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AFT Bullying Prevention Info

Bullying Prevention

Bullying is a widespread problem with harmful—sometimes tragic—consequences. As the school year gets into full swing, now is the perfect time to focus on reclaiming the promise of public education for all children by creating safe and welcoming learning environments. There are many ways to engage in bullying prevention and intervention; each approach will necessarily take into consideration the differing needs of your students. Below are a few ways for you and your members to participate.

Tell us about bullying prevention in your community

The AFT takes school safety seriously, and we would like to know how we can support you and your members in your efforts to promote safer, more supportive schools and communities. Please take this short survey to tell us about your bullying prevention efforts and where you could use help. Feel free to share the link with your membership for them to complete.

Visit the AFT’s bullying prevention webpage for FAQs, classroom activities, booklists and more

Distribute AFT materials

The AFT offers free bullying prevention materials to affiliates, including brochures, posters and “See a Bully, Stop a Bully” wristbands. Consider holding a bullying prevention event at your school and having each student sign a pledge to work to stop bullying (for ideas on how to hold such an event, see this guide from our partner PACER). After students sign the pledge, give them wristbands to wear to signify their dedication to helping make their school a more tolerant place. Be sure to wear your own band to signify your commitment to safe and inclusive learning environments, and that you are available to help them deal with bullying or harassment. We also have colorful posters available for you to hang in your school or classroom to raise bullying awareness and brochures you can distribute to fellow educators. Click here for descriptions of available materials, and how to order.

Download resources from Share My Lesson

SML has some wonderful bullying prevention and intervention materials, including a collection of some of our favorite resources on the topic. Do you have ideas or resources you would be willing to share with educators throughout the country? Be sure to upload them to Share My Lesson!

Screen Bully in your classroom or at your school

The movie Bully has captured the hearts and minds of students and adults across the nation, offering a window into the damage bullying can cause. The Bully Project has a wonderful toolkit with materials and a DVD (including a version of the video that is appropriate for younger audiences). Educators who thoroughly complete this short surveywill receive a kit for FREE, while supplies last (feel free to share this survey with any AFT member who works with students).

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Strike a Pose for Early Childhood Education

Strike a Pose for Early Childhood Education!

During his annual State of the Union address on Jan. 28th, President Obama will list his goals for the upcoming

year. Right now, the week prior to the State of the Union, we will call on the president to include early learning in his

speech through a Twitter action with advocates across the country. Tweet your support for early childhood education

using hashtag #StrongStart.

 

Download Your #StrongStart sign here.

 

We will be tweeting at the President using photos of people who believe all children should get a

#StrongStart! Join us by following these three easy steps:

1. Download and print out a #StrongStart sign here

 

2. Take a photo with the sign, like one you see here. Feel free to get creative—you could have children

(or yourself) strike a “strong muscles” pose or make a funny face.

 

3. Send your photo to photos@aft.org or tweet them to @AFTunion.

The more photos we’re able to tweet, the more likely we’ll get the president’s attention. So send in as

many photos featuring different people as you’d like, and forward this request to your friends and family.

Then, on Jan. 21, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern time, we will tweet your great photos on the hashtag

#StrongStart. Please contact Socnet@aft.org if you have any questions.

Thank you for everything you do to support early learning!

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BESE Report, January 2014

BESE Report January 2014

No mandatory salaries in the new MFP

This week the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education approved an MFP Task Force report that recommends a 2.75 percent increase in the $3.5 billion formula, but does not specify that half of the increase should go to teacher salaries.

That prompted LFT President Steve Monaghan to point out that after five years of frozen salary steps, teacher pay is an issue that needs to be addressed.

Prior to the Jindal administration’s freeze on the MFP, half of an annual 2.75 percent increase was dedicated to salaries. Although school boards can choose to spend some of the MFP increase on salaries, Monaghan said, teachers and school employees have no voice in the decision.

“There is no real negotiation over the use of funds,” Monaghan said. “Those who have the authority will make the choice.”

The lack of step increases “is having an effect on teachers and educators,” Monaghan told the board. “We are going to lose some good people, and we already have.”

The LFT president suggested that collective bargaining agreements between school boards and employees would help ensure that scarce funds are spent wisely in school districts.

The 2.75 percent increase would amount to about $70 million. An MFP formula will be developed by BESE in March and sent to the legislature for approval. Lawmakers may either approve or reject the formula, but may not change it. If it is rejected, BESE can rewrite the formula, or let the previous year’s formula become effective by default.

Course Choice will be problematic in MFP

The controversial Course Choice program will be included in the Minimum Foundation Program if BESE takes the advice of the MFP task force, a step that LFT President Steve Monaghan said could provoke yet another constitutional confrontation.

Course Choice, one of Gov. Jindal’s pet education initiatives, allows non-public providers to create credit courses for public school students. Funding the program through the MFP was declared unconstitutional by the State Supreme Court.

Since that decision, the $3 million Course Choice program has been financed by the Department of Education outside of the MFP.

Supporters believe it will be legal to launder MFP funds for Course Choice offerings if the money is sent to local school systems to subsidize the courses.

At Tuesday’s meeting of BESE’s finance committee, Monaghan said he believes that would still violate the constitutional ban on using MFP funds for non-public schools.

The LFT president pointed out that the state Virtual School, which was abolished in favor of Course Choice, would have provided online courses without violating the constitution.

VAM study to move forward, sort of

BESE will move forward on a study of the effects the Value Added Model of evaluation has on teachers, but that is not quite what the author of the proposal intended.

Across the nation, questions have been raised about the validity of Value Added Methods. Last October BESEMember Lottie Beebe asked for a study of the reliability of the VAM. She suggested that a panel of statisticians and mathematicians look at the formula, and report on its reliability.

Instead, the board authorized Superintendent John White and BESE Executive Director Heather Cope to get a third party to study VAM with a focus on how it impacts teachers.

Their waffling prompted Dr. James Finney, a theoretical mathematician, to ask, “What are you afraid of Superintendent White? Are you afraid that people will finally learn what you already know, this model does not work?”

FBI investigation of charter school raises questions

An FBI raid on a Baton Rouge charter school prompted discussion of a new policy aimed at informing BESEmembers when a school is under investigation. The charter of the Kenilworth Science and Technology Charter School was recently renewed even though Superintendent of Education John White was reportedly aware of an investigation.

BESE Member Lottie Beebe said that members had no knowledge of the investigation into the charter school’s finances, and had received no communication from White about the issue. FBI agents descended on the school in December, just weeks after BESE voted to renew its charter along in a package that included a number of charter renewals.

White said that the department of education will develop a protocol for reporting issues and present it to the board.

Board member under investigation for cheating submits expenses

A BESE member who is under investigation for allegedly double billing the state and his local school board for travel expenses submitted a bill for $3,600 to BESE this month.

DeSoto Parish District Attorney Richard Johnson has said he plans to charge BESE Member Walter Lee with felony theft and malfeasance in office. Lee allegedly billed both BESE and the DeSoto School Board for travel expenses amounting to more than $13,000. Lee is also accused of shenanigans involving a leased school board vehicle that he returned to a dealership, and then bought for far less than its book value.

BESE President Chas Roemer has reportedly told his colleagues that Lee will not be reimbursed for his current ravel expenses until the legal situation is resolved.

Lee did not attend this week’s BESE meetings.

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LFT News: New MFP won’t require teacher raises

New MFP won’t require teacher raises

LFT President Steve Monaghan: “There is no real negotiation over the use of funds. Those who have the authority will make the choice.”

This week the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education approved an MFP Task Force report that recommends a 2.75 percent increase in the $3.5 billion formula, but does not specify that half of the increase should go to teacher salaries.

That prompted LFT President Steve Monaghan to point out that after five years of frozen salary steps, teacher pay is an issue that needs to be addressed.

Prior to the Jindal administration’s freeze on the MFP, half of an annual 2.75 percent increase was dedicated to salaries. Although school boards can choose to spend some of the MFP increase on salaries, Monaghan said, teachers and school employees have no voice in the decision.

“There is no real negotiation over the use of funds,” Monaghan said. “Those who have the authority will make the choice.”

The lack of step increases “is having an effect on teachers and educators,” Monaghan told the board. “We are going to lose some good people, and we already have.”

The LFT president suggested that collective bargaining agreements between school boards and employees would help ensure that scarce funds are spent wisely in school districts.

The 2.75 percent increase would amount to about $70 million. An MFP formula will be developed by BESE in March and sent to the legislature for approval. Lawmakers may either approve or reject the formula, but may not change it. If it is rejected, BESE can rewrite the formula, or let the previous year’s formula become effective by default.

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Appeals Court Vindicates 7,000 Fired Educators

Appeal court vindicates 7,000 fired educators

To read the Court of Appeal ruling on the case, called Oliver et al v OPSB et al, please click here.

(Baton Rouge – January 16, 2014) Some 7,000 teachers and school employees who were wrongfully terminated in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina were vindicated Wednesday by a five-judge panel of the Louisiana Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal.

The unanimous ruling says that the educators “were deprived of their constitutionally protected property right to be recalled to employment without the due process of law.” The ruling means that all tenured employees who were fired after the storm must be paid two years’ salary by the Orleans Parish School Board. Teachers who meet certain criteria must be paid an additional year’s salary by the State of Louisiana, according to Louisiana Federation of Teachers General Counsel Larry Samuel, who also serves on the Plaintiffs’ Legal Committee in the class action.

“We are very pleased with the ruling,” Samuel said. “These employees suffered a dual tragedy, once when the levees broke and another when their livelihoods were taken from them.”

Louisiana Federation of Teachers President Steve Monaghan said “We hope this will mark a positive ending to one of the saddest stories to emerge from the 2005 disaster. Teachers and school employees lost family members, their homes and property, and their jobs. Much cannot be replaced, but at least they will have the knowledge that their firing was illegal, and they will have some compensation for their loss.”

Most of the educators were members of the United Teachers of New Orleans, an LFT affiliate, which was the collective bargaining agent for teachers and some school employees when Katrina struck.

The Class Action applies to all employees who were tenured on August 29, 2005, including principals, teachers, paraprofessionals, central office administrators, secretaries, social workers and other employees who provided instructional, administrative, food services, security, maintenance, transportation and other services.

Following the storm, efforts to re-open schools that had not suffered damage were thwarted. The State of Louisiana, acting under a radically expanded Recovery School District authority, seized control of New Orleans’ schools. After that, the district terminated the vast majority of its employees.

“New Orleans had a corps of dedicated professionals who wanted nothing more than to teach children,” Monaghan said. “The city had a handful of schools that could have been opened within weeks after Hurricane Katrina. They were kept shuttered, the state took over the schools, and all the teachers in the city were fired.

“This ruling paves the way for some semblance of justice for those educators,” he said.

The ruling is not necessarily final. The school board and the state have the right to ask the State Supreme Court to review the ruling.

– See more at: http://la.aft.org/press/appeal-court-vindicates-7000-fired-educators#sthash.eqzYFN8D.dpuf

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[LINK] Thank a Million Teachers!

 

Thank a Million Teachers

Help Farmers’ Insurance  Thank A Million Teachers and Give A Million Dollars to Teachers

Farmers’ Insurance is giving away $2,500 grants to America’s teachers and you can help! Take this opportunity to say “Thank You” to an educator that’s made a difference in your life and your community.

Everyone has a story of a teacher who has gone the extra mile and had a lasting impact on someone’s life.  Whether it was the 6th grade English teacher who stayed after school to put on a play, a science teacher whose infectious enthusiasm launched a lifelong passion or a coach who taught us to never quit, we each have an experience that we still appreciate today.

Join Farmers in showing educators how valuable they are to us. Share your stories, tell your friends and make sure the teachers in your life understand what big effect they had on your future.

Thank a Teacher Here!