NEA Convention Report

NEA Convention Report

by Thom Ryder

The NEA Convention was held this year from June 30 through July 6 in Washington D.C. The RCEA was represented by a trio of members; Bud McWhorter, Linda Hogan, and me.

It’s hard to describe how amazing this convention is. The Washington D.C. Convention Center takes up about three square city blocks. The NEA set up shop inside virtually the whole complex. It was like a miniature city. Delegates from around the United States and territories all came, along with education dignitaries from across the world. Ex-NEA and VEA President, Mary Futrell, sat with our delegation during one stretch.

All told there were about 10,000 delegates in attendance plus another 4,000-6,000 visitors. Each convention session was filled with debate over education issues brought forth from members in every state. The debate was frequently spirited, but in the end democratic principles reigned supreme and discussion gave way to decisions.

You may have been told that NEA is a liberal organization or perhaps you remember when the former Secretary of Education Bell referred to the NEA as a terrorist organization. Well, I can give testament to the fact that the NEA was most concerned about the education of our country’s children and the working conditions of our educators and support staff. Much of our discussion centered on dealing with the constraints of NCLB. I left feeling assured that NEA will work diligently to revamp the in such a way that the act accomplishes its challenging mandate.

One of the highlights of the convention for me was the address by North Carolina Governor Mike Easley. Governor Easley was the recipient of the first “America's Greatest Education Governor” award from the NEA. Governor Easley understands it. He gets it. He knows what needs to be done, and he has a plan. It was delight to hear him speak. If you have a few minutes, watch the video (you may need to register on the NEA member site) of his presentation, you will be invigorated. Senator Obama also spoke to the convention delegates after the delegates voted (electronically) to endorse his candidacy, and there was a lot of dancing in the aisles.

There was dancing in the aisles after Obama spoke.

Each morning of the convention, the Virginia delegation would meet in the ballroom of our Marriott Wardman Park (across from the National Zoo) and hash out our state positions on the issues of the day. We even had entertainment by our own Virginia Delegate choir (Bud of course sang in that). They were incredible.

The highlight for our delegation was the election of ex-VEA President, princess Moss to the NEA Executive Board. Her election was no small feat. We campaigned hard for her at all public functions. I personally held a sign and screamed “Vote for Princess for several hours as delegates entered the convention hall on Election Day. Princess was the top vote getter and was one of two members elected to that prestigious position. As a person who has known Princess Moss for over twenty years dating back to when we were both presidents of tiny locals in Central Virginia, I can honestly say that the NEA delegates made a sound choice.

There was fun to be had in D.C. I was fortunate to pull some family strings and get access to a July 4^th celebration on the roof of the Willard Hotel and Office complex right beside The White House. The Willard Hotel is a Washington landmark. In fact the term “Lobby” is said to originate there. According to local lore, U.S. Grant would step across the street to the lobby of the Willard for beverages and cigars with his high-powered Washington friends. These encounters soon became known as “lobbying.” Anyway, the fireworks were awesome, and I enjoyed meeting people I would have never dreamed of meeting.

By far the most important thing I did at the NEA Convention was to join Bud in the annual Habitat for Humanity project. I will share that story in a separate article.

If you ever get a chance, you should really consider attending an NEA Convention. You will leave on fire for your profession.

Lobby Day 2008

Lobby Day 2008

In Search of Morgan

VEA celebrated Lobby Day 2008 on Monday February 4, 2008 and ten RCEA members attended the gala in Richmond. Actually, our troop (Bud McWhorter, Sarah Hollett, Tammy Wood, Sara Cann, Sheila Salisbury, Tim Summers, Linda Hogan, Thom Ryder, Sherry Foti, and Theresa McGuire) loaded up several cars and headed for Richmond on Sunday afternoon.

VEA staff, Rob Jones and Doris Boitnott briefed the standing room only statewide delegation at a 5:30 gathering and then pizza eating and Super Bowl viewing was the order of the day. In the briefing, however, Rob and Doris highlighted several points of emphasis for our discussions with legislators.

1. We are seeking money for the state share of a 5% salary raise for teachers.We are seeking the Rebasing of the SOQ’s. The SOQ’s are the regulations and funding components that reflect how the state will support public schools in Virginia. The SOQ are rebased each biennium, the rebasing takes into consideration changes to average daily membership, changes to the composite index as-well-as revisions to the lottery proceeds, sales tax distributions and other factors which help determine the recalculation of the state share of the SOQ.

2. We support legislation (SB48-Whipple) to provide a guaranteed 30-minute planning period for elementary school teachers. Currently 68 localities have it and many others are within 5 minutes of hiving it, but a bill would provide a mandate to convince the recalcitrant school divisions to provide this most basic professional courtesy.

3. We oppose tuition tax credits/vouchers.

4. We oppose any further erosion of VRS funding and support making VRS fully funded.

5. We oppose the Homestead Exemption as it will potentially starve local school divisions of local funding sources.

The RCEA delegation left the hotel bright and early on Monday morning heading to the General Assembly building in search of senators and delegates with whom to speak. Pat Wood, our Uniserv staff leader, had scheduled several appointments with local representatives for us. Our first stop was the office of Delegate Morgan Griffith. Delegate Griffith, Speaker of the House and representative from Salem, could not schedule an appointment with us due to his busy schedule. We were especially hopeful to check in with Delegate Griffith to see if he had made any headway on finding money for the state share of a 5% pay raise for teachers. Dauntless and full of hope, we waited outside his office door. Unfortunately, Delegate Griffith’s assistant informed us that Morgan had already headed off to committee meetings. She advised us to come back in an hour.

At 9am, we split our delegation. Half of us went to the education subcommittee meeting and watched Delegates William Fralin and Onzlee Ware work within this large committee. The other half went to visit with Senator Ralph Smith, the new state senator from Botetourt. Mr. Smith was gracious, although he seemed a bit quiet when we mentioned our opposition to tuition tax credits and vouchers. We were pleasantly surprised that he stated his opposition to the Homestead Exemption. He said he might be a lone voice voting in opposition, but he felt that it was a political ploy and would not serve localities very well.

The delegation visiting Senator Smith then crammed into elevators to drop by Morgan Griffith’s office again. This time we were met by a different office worker who was running copies. She kindly stopped her copying and came over to speak with us. She told us that the Delegate was extremely busy and hadn’t returned to the office yet. We wrote down our names and gave them to her and secretly vowed to return for our meeting with Morgan (we were beginning to feel like Michael Moore in the movie Roger and Me).

The next stop was a meeting with Delegate Onzlee Ware. Delegate Ware is a staunch friend of public school education. He opposes vouchers. He did seem confused about the elementary planning period bill. He said that others from our group suggested he be opposed to it. We asked him who those people were, and he couldn’t remember exactly. Then we clearly suggested that he SHOULD support planning time for elementary teachers. He told us that he now clearly understands our position. (Rob and Doris…I have more to tell you about this conversation sometime.)

After our meeting with Delegate Ware, we had just enough time to stop by Morgan Griffith’s office. In an exciting development, we noticed that his office door was ajar just a bit. We spoke with the lady with whom we first spoke early that morning. She didn’t seem to remember us. We explained again that we were teachers from Roanoke County here to see Delegate Griffith. There was a pause…then another lady came over from the copy machine to tell us that Morgan was due in House Conference Room #1 in the Capital Building at 11:30. She suggested that our best hope for contacting him was to stop him outside the conference room.

Our next appointment was with our good friend, Senator John Edwards of Roanoke. The Senator was detained in a meeting, but his most gracious assistant, Allison Byrd, spoke with us. Senator Edwards is a 100% friend of VEA. Near the end of our time, Senator Edwards arrived and spoke briefly with us.

Meanwhile, half of our delegation, led by Sarah Hollett, was visiting with William Fralin. Delegate Fralin had supported several bills that concerned us. One bill he sponsored sought to clarify the role of religious expressions in schools.

“Board of Education; regulations governing limited public forums and religious viewpoints in the public schools. Provides that a student's voluntary expression of a religious viewpoint on an otherwise permissible subject must be not be discriminated against by local school divisions. Also, local school divisions must establish and implement a policy to ensure that the school division does not discriminate against a student's publicly stated voluntary expression of a religious viewpoint. Requires the Board of Education to promulgate and implement regulations regarding a limited public forum and voluntary student expression of religious viewpoints.”

I always get nervous when legislators start telling people to “promulgate and implement.” Delegate Fralin believes that this topic needs clarification and direction so that practice is in line with the religious liberties guaranteed in the Constitution. Sometimes, however, regulation can make something simple far too complex.

With 11:30 approaching, we hustled as best we could down the stairs and across the courtyard into the capital building. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get through security soon enough to make our way to the conference room to stop Delegate Griffith, and thus ended our quest to speak with Morgan.

As we were about to head for the final rally, Sarah Hollett was contacted by Dr. Lange. A bill that the school division had sponsored by Senator Smith had been moved up to Monday to be heard. Dr. Lange was stuck in Roanoke and asked Sarah to speak to it for her if needed. So Sarah was whisked away by Delegate Fralin and through security where she could be briefed on the bill.

“Reports of Class 1 misdemeanors to school authorities. Provides that local law-enforcement authorities shall report to the school division superintendent and to the principal or his designee all offenses, wherever committed, by students enrolled in the school if such offense would be a Class 1 misdemeanor if committed by an adult.”

After a brief meeting of our complete delegation minus Sarah in the old Senate chamber in the capital building, it was decided that we would head off to lunch and then home. Sarah told us later that she indeed was called upon to speak to the bill, but it was sent away for wordsmithing.

All told, we had a successful trip. Almost all of our area legislators were friendly and accessible. While we didn’t actually see Morgan Griffith, we hope that word gets back to him that we were looking.

After completing this report of our visit, I found a little article on the automatic General Assembly news search feature on this blog. The feed comes from The Richmond Times. The light-hearted piece chronicles a typical day with Morgan Griffith. Here is an interesting tid-bit from that piece:

After another such private meeting, he[Morgan] sneaks quietly back into his office.

Literally.

He was one of the first, if not the first, to have a door put in from his assistant's office to his own three or four years ago.

"I could never get out of my office without being stopped," he says, adding that his staff is instructed to draw visitors away from his door toward a corner area nearby.

Hearing From the People

School Board Report

January 31, 2008

The Roanoke County School Board met this evening for their regular monthly meeting. This was their third regular meeting this month. The big ticket item on the agenda tonight was a public budget hearing. Eight speakers addressed the Board about three different issues. Thom Ryder led off by stating the case for the RCEA salary proposal.

Next up were several speakers who petitioned for the addition of gifted resource teachers. They effectively pointed out that the current gifted resource team is stretched very thin, serving children at five or six elementary schools a piece. Between the testing requirements and the student case-load, the teachers are not able to be as effective as they desire.

The other issue brought before the Board was from parents in the Back Creek community. They were concerned at the alarming trend of higher class sizes in their school. They argued that lower pupil/teacher ratios allow for greater educational success in the classroom. They reported that many classrooms at Back Creek have 23 to 25 children in them which is unacceptable to them.

The meeting also featured a report by Central Middle School’s principal, Becky Rowe. Becky shared data with the Board about the progress students at the school are making. They Board seemed impressed.

Odds and Ends

1. $29,444.72 was the cost of peace of mind at William Byrd. That’s how much it cost for environmental testing to help identify the cause of the mysterious twitching cases back in the Fall.

2. Horace Mann has donated$2000 in order to test all of the toys in the pre-school classrooms for lead paint. More piece of mind.

3. Northside’s geothermal heating and cooling system, an environmentally friendly and highly efficient system, has netted the county a credit of $267,000 from Martin Brothers construction firm.

4. Personnel Policy 7.2 regarding Resident and Non-Resident school attendance was revised to allow grandchildren in legal custody of non-resident former Roanoke County School employees to attend RCPS schools. (Expanded the benefit previously just given to current employees.)

5. The Board approved the spending of $1,282,000 from the personnel department account for various items that were brought up at the January 2 pre-budget hearing. Included in the list is money for HVAC technician, roofing various schools (Penn Forest?) and paving projects. We’ll have a more detailed list of the exact projects when we receive the minutes from the School Board retreat from January 26. According to Penny Hodge, this money has been building in the personnel department’s account over the last few years. The money has carried over and built up to $3.4 million. Mr. Hall felt comfortable allowing the fund to be drawn down to $1.5, with $1.9 million freed up to reapportion. We will also look to the minutes to see how the other $600,000+ are being spent. (They were discussing using some for assistant principals or future elementary school renovations…not sure the final decision.)

5. Allen Journell informed the School Board that due to the reinterpretation of the bank day policy for making up school days missed due to inclement weather, beginning THIS SCHOOL YEAR, RCPS will use bank time to make up the first three missed school days. That means that as of this moment, no matter what happens on Friday, we will have NO days to make-up.

Text of the RCEA Comments to the School Board January 31,2008

RCEA Salary Proposal

These are difficult economic times. Prices of food and energy are rising. Employees are picking up more of the health insurance co-pay. It’s getting more and more difficult to live within today’s economy.

In the last few years, raises for teachers have varied from slightly more than, about the same as, or slightly less than the cost of living. Over the most recent seven year period, disposable income for teachers has generally decreased at most levels when inflation is factored.

Our jobs have become immeasurably more difficult and pressure packed. NCLB, SOL, AYP, ELL, and VGLA are all terms with associated requirements and stresses that the 1998 Roanoke County teacher could just barely conceive. Those terms have changed the face of education in our school system and our state. The teachers have met the challenge of revamping and reworking their instructional models and practices.

Over the same period, compensation for Roanoke County teachers has slipped gradually away from the top tier in the region.

Career earnings (based on the current scale) for Roanoke County teachers now fall behind teachers from Salem, Botetourt, Franklin County, and Roanoke City.

We respectfully request that the school board make a commitment to teacher salary improvement in this year’s budget and the two following budget cycles.

Specifically, we request that you…

· Adjust the mid-range of the scale (approx 1%)

Right now, it takes a teacher around twenty years to reach the halfway point on the scale. We want teachers to reach this milestone earlier. We believe that reaching the midpoint of the scale at the midpoint of a career (30 years) would be a reasonable goal. Neighboring localities reach that level by step 15 (Salem, Franklin Co.)

· Include an across the board 4 % raise for teachers this year

· Agree to a 5% Compensation Commitment over the following two budget years.

These steps, taken in unison and with committed purpose, will work to improve the compensation of our teachers, the most important educational resource.

Thank You

Thom Ryder

RCEA President

Calendar News

Calendar Update

An Open Letter to RCEA Members

The calendar committee met on Tuesday, October 30. There were several items considered. Overall the RCEA Calendar Committee members (exec board at-large reps) felt that Central Office had done a good job with the proposal they made. For instance, there were no conference days scheduled on Wednesdays and for the first time in memory, Roanoke County has been allowed to use bank days as the first 3 snow days instead of using make up days. After the first 3 days are used, we will be alternating make up days with bank days to use the other 2 bank days if necessary. Also, Good Friday will be part of our spring break as it is proposed that spring break fall on the week prior to Easter.

There is one area that we as a committee and hopefully you as RCEA members would like to see changed.

We have the opportunity, for the first time in many years, to be able to have a full 2 weeks of winter break. As the calendar proposal currently stands we would begin school on Monday, August 25 at the suggestion of the school board. Our winter break would begin on Wednesday December 24, Christmas Eve. We would return to school on Monday, January 5.

This schedule offers several concerns/opportunities. First, by beginning on the August 25, we would have a full week in school on the first week. In the past this has been considered difficult for both teachers and students returning from summer break. Second and most importantly, Monday, December 22 and Tuesday, December 23 would be wasted days for instruction in our calendar. With our responsibilities, and level of accountability as teachers constantly rising, we need every day in school to be productive or at least potentially productive. Common sense would dictate that the 2nd and 3rd days before Christmas would be academically unproductive at best.

The calendar committee, along with others present at the RCPS Calendar Committee meeting, have proposed that school begin 2 days earlier in August, thereby addressing each of these concerns.

If we begin on Thursday, August 21, we would have a partial week for the first week of school which would facilitate orientation and acclimation activities. We could then change December 22 and 23 to break days, preserving our instructional integrity and perhaps a bit more of our sanity.

RCEA will present this idea to the school board during citizen’s comments at the Thursday school board meeting.

Just letting you know what’s going on in the world of calendar creation. If you are in need of further information, please let one of us know.

Good luck and take care,

Tim Summers

RCEA Elementary Representative

Sheila Salisbury

RCEA Middle School Representative

Sara Cann

RCEA High School Representative

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