Negotiations Update!

December 2013/January 2014 Negotiations Update

-Lisa was able to address the National Board Certification for Speech Teachers. WDEA believes that if they are Nationally Certified they should be getting the stipend as stated in our pay scale stipend section. Lisa will bring back info about this on February 3.

-Coaches- Concern is that in some sports, there need to be more coaches to supervise students safely. Amy checked with RESIG to get specific numbers. RESIG said they don't have numbers because it is situational. Pete and Lisa will look into the forms that coaches get. Lisa will check with Marc to make sure coaches are getting the information they need for the safety of their students in a timely fashion.

-Calendar-Lisa was attending the county wide meeting on January 23 after our session. She will bring back info to our Feb 3 meeting.

-WDEA had an interest in adding a column for WUSD Service Credit to the tie-breaker form used when teachers are given Probationary status. The interest is to recognize any non-certified service to the district with .5 points per year. Lisa and Melissa agreed to add this to the form. It will take effect beginning July 1, 2014. We reviewed the new form on Jan 23.

-Combo Class Language Section 5.1.4.1- There are many concerns about confusion surrounding this section. Honors classes are being imbedded into regular classes at WHS and this should be considered a combo. Pete will come back with more info about how this can fit into the contract. We spoke about specific numbers, percentages and algorithms. We will continue this discussion in a future session.

April 21- This will be a Professional Development Day. Teachers will be paid on a time card. It will be per diem rate, not hourly. It is not considered an optional day. Lisa is working on purchasing copies of the Common Core standards for everyone. All will receive ELA. Only people who teach math will receive those.

  Instructional Leadership Team- On Dec 10, Lisa passed out a draft for going forward with the committee. The district heard our concerns about how stipend positions are chosen at some sites. All teachers will have an opportunity to apply and interview at their sites. The final decision will be consensus. Special Ed will be interviewed and chosen by Zenia. Sites are moving forward on this.

Special Ed Concerns-On January 10, Zenia Horning, Director of Special Ed, came to our session to address concerns we had sent to her. One of the main concerns was the change from having a Full Inclusion Case Manager to having RSP and SDC teachers have these students on their case loads. Zenia agreed with us that this is not a good model and that she is going to recommend to the board that we go back to the previous model. If the board does not agree with this, we will need to negotiate further around the issues that having FI on RS caseloads creates. Another concern was that RS and SDC teachers have Mild to Moderate credentials and some of their FI students are severely handicapped. According to Zenia, it is legal for them to serve these students. In the area of training, Zenia has made sub time available to RSP teachers and regular ed classroom teachers. She will provide a list of the trainings that are available. In the past, FI students on RS caseloads were counted as two. This was not contractual. Zenia checked with SELPA and will be following their direction that FI will be counted as one. Our contract calls for trainings for Regular Ed classroom teachers who have FI students. This has not been happening. Zenia assured us that the contract will be followed as students are placed for next year. There will be a Full Inclusion Sub-Committee to discuss other issues.

Temps and Leaves of Absence- Lisa brought information about temporary teachers and how they are matched up with staff on leaves. There are 11.4 FTE on leave and we have 10.0 FTE Temps.

Tech Issues- The Tech Department is going to develop a checklist for setting up new computers. The checklist will come to the table for our review. Cali will be getting wireless access by the end of the year. This will come from bond and Common Core money. There was also discussion about an Aeries report card for Cali K-4. This will need to be a site based project and decision. Lisa is working on a district wide standardization of how staff gets help with computer problems. Fix-it is not working for all staff.

Contract Language- We continued our work on the Transfer and Reassignment language. Mike Tucker, the district’s lawyer, will bring us language on 8.3.1 and 8.3.6. WDEA has an interest in having a process and recording form for areas where the contract says “mutual agreement.” We want the process to involve WDEA, probably on the site rep level.