The freedom of D.C. Public Schools to fire its teachers has resurfaced as a critical issue in ongoing and overdue contract negotiations.
A draft version of a contract two years in the making includes a provision that “teachers could be subjected to performance-based excessing,” according to a copy obtained by a teacher turned blogger, Candi Peterson.
To be “excessed” is to lose a job when a school is closed, merges with another school or is taken over by an outside agency aiming to reform it. Those teachers would have options such as buyouts, early retirement, or one year to find a new job in the system while participating in professional development and earning a full salary for duties such as long-term substituting. Those options, however, are largely left out of discussions among teachers, like many of Peterson’s followers, incensed by the notion of losing a job.
Peterson, who runs the blog Washington Teacher and sits on the Washington Teachers Union’s board of trustees, calls the provision “bad news,” saying that even if teachers earn good evaluations, “this does not guarantee them a job.”
Peterson’s publishing of some details of the unfinished contract earned uncommon ire from teachers union president George Parker.
“I am appalled today that some who have a responsibility to work on behalf of our members made a unilateral decision to take from [union members] … the right to make an informed decision,” Parker wrote in a letter to union members, first reported on WAMU radio.
Parker’s frustration may stem from what Jeff Smith, executive director of educational advocacy group D.C. VOICE, calls exhausting efforts “not just to tweak parts of the contract,” but to “change the entire paradigm” between D.C. Public Schools and the union.
“What’s being negotiated on both sides is really innovative, and heated debates and ill feelings are to be expected,” Smith said. “If it were easy to get the union to agree to adopt new priorities and give up things they’ve become comfortable with, like seniority, then one of the last five superintendents would’ve done it.”
The fear over teacher firings has galvanized many union members to reject a new contract wholesale, often without weighing other proposals.
Peterson’s leak “jeopardizes every provision of the draft proposal, including those related to working conditions and salary increases,” Parker wrote.
