Monday, March 24, 2014

MONDAY News!!!

Good morning WLEA Members,
Some news that can’t be sent through email…..

**** We haven’t received 4 building’s PAC envelopes yet, but our WLEA members have broken last year’s record for donations to PAC already!   Daryl Szymanski, our PAC chair and Vice President, reported to me over the weekend that as of Friday 442 members have contributed $18, 641!  That beats last year’s total of $17, 118 in contributions to PAC.

Needless to say, as our profession is attacked by very rich individuals and groups in the name of “reform” and “improvement”, our contributions to PAC become even more important to help elect our next set of leaders who understand that educators are some of the best educated and knowledgable people in our state.

I would love to see us top $20,000!!!!  If you still want to donate, contact me at tfitzprez@yahoo.com

*** An update on the addition of 5 days to the calendar next year -  
We received this information from Ruth Beier, the MEA’s Economist:
“The School Aid Supplemental for this year, HB 4295, includes the language at the end(in Section 101).  This language passed the House and Senate (today), so it will be in the final version of the bill.

” IF A COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AGREEMENT THAT PROVIDES FOR AT LEAST 170 DAYS BUT LESS THAN 175 DAYS, AND AT LEAST 1,098 HOURS, OF PUPIL INSTRUCTION IS IN EFFECT FOR EMPLOYEES OF A DISTRICT AS OF OCTOBER 1, 2013, THEN UNTIL THE SCHOOL YEAR THAT BEGINS AFTER THE EXPIRATION OF THAT COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AGREEMENT THE DISTRICT SHALL PROVIDE AT LEAST THE NUMBER OF DAYS OF PUPIL INSTRUCTION IDENTIFIED IN THE COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AGREEMENT, AND AT LEAST 1,098 HOURS OF PUPIL INSTRUCTION.”

If this passes both houses of the legislature, it would mean that we would not need to change the 2014-2015 school calendar.  We can make changes to the 2015-2016 calendar through our regular contractual talks.

***  The EAA legislation has passed the House and is going on to the Senate.  It does include stipulations for a failing school to first work through their ISD.  There are also provisions for ways for a failing school to leave the EAA and return to their home district.   Two democrats actually casted the passing votes for this version of the bill because their amendments were included in the bill.   (The vote was 56-54).  Cynics, as you can imagine, are saying that those amendments could easily be stripped when the bill gets to the Senate.  So, this is a bill to still keep your eyes on.