution varies, but they average about 5% of the 2011-13 biennial funding level.

Despite the previously touted reduction in tuition being proposed by the Senate, that proposal is not included in this budget proposal, but instead is part of a separate piece of legislation (SB 5883).

Notable New Higher Education Enhancements:

In addition to the funding for core functions addressed above, the proposed Senate budget includes $ 50 million in “performance funding” designed to recognize each institution’s performance in statewide goals related to retention and completion. In addition, a modest amount is provided for the state’s two-year college system to support creating two applied baccalaureate degree programs in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. The higher education budgets assume only very modest changes in the numbers of full-time equivalent state supported students per academic year.

The Senate budget proposal also includes an additional $33.7 million in funding to support the demand for College Bound Scholarship funding to fulfill the promises made in 2007 for scholarships to state students who meet the eligibility criteria for those scholarships with the first cohort beginning to receive those funds in the fall of 2012.

Notable Higher Education Reductions:

In addition to the presumed savings on health benefits detailed below, the proposed major reductions to the higher education system are elsewhere in the student financial aid programs. These includes savings from: Suspending again the Future Teachers Conditional Scholarship program ($2 million); Suspending again the Health Professionals Conditional Scholarship Program ($7.6 million); Suspending again the Washington Scholars and WAVE financial aid programs ($8.4 million); and Suspending again the Small Grant Program ($1 million). In each of these instances, those students who received awards in previous years will maintain their awards until they complete their program of study, however these suspensions mean that no new students will receive any awards.

Higher Education Compensation:

There is no funding for additional salaries at any of the higher education institutions, including no I-732 cost-of-living increase for employees in the two-year colleges. This also includes no funding for faculty increments at the two-year schools. For higher education employee health care, the proposed Senate budget reduces the monthly allocation for benefit due to favorable claims experience. However, the budget also proposes a radical shift in the delivery of health benefits to higher education employees who work less than three-quarter time. These employees would NO LONGER be eligible to receive benefit coverage under the Public Employees Benefits Board (PEBB) plans and would therefore become eligible to purchase their coverage – on their own – through the Washington Health Benefit Exchange established under the federal Affordable Care Act. The proposal assumes that, depending on household income levels, many of these employees will be eligible for federal subsidies in the purchase of their coverage. Some funding from the overall savings is redirected to assist part-time employees pay for their premium costs. The direct impact to any individual employees is not discernible at this point pending eligibility determination based on their family income. However, anyone less than 400% of federal poverty level is eligible for some manner of subsidy in purchasing coverage through the exchange. In addition to this change, for those full-time employees who remain in the PEBB for their health benefits, who also consume tobacco products, will be charged a monthly premium surcharge of $25 above the amount paid by others. Should this entire proposal advance towards any realistic implementation we will provide additional details for you on the impacts on higher education employees.

K-12:

The state cost to fund the current statutory level of services required in K-12 for the 2013-15 biennium is nearly $14.6 billion. The Senate budget proposal provides just over $15.1 billion for our state’s schools. This net increase of $587 million includes approximately $1 billion in new education enhancements, and about $466 million in reductions – primarily due to another proposed suspension for the I-732 cost-of-living increases. In addition to these totals, another $87 million in health benefit funding for K-12 employees is assumed elsewhere in the budget reducing the net increase in funding to $500 million.

The proposed Senate budget provides no new class size reduction funding and proposes to repeal the I-732 COLA provided to educators. The budget does restore funding for the 1.9% salary reduction (3% for administrative staff) that was included in the 2011-13 biennium.

Notable New Enhancements:

· Full funding for the Materials, Supplies and Operating Costs formula – $521 million

· An increase (adjustment) to the Material, Supplies and Operating Cost rates for Skills Centers – $15 million

· Fully fund the new student transportation system beginning in the first year of the biennium – $197 million

· Incrementally expand Full Day Kindergarten to schools beginning with those with 50% Free and Reduced Lunch eligibility, or the equivalent of 30% of all kindergarten students in the state in 2013-14 and 35% of students in 2014-15 – $41 million

· Restoration of the 1.9 percent state cuts made to compensation in the prior year – $129 million

· Expanded funding for the Learning Assistance Program to serve an expanded population using evidence-based programs – $ 241 million

· Expanded funding for teacher training on the new evaluation system to provide for implementation of TPEP – $10 million

· Additional funding provided for students exiting the transitional bilingual program – for an additional three hours a week of intervention activities. – $6 million

· Funding for assistance to 10 persistently failing schools with the beginning of a three-year improvement process using a process chosen by the district from the four federal intervention models or Washington’s Collaborative Schools for Innovation and Success model – $10 million

· Strategic Innovation Grant to provide funds for school districts to implement compensation systems that provide incentives for hard-to-fill subject areas or challenging school assignments – $ 5million

Notable Reductions:

· Continued suspension of cost of living adjustments for education personnel required by Initiative 732 saving the state (and costing teachers) – ($296 million)

· Continued suspension of inflation increases for the National Board Certified Teacher Bonuses, saving the state (and costing teachers) – ($3 million)

· Career and technical education program reduction in materials, supplies and operating costs funding through lowering the rate by 43% – ($72 million)

· Consolidated grants and programs combines 24 current non-basic education programs are all combined into one grant program and the overall funding level is then reduced and assumed to be covered by the additional LAP funding – ($37 million)

· Transition to the Smarter Balanced assessment system but maintain all current graduation requirements and high stakes high school exams. This transitions reduces state funding – ($17 million)

· Certain basic education increases result in an offset to existing “hold harmless” funding for some districts, which results in a savings to the state of – ($25 million)

· Suspend (again) the Alternative Routes to certification teacher-training program – ($5 million)

Compensation:

As mentioned above, the Senate’s budget proposal restores funding for the 1.9% salary reduction (3% for administrators) adopted a couple of years ago, but does not fund the I-732 cost-of-living increase or the inflationary increase for the bonus paid to teachers with National Board Certification. The Senate budget does propose a pool of $ 5 million for the Professional Educator Standards Board to provide grants to school districts who adopt merit pay plans that reward those who take on assignments in challenging schools and/or hard-to-fill subject areas.

For health benefits, the Senate’s budget proposal lowers the monthly amount distributed to schools to support the purchase of health benefits from the current level of $768 per month for each fte benefit unit, to $763 per month for the 2013-14 school year and to $764 per month for 2014-15. However, the amount for the retiree subsidy remittance to the state Health Care Authority was lowered for the 2013-14 school year from $65.17 per month to $60.17 per month in the 2013-14 school year and $61.00 per month in 2014-15. Funding for the explicit subsidy provided to retired K-12 employees who are Medicare eligible and enrolled in the state’s PEBB for their benefits remains at $150 per month. However in an added twist, for those Medicare retirees who retired with less than 20 years of service, or whose monthly benefit level exceeds $80 for each year of service credit earned will receive a subsidy of only $100 per month that will grow to $110 per month in 2015.

In addition, the Senate budget proposes an additional $87 million in net health benefit savings for part-time K-12 employees who work less than 30 hours per week through assuming those employees no longer receive their benefits through the employer sponsored school employee plans and instead gain their coverage through the Washington Health Benefit Exchange. The overall reduction is $120.2 million with $33.2 million being provided to school districts to reimburse insurance premium costs for those part-time employees for the purchase of their coverage through the exchange. Again, should this entire proposal advance towards any realistic implementation we will provide additional details for you on the impacts on part-time K-12 employees.

Levies:

The Senate’s proposed budget implies a pending change to the current levy limits for school district local levy collections. The proposed budget provisions for local effort assistance (levy equalization) do NOT include any increase in funding despite the fact that the additional K-12 funding should increase the state’s overall levy base and equalization payments commensurately. Instead, the proposed budget suggests that the current 28 percent levy limit will be “decreased on a linear basis” consistent with the increased funding for full-day kindergarten, MSOC, transportation and the Learning Assistance Program. The levy equalization percentage is proportionately reduced to maintain the 50 percent equalization policy. It is unclear at this point precisely how this impacts each specific school district, however not everyone receives the transportation and MSOC funds in the same amounts and yet the local levy reduction percentage will be uniform across the state which likely means there will be district with an overall lower level of state and local funding available. We will continue to research this provision and share additional details with you.

WEA key issues, 2013 legislative session
View and download the legislative agenda and gather additional information. Read more on OurVoice Washington EA …

WEA response to Gov’s K-12 budget plan: the right direction
Gov. Inslee’s education proposal is a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t go far enough to fully fund our K-12 schools as required by the Supreme Court’s McCleary decision. Read more on the WEA website …

Washington’s paramount duty
Every child in Washington has the right to a fully-funded, high-quality education. Read more on ParamountDuty.org … (listen to a recent radio ad featuring WEA members)

Inslee will seek to extend temporary taxes
Gov. Jay Inslee will call for extending taxes set to expire this summer as part of his plan for balancing the next state budget and steering more than $1 billion of new money into public schools in the coming two years.

He said he is focused on making a “healthy down payment” to comply with the court ruling on public school funding. But with an estimated $1.3 billion shortfall, Inslee said new and existing streams of taxes will be needed to make ends meet. Read more in The Herald …

Inslee on budget: ‘I choose education over tax breaks’
Gov. Jay Inslee called for putting $1.3 billion more into public schools in the next budget and paying for it by closing tax breaks and continuing taxes set to expire this summer. Read more in The Herald …

Schools, cities worry about bill pushing for wider representation
A proposal in the state Legislature would let minority groups to seek changes in voting districts. Read more on Crosscut …

Waiting for budget reality enters new act in Olympia
This week’s biggest event in Olympia may or may not occur. Read more on Crosscut …

Blog
Teachers target Hobbs on school hiring bill. Read more in The Herald …

Blog
Gov. Inslee to offer budget scheme. Read more in The Herald …

Column
Inslee ready to take budget battle to GOP. Read more in The Herald …

Editorial
Slicing the pie. Read more in Mercer Island Reporter …

Editorial
Ending unneeded tax breaks could help sew up budget. Read more in The Olympian …

Editorial
Dollars alone won’t ensure first-rate public schools. Read more in The News Tribune …

Editorial
Does the WEA stand for Washington Education Association or We Eviscerate Anyone? Read more in The Seattle Times …

I am Sandy Aitken and I teach math at Cedarcrest for the past six years. My family moved back to this area ten years ago when our son was a freshman and our daughter a kindergartner at Eagle Rock. Prior to teaching, I was a software engineer in the aerospace industry for twenty years. This is my first job where I had to join a union. Learning what our union does and how we bargain for our contract was intriguing. That is why I became a building rep and also a member of the negotiation team.
Janet Laverne (Lead) — Tolt

One of my passions is education. My own and that of the young people
that grace our classrooms day in and day out.  I have been teaching
for nearly 25 years here in the Riverview School District.  Currently,
I’m teaching math at Tolt Middle School even though I started at
Stillwater Elementary when 6th grade was included at the elementary
level. I believe that when we work together we can accomplish many
positive things. And I believe that bargaining is a way we can work
together not only as an association but as a district. There are
several skills I bring to the bargaining table including bargaining
experience in this district where I have been involved in several
bargains. Other skills include listening, problem-solving, a global
outlook, and a sense of humor (though that is sometimes at a middle
school level). I strongly want us (teachers, students, and the
district) to continue to move in a positive direction. This bargain is
a step in that direction.  (PS- for a good read on math try Here’s
Looking at Euclid by Alex Bellos)
Cody Hamar — Carnation

This is my 6th year teaching in the Riverview School district. I earned National Board Certification last year.  I chose to be a part of the bargaining team this year because I wanted to learn about the process and be a voice that represents my colleagues within the process.

Getta Owen — Carnation — Specialist Representative

I’ve worked in the district for the past 14 years. Started as a fry cook at CHS, moved on to Sp Ed Para, became a SpEd teacher, worked across settings from Elementary to High School . I joined the Bargaining Team, to become a more active member, and learn more about the process and our contract.

Lisa Taylor — Cherry Valley

 My name is Lisa Taylor and I am a 4th grade teacher at Cherry Valley.
This is my 8th year in the district as I worked in the PARADE program
for the past 7 years.  I became involved in the union as a member of
the last negotiation team.  I learned so much about our teaching
contract and wanted to continue that involvement, learning, and
enforcement.  I feel that it is important to have a voice in the
decisions that happen in teaching.  This is even more true now in our
current economic downturn and the attack that teachers are enduring
from state and federal legislaturors.

Kathleen Heiman — Sammamish UniServ Director

Kathleen Heiman has been a WEA UniServ Director for 15 years. This is her 3rd bargain with Riverview. Kathleen knows that competitive pay and benefits and small class sizes are good for educators and their students because REA members’ working conditions are students’ learning conditions. A contract that creates a competitive, respectful culture where educators are truly valued for their work is a good place to work and learn.

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