August 31, 2006
All of the normal stuff was there: the hellos, the discussion of summer travel, of who had retired, meeting the new folks.
We should not be in school before Labor Day!
But it’s not Labor Day yet! We should be in our five last days of vacation! Don’t we want our time back?
We had a ‘robust’ breakfast and then the Day 1 faculty meeting, which went mercifully quickly. And we got some set-up work done.
Now, getting the set-up work done was important (and most of tomorrow has been set aside for that purpose in my school) because the new contract said that part of these two days was to be used by teachers for classroom set-up. So at least in my school the letter was being followed. Hooray for us?
Yes, and pity on the teachers whose principals see these days as 10+ hours of faculty conference. I hope your chapter holds your principal to the contract language if he tries to pull this.
For the contract language click —>
ARTICLE SIX
May 22, 2006 4:20 PM
HOURS
C. Work Year
All teachers shall report to their schools to begin work on the Thursday preceding Labor Day for a professional day, and will also have a professional day on the Friday preceding Labor Day and on Brooklyn-Queens day. Part of the time on the days before Labor Day will be allotted to classroom preparation. The Tuesday following Labor Day shall be an instructional day. Teachers shall be in attendance on duty thereafter on all days of the school year except for the last two weekdays of the month of June.
(emph mine – 2718)
JD2718 
I want my time back! Seriously- these last 2 days were a total joke- but at least we were given the majority of the time for room set-up on both days. I don’t particularly see this as a big win, however, but it’s better than listening to hours of crap.
All the kids really get out of this is two more instructional days (in an already overly long year- I’m anticipating the kids shut down even earlier in the spring than they did in the past).
We got two hours yesterday for classroom prep. However, many teachers went in days early anyway.
I can already hear what Klein will want for the next contract, and I see no precedent whatsoever for anyone standing up to him. The nebulous language you’ve reproduced from the contract will be of little help.
What part of the days? How many minutes? How many hours? Both days or one?
I’m no lawyer, but Randi is, and she should have known better.
Agreed. But nebulous or not, let the DR’s and UFT Central fight over blatant abuse, since they are on record saying they will. I take no joyo in being correct, and if Mendel or Weingarten can get anything back, let them get it.
In the long run, I think the extra time is lost forever, but I would like to see the extra days back on the table, especially since we run so late. Is there another district that goes to June 28?
My school was fortunate. We had an hour and a half in the morning and all the after lunch time on Thursday. On Friday there were departmental meetings with the principal, about 30 – 45 minutes each, and a closing meeting for about one hour. The rest of the time was ours.
I agree with you, of course. But I’m less than optimistic about the result, and I’m very upset by this union’s lack of vision. I should not be able to anticipate things better than Randi Weingarten, who is very, very smart.
I know that from seeing her speak. Unless my very worst suspicions about Unity are true, however, her actions suggest otherwise.
By the way, if you see Chaz, tell him I can’t post comments on his site.
Apparently, my beta-blogger status precludes me from commenting on Blogger sites that don’t allow anonymous comments.
Stupid, but true.
NYC Ed,
I see you found a work-around.
Yup. But beta-Blogger is awful and I may join you in WordPress. Only I’ve got a much larger backlog of posts than you did when you moved, and I’d rather not just dump them.
You lose some control of your template at wordpress. And no java. Apparently you can get control back in two ways, which I do not completely understand – for a small fee ($15?) you can customize the page that controls the appearance, or you can set up something like Edwize, which uses wordpress, but not wordpress.com. Kombiz can explain, if you are interested.