DISD Must Keep Its Promises!

A little over a year ago the Dallas ISD Board of Trustees approved doing the Teacher Incentive Fund program. This program is funded through a grant from the U. S. Department of Education to the tune of $22 million over five years. It's designed to pay teachers who's students show academic improvement.

NEA-Dallas has, and will continue to, oppose this program for two very good reasons: 1) Employees do not have a rock-solid base salary schedule that is contracted and mandated to be met by the Board of Trustees each year; and, 2) The instruments used to determine this incentive pay, the Classroom Effectiveness Index (CEI) and School Effectiveness Index (SEI), in our opinion, are invalid. I will give you one of many examples on how we believe this to be so.

Ninth (9th) Grade Science teachers have their CEI's calculated by using their students' Eighth (8th) Grade Reading Scores. Since the there is no science test in 8th grade, the district uses the reading score for the baseline. You can not compare reading scores to science scores and be accurate. That's like comparing oranges to corn. It just does not compute. But, that's what the district is doing.

Now it has come time for these teachers who participated in the program to be paid. Many have been paid from the Federal Grant money, but over one hundred (100) others are unable to be paid from the grant. Why? Because their administrator did not do their second observation as required by the law that legislated the grant.

As a result, the DISD Administration now has to go before the Board and ask them to approve $450,000 from the General Operating budget to pay these teachers tomorrow night. These teachers have met the criterion that they have control over to earn this award.

This is about keeping promises, not philosophical differences. The Board promised these teachers the money last year when they approved this program over our objections. Now, because administration has fallen down on the job, again, the Board must step in and make sure it happens. Therefore, I will be asking the Trustees to support paying these teachers from the General Operating budget.

I will, however, urge the Trustees to require that this money be cut from the Administration's budget and that wording actually be put it in the motion. If they don't, then the Administration can get the money from where ever they want to.

I am also cautioning the Trustees that this may not be the last time that the Administration comes before them asking for money for this. The reason being is that this amount only covers the teachers who filed an appeal with the TIF Appeals Committee. If this is approved, then the teachers who did not appeal, may come back and file grievances against the district to get their share as well. I believe that total amount will be closer to $1 million rather than what is being requested tomorrow night.

Sounds Like Government Class To Me!

Before I was elected by the NEA-Dallas membership to serve as their President, I taught U. S. Government and AP U. S. Government at Skyline High School. One year there was a discussion at the DISD Board about trying to draw up a second majority Hispanic district. My students and I had many conversations about how that idea may or may not play out. I asked my students to think about this question: Since it will be the Trustees that vote to create a second district, who do you think that currently sits on the board will vote to put themselves into that district?

You see, if they would have appproved its creation, then one of the non-Hispanic members of the Board of Trustees would then be in a district that was majority Hispanic. What politician would vote do possibly get themselves defeated in an upcoming election? Their disappointed answer was, "No one."

Well, ladies and gentlemen, tonight's vote by the Dallas ISD Board to extend their terms of office is just like this one from several years ago. The three Trustees up for re-election next year were bound to vote for it. Then you have three more that get an extra year at the end of this thing bringing them up for re-election in 2012 instead of 2011. It doesn't take a rocket-scientist or Harvard graduate to do that math.

So, tonight, the Board of Trustees voted in THEIR OWN BEST INTEREST! They became typical politicians, except for Carla Ranger in the end, and became self-preservationists. They blindly accepted the independent ruling of Rolando Rios, Jack Elrod and some other attorney that Mr. Elrod had sitting next to him that the DISD Board could do this. Could do this even though none of the attorneys had spoken with the Secretary of State's Office or the Attorney General's Office to "make sure" that their interpretation was correct. Could do this even though Trustee Ranger presented a ruling from the Secretary of State's Office saying that the timeline had expired on December 31, 2007.

I presented each Trustee with a ruling from our state affiliate's General Counsel Joey Moore (Texas State Teachers Association) that also stated the timeline had passed. I guess, in the end, a judge will probably have to decide who's interpretation is correct.

We will be looking to find out. But, in the meantime, NEA-Dallas will re-double it's efforts to make sure that our children, our teachers, and our support staff are treated fairly and equitably by this Administration and the Board.

Because, believe it or not, after all of the things that have happened this semester, there are still Great Students and Great Teachers doing Great Things in the Dallas Independent School District!

Have You Had Enough, Yet?

Trustees allowing the Superintendent to take clusters away from Skyline High School. Trustees voting to limit speakers to the same agenda item to a TOTAL of fifteen (15) minutes of speaking time for ALL speakers to that item. Trustees sitting idly by not doing their job and then being surprised that the Administration has just found a $64 million deficit. Trustees calling a special board meeting during the middle of Board Briefings to pass a policy amendment requiring two (2) Trustees to sign off on pulling an agenda item from the consent agenda for a separate vote. Trustees looking to pass another policy amendment on November 20 to require those two Trustees to request pulling an item for a separate vote by 5:00pm on the Tuesday preceding the Board meeting. Trustees allowing this Superintendent to lay-off nearly 1000 employees in the last fourteen months due to "delayering" or to "reduction in force".

And, finally, ladies and gentleman, these Trustees want to vote on November 20 to extend their terms of office from three years to four. They want to do this with no public hearings and hope they can pull it off on the consent agenda without having to actually put the check next to their name on a separate vote.

This vote would extend Trustees Flores, Ellis and Price's terms automatically by one year to at least 2010. They are the ones up for re-election this coming spring. The spring of 2009! Hmmm.. just extend your term of office with no input from the public... that doesn't sound much like a democracy to me. Sounds more like an autocracy to me.

So, when are you, the public, finally going to have had enough? You pay the bills for the Dallas ISD! You pay for the lack of an ability to do math by senior administrators! You pay the salaries for the Superintendent and his Administration. YOU ELECT THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES TO RUN OUR SCHOOLS!

There is only so much the employees and employee organizations can do when it comes to fighting for the education of our children. We need YOUR HELP!

We need YOU to call, write, email and personally visit with YOUR TRUSTEE! Tell them that now is not the time to be extending their own terms of office! Then, call in and sign up to speak at the Board meeting on November 20! You simply call 972-925-3720 and sign up by 5:00pm on Wednesday, November 19.

Come early and join us in our protest of this idea. Or, have you still not had enough?

Let's Make History!

With all of the attention that I have had to devote to the Dallas ISD over the last month and a half, I have found that I have had little time to talk to anyone about one of the most important elections to come during my lifetime. Time to remedy that!

The National Education Association has many members from both of the two major parties. Whether you are Democrat, Independent, Republican or something else, WE HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO MAKE HISTORY! For the first time in our nation's history, either we will elect the first person of color to the Presidency or the first woman to the Vice Presidency.

There is absolutely no excuse for any of us not to vote. Early voting opened in Dallas County on Monday, October 20. We still have until this weekend to get our vote in early and then all day on Tuesday, November 4. We, as Americans, can not take this important privilege for granted. We must vote to insure the future of our county, state and nation! We must vote for the future of our children! We must vote for the future of public education!

So, between now and late on November 4, please join me in making history! VOTE!

Survey Time!

NEA-Dallas is currently conducting a survey of Dallas ISD employees asking them their thoughts on Superintendent Dr. Michael Hinojosa and the Dallas ISD Board of Trustees. I tried to post the web address to go and take the survey on this blog, but for some reason, it won't post.

SO, if you would like to take the survey, please email me at neadprez@aol.com and I will send you the link to be able to do it. We are asking that everyone complete the survey by, Tuesday, October 28, so that we may present the results to the Board of Trustees at their October Board meeting.

So Sorry, But the Job Fair Is Full

I spent most of the day on Friday trying to track down the DISD employee in charge of the "Operation Safe Landing" job fair the DISD is holding on Tuesday. I had been told by a couple of perspective employers that they had been told that the Job Fair was full and had no more room for them. They had been told that they could fax their information to be posted, but that there was no more room "at the inn".

Unfreakin believable! This "Operation Safe Landing" is being held at the Dallas Convention Center. The same convention center that hosted the NEA's Representative Assembly (National Convention) in 2002 which had over 15,000 educators and guests from all over the United States, its territories and many countries from around the world in attendance. How can they not have any more room?

And, to add insult to injury, the Workforce Commission and Dallas ISD are charging each participating company/school district a "nominal" $35 fee to participate. They do receive a complimentary box lunch, however. Just when I thought I couldn't be surprised anymore... Guess I should have known better..

So, I called the employers back that I had spoken to earlier in the day and asked them to participate in NEA-Dallas' RIF Recovery Resources Seminars to be held on Monday, October 20 at the NEA-Dallas Building. We will be conducting rotating, concurrent seminars on resume preparation, the RIF policy, financial/retirement counseling, and providing an opportunity for participants to go online and complete applications for other school districts in the area.

These seminars are FREE and OPEN to ALL DISD employees affected by the RIF. We're not limiting participation to just NEA-Dallas/TSTA/NEA members nor or we requiring anyone to join the Association if they get a job in another district. We also are NOT charging those employers who participate with us as single penny!

The seminars will be from 10:00am through 8:00pm. Our address is 3816 San Jacinto St., Dallas, 75204. We are just across Washington on San Jacinto from the Dallas ISD Administration Building.

Dark Day In Dallas

Today, October 15, 2008 is one of the darkest days in the history of the Dallas ISD. Dark for the 463+ or 350+ employees, depending how DISD does their math, who are losing their jobs today. Dark for the other employees and their families who have lost their jobs already. And, most importantly, dark for the thousands of students who have lost their teacher and now must start Monday with a new one.

Who is the Dallas ISD supposed to serve? Who do Trustees continue to say this is all about? Who does the Dallas Achieves aim to improve education for? WHO?!

THE CHILDREN! When all is said and done today and next week, it is the children who will pay the ultimate price for all of the adults at 3700 Ross Avenue that can't do simple math.

What is the DISD going to do for these children? NEA-Dallas and the other employee organizations are doing what they can to assist the employees who are losing their jobs. Parents and community leaders must now ask the Superintendent what HE AND HIS STAFF are doing to help these children understand why they lost their teacher today and deal with their emotions.

In addition, parents, please talk to your students tonight and in the nights to come and let them know that their teacher did not leave them or abandon them. Their teacher would never do that. Help them to understand that their former teacher will miss them and want them to do their very best for their new one. Talk to them, listen to them, and most importantly, hug them and love them! That's what our teachers who wont' be there tomorrow need you to do. It's what your children need for you to do,too.