During our last contract negotiations, we negotiated against a Superintendent and Board that publicly stated they wanted to destroy our union and do away with our collective bargaining. Thanks to our great team and member action, we not only survived but won several very important gains that we must preserve:
FULL PAY FOR OTHER WORK: For the first time in GFT’s history, teachers that work DEED, Eskuelan Puengi, or Summer School, get paid their full salary as opposed to being capped at step 4 (Article 9J) which has put millions of dollars into teachers’ pockets.
GUARANTEED PAY FOR UNUSED PERSONAL LEAVE: Personal leave only exists in our contract and for the first time we ensured that teachers got paid for their unused personal leave.
PUT A CAP ON SPECIAL STUDENTS IN REGULAR CLASSES: While the cap of 12 per class max. is not what we wanted, it was a start to build on this time.
LESSON PLANS ARE BEST DECIDED BY THE TEACHER: The new language ensured that the people that know what’s best for their students, teachers, get to decide how best to teach it.
KEPT THE BEST CLASS SIZES IN THE NATION: Many school districts hurt their students and teachers by having 32 – 45 in elementary and up to 75 in secondary! These and so many more things have preserved the quality of education for our children and our status as professional educators, but we can never doubt that we must remain strong and unified if we want to preserve our gains and move forward. There have already been indicators that they want to increase class sizes and force teachers to take on unprofessional duties such as bus, lunch and janitorial duties.
In order to further improve our quality of education we will be attempting to standardize a number of things in our schools and having more specific language with regards to the specific needs of Elementary, Middle and High school. Your input is critical to the success of these issues. Please register on our website, log in and complete the survey regarding your bell schedule. Email cory@gftunion.com if you encounter any problems.