Ask your questions here. We’ll respond to as many as we can 🙂

Read the full TAs or TA summary here.

Building Leadership Teams

Q: The district wanted to make BLT and its sub-committees advisory bodies rather decision-making ones. There’s no mention of the issue in materials about the TA. Has this issue been dropped so that BLTs retain their power?

A: We were able to defeat this proposal and maintain current contract language for BLTs.

Class Size

Q: Why does it seem class size wasn’t a high priority?

A: Class size was part of the relief from pressurization priority, and we did lots of work to try to get relief. The biggest obstacle was cost — SPS didn’t have money to address class size in a meaningful way. Our team even got creative and created a “roadmap” proposal that would have opened negotiations on class size if the district hit a certain ending fund balance (i.e. its finances were better). Even that wasn’t going to get us where we needed to be. This is an issue we need to take to the state legislature next.

Counselors

Q: The allocation for 1.0 Elem counselors over the next few years intentionally excludes K8 schools in the new language. Why? As an employee, this feels like an incentive to relocate to a K5 Elem school for job security. Wording MUST be clarified in the CBA if the intent is to include K8 schools.

A: We need to clarify with SPS but K8 is supposed to be included in the new ratio.

Q: Is there an upper limit to the caseload for elementary counselors in 27-28 or 28-29? In other words, in 27-28, all elementary buildings over 350 would have a full-time counselor, but at some point would they add FTE to a building? Would a school of 700 still have just 1.0? Or would they have two full-time counselors? Thanks.

A: For Elementary, there is no language to trigger additional FTEs, which is the same as previous contract.

Curriculum Embedded Assessments

Q: Is there anything under the CEA TA which gives time off, PD days or paid work time for folks like the MS Language Arts department to grade 2-4 page mandated CEA essays and input scores online? We were asked to do 3 CEAs last year which takes an exorbitant amount of time to read, score, and give Meaningful feedback on student growth. I’m also not sure that pre/TA language was sent to members about what we were fighting for in regards to the CEA (inputting scores into a system vs. amount of labor and time outside of school it takes to grade essays which falls under pressurization). Inputting scores into a one online system is significantly different than the labor and work it takes for teachers to read and grade mandated CEAs.

A: The TA provides for 18 early release days to be used for individual planning time, including grading, to help alleviate some of the pressurization of heavy grading and feedback requirements.

Early Release Days & Building Meetings

Q: For the three times a month admin can require us to stay one hour later than contract time, how much advance notice does admin need to give? Is the extra hour only for staff meetings or can it be required for other work?

A: SEA leadership will discuss scheduling related to staff meetings with SPS. The staff meetings can be for principal discussion, but may also be designated by the principal for other staff meeting purposes (e.g., grade level, content groups)

Q: Has anything changed with Wednesday mornings? What is permissible with AM meeting times? 

A: There will now be no more than three meetings per month and they will be principal directed. Ben indicated that they would likely not be on Wednesdays.

Q: On educator directed early release days, may IAs use that time to work on student data, goals, planning, emails, PD, and collaboration with other IAs? Do principals or certified teachers have the right to schedule meetings during that time?

A: Per the tentative agreement, “These days may also be used to accomplish employee training plans, general certificate clock hours, advanced certificate clock hours, career ladder trainings, professional growth, or perform other duties associated with their positions… On Implementation Days administrators will respect individual employee professional judgement and will not schedule meetings or activities.”

Q: New TA states the early release scheduled activities start 30 minutes after students are dismissed. It used to be understood as 20 minutes after dismissal. Does that decrease meeting times by 10 minutes or is the end of the contract day 10 minutes later? For example, at Mercer students are dismissed at 2:30pm. We started early release meetings at 2:50 and ended at 4:05 (75 minutes). The new TA says we’d start at 3:00. Do we still end at 4:05? Or do we end at 4:15?

A: For secondary, early release will start 20 minutes after student dismissal which matches the before and after student part of the contractual day. There isn’t a need for an extended day. I believe the actual language in the TA makes this clear.

Q: New TA states 18 early release days are admin directed and fall on the 1^st and 3^rd Wednesdays of the month. 18 are educator directed on the 2^nd and 4^th Wednesdays of the month. Looking at the month of September – the first Wednesday was not an early release. The 2^nd Wednesday was. Do we start with an educator directed day this Wednesday, September 9?

A: The contract won’t be ratified before September 9th but if it were to be followed then yes, first early release would be teacher directed

Q: What happens in months like November, February, and April when the 2^nd or 3rd Wednesday of the month is a holiday/break?

A: Those Wednesdays don’t count in the 36. We maintained language that we would negotiate the early release calendar which we will do but often happens after school has happened.

Q: Do I understand correctly that on educator directed early release days educators could be working alone in their classrooms making parent phone calls or grading papers? In our previous contract, we had to work with at least one other person doing something together.

A: Yes implementation days can be used for individual planning.

Q: My worksite ( elementary school) starts at 7:55. Are we required to stay until 3:55 every Wednesday?

A: You are required to stay during your contractual 7.5 hours, unless there is a 1 hour staff mtg.

Q: Hi, I am a librarian. I am interested in how the Wednesday early release might impact “job alike” meetings. If these were taken away, I am interested in knowing if the contract language for librarians around monthly meetings was changed article 9 section M point 3. 

A: Job alike collaboration can still occur on educator- directed Implementation days. It can also occur on SPS-directed days if they choose to do that.

Q: Will PLCs continue to exist as part of admin Wednesdays or does language referring to them need to be updated?

A: References to PLC on Wednesdays has been removed from the CBA; they would exist at either principal or educator discretion.

Q: On regular workdays we are off at 2:55pm. What time does the work day end on Teacher directed Wednesdays and what time does it end on Principals directed Wednesdays

A: After the contract is ratified, the regular workday would continue to end at 2:55 pm. The principal may require certificated staff to stay for up to one hour 3 times per month (except in December and April-2 times per month). That may or may not happen on Wednesdays.

Q: Do mandatory trainings related to the adoption of new curriculum materials which take place outside of contract hours and which exceed 1 hour in duration violate the new TA’s language related to “required cert trainings outside of contract hours,” or are such trainings governed by a different part of the TA?

A: The District can require up to 24 hours of paid training time for certificated staff. This language is unchanged, and is not impacted by the new language regarding staff meetings.

Immigrant Rights

Q: Would the new Tentative Agreement include the original bargaining proposal to allow SPS staff to take unpaid leave for immigration matters (I haven’t seen those listed specifically in the TA)? If so, will these matters apply to the national DACA renewal delays that many recipients (many of them SPS staff) are experiencing?

A: We believe that the language in the TA would allow members to take unpaid leave to address immigration-related matters.

Multilingual Learning

Q: Based on “No partial FTEs for IAs and 0.5 or 1.0 FTE for Certs,” does that mean some teachers and IAs are going to get displaced or lose their jobs/FTE if they work in small ML population schools in October?

A: Those changes will take place for the 2027-28 school year. The agreement is that there will be no RIFs within the ML department. Reallocation of FTE will happen as past practice and any changes would be subject to the displacement process. Currently all school sites with less than .5 school site FTE are being served by central ML cert FTE and will continue to be.

Q: My understanding is that under the new model, ML staffing would only be allocated in 0.5 or 1.0 FTE increments, meaning the current smaller allocations, like 0.2, would no longer exist. The proposed ML ratio is 1:70. Mathematically, half of that would be 35 students, but what I don’t see anywhere in the language is how many students a school actually needs in order to qualify for the 0.5 FTE. That’s what concerns me. If smaller allocations are eliminated, there needs to be a clear threshold for when a school receives 0.5 FTE. Otherwise, I’m worried that schools with smaller ML populations could end up receiving no direct ML support at all.

A: We understand and share your concerns. We definitely don’t see these changes as a win but the district proposed totally eliminating staffing ratios and essentially refused to walk away without some concessions on ML. The new staffing are not a win, but minimizing the concessions was significant. The way the staffing will work will be a strain on capacity. Tier 1 and 2 will not be staffed with a .5 until 25 students and tier 3 and 4 will not be staffed with a .5 until 35. There will be no further staffing adjustment until the number of students reaches the full ratio. The district will use central office based ML certs to support schools who have not reached the staffing threshold and schools where there is greater need based on the language acquisition level of the student population. We are restarting the ML task force to monitor this and ensure the district continues to provide general education teachers with training to support ML students more effectively in the classroom.

Q: The TA states, “Multilingual teams will have uninterrupted scheduled team planning meetings for 30 minutes.” However, it seems like the frequency of these meetings is not stated. Would these meetings happen weekly, monthly, yearly, etc?

A: The understanding is that uninterrupted time would be available weekly. The emphasis on “uninterrupted” time is that both certificated staff and IAs would not be directed to cover for others or pulled from the ML team meeting for at least 30 minutes of their team planning.

Q: I’m very concerned about the staffing allocations for ML. I am also confused about how the 0.5 allocations will work for secondary. Generally, a 0.4 cert will teach 2 sections and a 0.6 will teach 3 sections. What is the expectation for a 0.5 cert? Does this new 0.5 rule also apply to our contracts? For example, I have a 0.6 Gen. Ed. contract and 0.4 ML. I’m concerned that buildings will end up needing to use FTE from other sources to “round out” ML FTE to fit how we actually staff in 0.2s and also to ensure we can meet the needs of some our most vulnerable populations. I fear this will only exacerbate the inequity issues that already exist across sites.

A: SPS would not accept counters that allowed for 0.2 increments for ML teachers. We anticipate guidance from the ML department and the superintendent for buildings on how to address the segmentation. This may be in line with a greater focus from the District on utilizing the expertise of ML teachers to help gen ed teachers support ML students rather than direct instruction.

Q: Can you provide details about applying for a waiver for ML when 25% or higher of students are level 1 or 2? What measure are they using for level 1 or 2? WIDA or something else? How much staffing can the waiver get you? Who submits the waiver? When and how?

A: That is current contract language. The measure is the WIDA assessment. The person to request the waiver from is ML program Director Michelle Ota. You may want to reach out to her to see if there is a form.

Overage & overage pay

Q: Have there been any changes to the overage pay for class loads above the max?

A: No change to the formula for overage pay, but the rates will increase as the average cert hourly rate goes up.

Preschool

Q: When will preschool teachers begin to have PCP time and who will be funding those positions? Also, does this mean that preschool teachers will be now included when determining how much PCP FTE will be allocated to a school?

A: The updated CBA langauge about preschool certificated educators is to affirm current practice. School site practice varies around how they include preschool in PCP coverage. The updated CBA langauge affirms that all certificated Preschool educators get their contractual PCP time and it is covered either within the school schedule or convered by an administrator and the IA team coverage.

Racial Equity Teams

Q: Were there changes made to Section A6. Building Racial Equity Teams? With the new Early Release agreements, is there language about the collaborative relationship between RET, BLT, and Admin?

A: There will be no changes to to racial equity teams. The racial equity teams will still be doing site based intiatives around equity. PD is not their only role. There are 6 racial equity days. 4 are district directed and 2 are educator directed. This means that the racial equity team should bring options to staff for those 2 days.

Representation Rights

Q: The TA says Non-disciplinary letters of warning, counsel, or expectations will be retained consistent with CORE, but CORE does not have a retention policy for non-disciplinary letters. How long will letters be retained? And why include language ‘consistent with CORE’ if it doesn’t apply?

A: School districts are bound by both the local government and k-12 CORE. Local government core speaks to these letters. They must be retained for 3 years after the letter is written. Our new language though makes it so that even though they are retained they cannot be used for hiring and cannot be used for discipline outside of the year it was issued.

Special Education

Q: Will special education caseloads remain the same as the previous contract during the focus group and pilot program?

A: The current contract language remains in effect through the pilot program.

Q: On our previous contract special education teachers received a stipend of $2,500. Is that still in the contract? Will we also get paid for writing iep’s above our caseload limit and if so, how much is that?

A: Yes, no change to IEP stipend and IEP overage pay.

Q: What guardrails are in place to ensure special education ESA rubrics for evaluation remain appropriate or meaningful to our work in schools with the removal of direct rubric input and SMART goal language?

A: The new langauge does not address that.

Specialists

Q: Has the section of the contract regarding elementary specialists been updated to accurately reflect our cap of 1280 minutes of classes each week? If not, will SEA make an MOU to support this cap that was promised to specialists when SEA increased PCP time to 160 and we started Wednesday early release days?

A: This was part of our initial proposal. We were not successful at winning this cap.

Q: Is SEA ever going to fight for full time librarians? Our kids deserve weekly access to books, but being .5 at a school of almost 500 students means I can only see my kids biweekly. If the district really wants to increase ELA test scores, isn’t it common sense to give them access to books full time?

A: We fully agree, and increasing librarian staffing allocations was one of the changes we fought for. We just were not successful this time.

Sub coverage pay (substitute reimbursement)

Q: In the paraeducational substitute unavailabilitly sub pay document, how are provisions e and f equitable for paraprofessionals and certificated staff? Paras have to show impact of additional duties, historically, serving additional children has not satisfied this provision for our principal. We can’t get paid simply because we were “assigned to cover” additional children if our DUTIES did not change (e.g. classroom support). Certs, however, merely have to show that there was no substitute present. They do not have to prove that they have assumed “additional duties”; duties that were not simply doing their job with less staff. Provisions: e. In order to claim substitute unavailability funds, employees must report to their supervisorthe blocks of time, such as periods, hours, entire day, half day, and/percentage of class they were impacted by ADDITIONAL DUITES. f. For certificated non-supervisory staff when a paraprofessional substitute is not provided and a certificated staff is ASSIGNED TO COVER the certificated staff will be reimbursed compensated at the rate of pay for a paraprofessional substitute.

A: The language regarding coverage pay is the same in all three bargaining units. To be eligible to receive coverage pay you have to be assigned. No staff will be expected to take on additional duties unless they are assigned. If a para is absent in the classroom, and no coverage has been communicated by the principal, the educators in the room need to email the principal and ask what the coverage plan is. “Coverage Pay:”

1. Employees must be assigned to cover for an unfilled substitute position to receive Substitute Unavailability coverage pay. No employee will be expected to take on additional duties until they have been assigned.
2. Compensation is step 1 of the daily substitute rate of pay for the unfilled substitute assignment.
3. If multiple employees are impacted, the substitute unavailability funds for that absence will be split between them based on the blocks of time and/or percentage of class.
4. When an employee takes additional students into their classroom as part of emergency substitute coverage, they will receive coverage pay. They will not receive overage for those additional students in addition to coverage pay.
5. In order to claim substitute unavailability funds, employees must report to their supervisor the blocks of time, such as periods, hours, entire day, half day, and/percentage of class they were impacted by additional duties.  “

Wages

Q: Why aren’t ELCs (for departments including OT,PT, SLP, Psych) given the same raises as TLCs when they have many of the same responsibilities?

A: The TLC increase is to address the addtional work TLC will take on with the reduction of consulting teachers.