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2/7 - CTA Special Ed Training 2/7 - 2/9 - CTA Good Teaching Conference 2/12 - Spelling Bee 4/4 - FMEA Basketball Tournament |
January 15, 2020
Hi FMEA members, Happy 2020! Winter break already feels like a distant memory, but I hope it was a good one. Below are highlights from Monday's Rep Council. Also, tonight the County Board will vote on the Alpha-Cornerstone appeal. If they uphold our local School Board vote then Cornerstone (charter school located on Kennedy's campus) will shut down in June. Please consider attending and speaking. The County Board will likely be in closed session until 6pm. Anyone showing up by 7pm should be able to speak, and it's anyone's guess what time they will vote. The County Board meets at 1290 Ridder Park Dr. January Rep Council Highlights: Bargaining begins January 28th. FMEA will be seeking another retroactive raise as well as improvements in the Hours article. If you are interested in joining the FMEA Bargaining Team let me know. The FMEA spelling bee will be February 12th. We need to know who each site's coordinating teachers will be ASAP. This is a simple job that involves offering interested students a chance to take a short written test. The FMEA basketball tournament will be April 4th. Once again we need to know who will be coordinating this at your site. Staffing: Unlike previous years, the district is considering all first-year teachers as probationary, not temporary. This means first year teachers will not have to reapply for their job, assuming evaluations are good and the principal chooses to rehire. This also means there is a small chance the district could run a layoff in March, but if there is a layoff it would be very small. SERP: The deadline to participate in the current retirement incentive is January 24th. The more people who sign up for the SERP, the greater chance a layoff can be avoided this year. The NEA Representative Assembly (RA) will be in Atlanta from July 2nd-6th. State Delegate declarations (attached) are due January 31st. 8th Grade Promotions will likely be similar to last year, and there will be an appeals committee. Juan Cruz and our Board will be gathering input and will craft new Board Policy, but that won't go into effect until next year. Attached are the current 8th grade requirements and the template for IPPs (Individual Performance Plans). CTA Scholarships: There are a number of CTA scholarships being offered, including the scholarship for dependent children of CTA members. Here's the link with all needed info: https://www.cta.org/scholarships CTA Events: Lastly, here are several great upcoming CTA events: CTA Special Ed Training: February 7th in San Jose. See first attached flyer. CTA Good Teaching Conference: February 7th-9th https://ctago.org/events/2020-good-teaching-conference-north/ CTA New Educator Weekend https://ctago.org/events/2020-new-educator-weekend-north/ Congratulations on making it to the bottom of this long email! December 13, 2019 Hi all, We made it! It's hard not to feel good about starting a three week vacation. Sometime before we come back please take a look at the Rep Council highlights below, and if you didn't get a chance to read the hardcopy of the latest edition of our newsletter, it is attached. Also attached are two new MOUs (Memorandum Of Understanding). The first of these makes it official that SPED folks doing extra assessments get per diem pay (instead of the hourly pay). The second MOU is an attempt to attract and retain SPED teachers, and changes the SPED signing bonus from three years to five years. December Rep Council Highlights 1. Bargaining will begin in January. Resources are getting tighter in the district due to declining enrollment, but hopefully FMEA can still win another retroactive raise this year. If you haven't taken the FMEA bargaining survey here is the link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/VD3RDJH 2. It's time for participating schools to determine who will coordinate the FMEA spelling bee (February 12th) and basketball tournament (April 4th ). 3. There will likely not be revised Board Policy this year regarding participation in 8th grade promotion activities. The district will be following the same 8th grade expectations as last year. See attached. I'm advocating that there should be no appeals committee, but that if there is one, it needs to hear from someone from the site. Here is a link to current Board Policy on the matter: http://www.gamutonline.net/district/franklinmckinley/DisplayPolicy/142673 4. FMEA will soon be conducting a survey to assess perspectives on district leadership, student behavior and more. 5. The appeal for Cornerstone charter school will be January 15th at the County Board. More details to come in early January. 6. There is an LGBTQ food drive underway. Sites just need someone to coordinate the food collection, and I will be happy to pick up and deliver. 7. The Schools And Communities First November 2020 ballot initiative is a BIG ISSUE. If it passes it will bring much needed resources to districts across the state by closing property tax loopholes on commercial properties. Big business is ready to spend up to $100M on deceptive advertising, so we need to be educated and prepared. 8. Lastly, for those considering taking the district's retirement incentive, don't forget the deadline is January 24th. Have a great vacation and thanks for all you do! November 26, 2019 Hi FMEA members, On December 6th CTA will offer a "Know Your Rights" training at the Mt Hamilton office at 1333 Piedmont Rd. A flyer with all details is attached. On January 15th the County Board will be voting on Cornerstone's appeal to stay open. Cornerstone (independent charter school located on the Kennedy campus) was denied their charter renewal by our FMSD School Board last month. The County Board is likely to overturn this vote. I will provide more details about the meeting as the date gets closer. Below is a new link for an all-expense-paid trip for teachers to the Museum Of Tolerance in L.A. for a "Tools For Tolerance" diversity training. This is a different link than what was included last email and should work. https://forms.gle/r91QxJNDQC3H5ZyH6. There is still time to take the FMEA bargaining survey. The link is below, for those who haven't already taken it. FMEA and the district will release initial "Sunshine" proposals at the December board meeting and proceed with bargaining in January. https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/VD3RDJH CTA's New Educator Weekend will be February 21-23 in Santa Clara. Below is a link with all details and registration info. 2020 New Educator Weekend NORTH - CTA Go! Lastly, CTA is holding a food drive for LGBTQ youth in the county. A flyer is attached, and I'll be happy to help coordinate donation drop offs. Thanks for all you do and have a great Thanksgiving holiday!!! November 8, 2019 Hi FMEA members, The latest edition of our FMEA newsletter is attached. Also attached is a flyer with details for an all-expense-paid trip for teachers to the Museum Of Tolerance in L.A. for a "Tools For Tolerance" diversity training. Here's the link to register: https://forms.gle/r91QxJNDQC3H5ZyH6. Our FMEA Bargaining Survey will be open for a little while longer, so take this quick survey if you haven't yet. We will begin bargaining for this year's raise and more in the coming months. https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/VD3RDJH The recent district training on suspension created a lot of confusion and frustration. I do want to make sure you are clear that teachers still have the right to suspend. Principals won't be able to send students home for "willful defiance" but there are still plenty of other suspendible offenses that do allow principals to suspend home. These include "Caused...or threatened to cause physical injury...", "Caused...damage to school property or private property" and " Committed an obscene act or engaged in habitual profanity or vulgarity." Suspensions should only be a last resort, but it's important we know our rights. The full list of suspendible offenses can be found here: https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?sectionNum=48900.&lawCode=EDC The district held interviews today for a new Director of I.T. to replace Hung, who resigned last month. Also, interviews were held this week for a new Assistant Superintendent of H.R. The Board is expected to announce their selections at the board meeting on Tuesday. Lastly, there is a very important ballot initiative coming up in November 2020. The Schools And Communities First initiative will raise over $11.5B by making large commercial companies pay their fair share in property taxes. This will bring in an additional $4M for FMSD every year! We will be talking a lot more about this crucial initiative as we get closer to next year's election day. Have a great long weekend! October 25, 2019 Hi FMEA members, Tuesday's FMSD School Board meeting had two big surprises. First, on a close vote, board members turned down the five-year renewal for Alpha Cornerstone charter school. Our board has never turned down a charter renewal before. This denial was based on the fact that Alpha Cornerstone has not had a single moderate-to-severe SDC student in its 10 year history! The charter school will definitely be appealing this decision to the County Board. I will let you know when that appeal is scheduled because we will want the County Board to here from district teachers. The board also voted to offer a retirement incentive for the second year in a row! Just like last year, this incentive (known as a SERP) is open to all FMEA folks who are at least 55, with 5 years in the district. Participants in the SERP would receive the equivalent of 65% of your salary if you resign June 30th (deadline to notify HR is January 24th). The SERP will go through if at least 15 certificated folks sign up. All eligible employees should receive notification from the district with all details, but feel free to let me know if you have any questions. Today is the FMSD open enrollment deadline. Anthem/Blue Cross will no longer be an option, Anthem folks will have to choose between Health Care United (HCU) and Kaiser. The list the district sent out this morning seems to be out of date by a day or two. Let me know if you are having any challenges getting your benefits resolved. Here is a link to our 2019 FMEA Bargaining Survey. Please complete it by the end of the month if possible. We will begin bargaining in December or January. FMEA 2019 Bargaining Survey FMEA 2019 Bargaining SurveyWeb survey powered by SurveyMonkey.com. Create your own online survey now with SurveyMonkey's expert certified F... There is a teacher student loan forgiveness workshop on November 4th. The attached flyer has all details. RSVP at: https://tinyurl.com/Nov4StudentDebt. October 17, 2019 Hi all, Tomorrow is our annual FMEA Oktoberfest happy hour. We will be at Stanley's Sports Bar, located above Sharks Ice, from 3:30-6pm, with free food and drinks for the first hour (and free stuff for new teachers the whole time!). It looks like they will have some other events going on so if you don't see us in the front area then walk around to the back. I hope to see you tomorrow because these are always fun! October Rep Council highlights: 1. The FMEA student track meet is a week from Saturday at Sylvandale, from 9:30am-noon. Come by and support our students. We have at least eight schools participating. Big thanks to the those helping coordinate this at sites. 2. FMEA needs a new editor for our newsletter. There is a $500 stipend for this position and the only requirement is that you are familiar with Publisher. Let me know if you are interested. 3. Most CTA cards have been distributed, except for folks who are at multiple sites or are brand new. If you still don't have your CTA card let me know. 4. Our school board is looking into creating clearer policies regarding 8th grade participation in promotion activities. The district will be scheduling meetings soon for the board to listen to teachers, as well as parents and students, about what needs to be included in this policy. I'm hopeful they will be responsive to our requests. 5. Below is a list of upcoming CTA conferences. Issues Conference (Urban And Rural) Location: Tropicana, Las Vegas, NV Conference Date: January 17-19, 2020 Good Teaching Conference - North Location: Fairmont Hotel, San Jose Conference Date: February 7-9, 2020 Equity & Human Rights Conference Location: Marriott, Irvine Conference Date: February 28 - March 1, 2020LGBTQ+ Issues Conference Location Hilton Financial District, San Francisco Conference Date: December 13-15, 2019 New Educator Weekend Location: Marriot, Santa Clara Conference Date: February 21-23, 2020 To apply for an incentive grant visit www.CTAGo.org/grants. To learn more about these conferences visit www.CTAGo.org Best, October 4, 2019 Hi all, I hope your first two months of school are off to a good start. I'm sure we are all ready for this early October break! Yesterday there was great news in Sacramento, as Governor Newsom signed into law two charter school bills, 1505 and 1507, that offer strong new restrictions on charter schools. These bills will not change the fact that FMSD already has numerous charter schools, but it makes it far less likely that we will get new charter schools in the future. Our FMEA Oktoberfest is Friday, October 18th at 3:30pm at Stanley's Sports Bar. It's always fun, with free food and drinks for the first hour. New FMEA members are especially encouraged to attend, and will receive free food and drinks the whole event! The FMEA student track meet is Saturday, October 26th at Sylvandale. We have half of our schools participating and look forward to adding more. Let me know if you want to get involved. Health Benefits: Open enrollment is coming soon. Luckily those with Kaiser will see monthly premiums go down for a second year in a row. Those with Anthem/Blue Cross will actually be shifted to a different HMO, United HealthCare (UHC), but almost everyone should be able to keep their old doctors, and premiums will rise just slightly for a small group of employees. The School Board will be putting together new Board Policy regarding who can participate in 8th grade promotion activities. After break there should be some meetings offered so that staff can give our input on what the new Board Policy should include. As usual, CTA is offering a number of great conferences and events this year. Click the "more info" links for all details, including how to apply for scholarships. LGBTQ+ Issues Conference (more info) Application Deadline: October 7, 2019 Location: Hilton Financial District, San Francisco Conference Date: December 13-15, 2019 Issues Conference (more info) Application Deadline: November 4, 2019 Location: Tropicana, Las Vegas, NV Conference Date: January 17-19, 2020 Good Teaching Conference - North (more info) Application Deadline: November 4, 2019 Location: Fairmont Hotel, San Jose Conference Date: February 7-9, 2020 Equity & Human Rights Conference (more info) Application Deadline: January 6, 2020 Location: Marriott, Irvine Conference Date: February 28 - March 1, 2020 Have a great October break! Best, Scott Shulimson September 13, 2019 Hi FMEA members, Below are the highlights from Monday's FMEA Rep Council meeting. Thank you to all the Site Reps who attended, making this the first time in over a year that every site was represented! FMEA Track Meet The annual FMEA student track meet for grades 4th-8th will take place Saturday October 26th. Each participating site needs a Coordinating Teacher (CT). Please consider helping coordinate this for your site. Let me know if you have any questions or if you want to volunteer. Bargaining There will be an FMEA bargaining survey in the near future, and bargaining will begin in the coming months. We will once again be seeking a retroactive raise for the current school year. The district ending reserve increased by $1M last school year, but due to declining enrollment, many cuts are still slated for this year, including eliminating the HR Director position that was formerly held by Marcela Miranda. FMEA Oktoberfest Our first FMEA gathering of the year will be Friday, October 18th at Stanley's Sports Bar. A flyer is coming soon. FMEA Communication Join FMEA's text blast list: Text “@fmeamember” to 81010 Join the FMEA Group on Facebook. Just send a request to join. Find all important FMEA documents on our website: www.fmea.mobi Two Upcoming Events Teacher Housing Town Hall: September 17th. See attached flyer. Student Loan Forgiveness Workshop: November 4th. See attached flyer. Charter School News Hot off the press: Our state legislature just approved two bills that would give local school boards much more authority when faced with new charter schools attempting to enter a district. If Governor Newsom signs these bills it will be a huge improvement in state law regulating charter schools. Have a great weekend! Best, Scott Shulimson September 3, 2019 Hi FMEA members, I hope your school year is off to a great start! There are a few important topics I want to bring to your attention: 1. For all who are being evaluated this year, don't forget that last year's bargaining agreement reduced the number of written objectives you must provide, from six down to three. Two are chosen by the teacher and one by the principal. 2. CalSTRS recently audited our district and found that the way our off-schedule salary bonuses were written into the contract ran the risk of lowering what retirees receive. For that reason FMEA and the district are working to re-word the language in these past agreements. There is absolutely no change to the amount of compensation we receive, but this change will ensure that CalSTRS pays FMEA retirees as much as possible. I've attached the new language, which is in MOU form (Memorandum Of Understanding), as well as a separate page which goes into detail on why this was necessary. The School Board approved the MOU on Tuesday, and FMEA will be working with the district to fix the problem for other previous years that had off-schedule bonuses. 3. There is a new Personal Necessity (PN) form, and with it has come some confusion. Please note that you do not need to provide or circle a reason for any of your seven annual PN days. 4. Lastly, for any teachers who left a picture up in June of how your classroom should look, all furniture should have been put back in place. If this did not happen in your room let me know. Have a great week! August 16, 2019 Hi FMEA members, Welcome to our new teachers! Returning teachers, I hope you had a rewarding and rejuvenating summer. It sounds like there are going to be some very full classes on Monday, but the district has until Labor Day to balance all classes and get under the contractual class sizes. After Labor Day you start collecting floating cap pay if your class is still over-enrolled. Don't forget, floating cap pay increased to $13 a day and is based on enrollment, not attendance. Paula Boling retired over the summer, and Human Resources Director, Marcela Miranda, will be leaving to take a job at the County Office at the end of the month. The district is still looking for a permanent Assistant Superintendent of H.R. but in the meantime it looks likely that an interim will be brought in to head the department. This will be important because we are starting the year with a lot of openings, especially in SPED, and H.R. is in charge of recruitment and hiring. The beginning of a new school year is always crucial, not just from an educational standpoint but from a union one as well. If something doesn't seem right, please let me know. There are always hiccups as the school year starts, and some problems become a lot harder to fix if they aren't caught right away. I'm excited for another positive and productive year for FMEA. We will once again have a number of student events and other great ways to support the students and staff of Franklin-McKinley. Have a great first day of school and an awesome year! Best, Scott Shulimson FMEA President |
