I received this email a short while ago:
Dear Nathan–
We all count on teachers to help students succeed, and you count on your union to be your voice at the table.
But the new “Readiness Schools” proposal will weaken teacher protections and lessen the role for teachers in decision-making. Under the bill, three new kinds of in-district public schools would be established, and union agreements could be unilaterally canceled, removing our right to collective bargaining.
Those agreements were reached collectively, with all of our voices at the table. It’s not fair to ignore them now — and it won’t help improve our schools.
We’ve sent you a way to fight back. Very soon you should receive a piece in the mail that will allow you to send postcards to Governor Patrick, your state representative and your state senator. As soon as you get it, please sign the three postcards and send them in.
If we’re going to keep our voice, we have to use it now.
Thanks for all your work.
Sincerely,
Anne Wass
MTA President
I wrote a reply and had my colleagues on the Readiness School project edit it. Any initiative that hopes to be successful has to have the support of teachers, individually and collectively. We don’t simply have to change what we’re doing in our school and district, but how we’re doing it. Here it is:
Ms. Wass,
I am a proud member of the New Bedford Educator’s Association and the MTA and I have taught at NBHS for 13 years. I am currently the chair of the high school’s restructuring committee and we have applied, as you might know, to be one of the Readiness Advantage Schools in MA. This summer, a group of engaged and dedicated teachers met and designed an autonomous small learning community for our mainstream high school. This was a completely teacher-led and teacher-directed initiative. Under the guidelines and legislation concerning the Advantage model of the Readiness Schools proposal, local control is assured by active engagement, equally distributed, in the approval process for the Readiness Advantage School plan. According to a post on the MTA website on July 17th:
The MTA, which will oppose the Readiness Schools legislation in its current form, will advocate instead for the MassPartners proposal, which sets forth a demonstrably collaborative approach that is preferable to the state-controlled model introduced today. The MTA believes that Readiness Schools will be more effective if they are based on the following premises from the MassPartners proposal:
Readiness Schools should be part of public school districts, and school committees should have final approval of the establishment of such schools.
A role for educators and their unions should be preserved in the process of creating Readiness Schools without allowing either the superintendent or the president of the local union to have veto power.
The MassPartners plan includes the following steps for the creation of each Readiness School:
Phase One: The local union and the school committee bargain the Readiness School process.
Phase Two: The Readiness School proposal is evaluated by a screening committee composed of all stakeholders identified in Phase One.
Phase Three: If the proposal is approved by the screening committee, a Readiness School plan is developed by the design team identified in Phase One.
Phase Four: The Readiness School plan is subject to a vote of the teachers at the school in question and a vote by the school committee. The plan could include agreeing to change provisions of the current contract for teachers in that school or freedom from school district policies.
Speaking for myself and my role in this design process, I fully support the above premises of the MassPartners proposal. Our initiative is not, nor is it desired to be, state-controlled. I agree that our model for a Leadership Academy at New Bedford High School will be an active component of the school district and that the School Committee should play an active role in the approval process, as explained in the proposed legislation on July 17th 2009. I also agree that neither the NBEA president nor the Superintendent should have final veto power, once proposed to the DESE. Under the proposed legislation (Section 3, Section 91 (J)), the screening committee will negate the possibility of a veto by each member by requiring a 2/3 majority for approval.
As to the four phases of the MassPartners Plan, we have adhered to that process, by communicating openly and transparently with both the NBEA president and a representative of the School Committee about the nature and direction of our proposal. After reading the legislation, it is clear that the threats to collective bargaining are real under the Acceleration model proposed as a state takeover of chronically under-performing schools. That has to be acknowledged, but in New Bedford, it must be equally be acknowledged that our school is in dire need of restructuring and reform. The Advantage model creates the opportunity for that process to be locally controlled and teacher-led, working in open partnership with the NBEA and all other stakeholders. We know that our Unit A contract will have to be modified for an autonomous academy to be created, but it is our sincere wish that this process create opportunity for all stakeholders, including and especially, our local union. Of course, if there’s information or history that we don’t have concerning this process or legislation on a state level, please let us know.
Ultimately, it is the students who matter most in these debates over policy. Our goal is to try to fix our school by demonstrating a successful teacher-designed and led autonomous small learning community, disseminating that innovation throughout the whole school. To accomplish this, we must strengthen our union’s position in the restructuring process, not weaken it. We believe that potential exists in the Readiness Advantage model. Thanks so much.
Nate Everett
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