Today your PAT Bargaining Team met with PPS management for our 5th bargaining session. PAT has already presented our full package of proposals to PPS management along with several counter-proposals. PPS came to the table today with proposals on Compensation, Retirement, and Extended Responsibility. Although we are still far apart on certain issues, we did make progress today when we tentatively agreed (TA’d) on Article 4: Dues and Payroll Deductions and Article 25: Complaint Procedure. 

PPS Management began the session with a presentation about the fiscal situation at PPS and student to staff ratios to demonstrate PPS’ commitment to using funds to increase staff. The PAT team asked questions about the data and pointed out the concerns we had about the lack of context: Which staff are included in this count? Does this include the district special programs and charter schools? Luckily following our caucuses, they were able to bring more information to clarify the difference between class size and a student to staff ratio, sharing a graph explaining the class size distribution across the district. We believe that transparency is only possible by providing the facts ALONG with context for the facts: Staff to student ratio is NOT equivalent to class size.

We are glad PPS Management finally completed their initial proposal by giving us financials. Unfortunately, the financial proposal is woefully inadequate. PPS Management has proposed a 2.5% Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) when inflation is over 6%. In the slideshow they shared, they conflated the increased income that comes with experience with a COLA, reporting that educators not yet at the top of our scale will have their salary increase close to 5.9% each year. The steps on our salary schedule are not, and have never been, part of our COLA.

In contrast to the fiscal overview provided by PPS, the testimony from our PAT educators clearly demonstrated that our schools are in a state of emergency. We want to thank Nina Senaga-Freauff, Moira Finnegan, and Kernan Willis for sharing powerful testimony with PPS management about the lived experiences and conditions in our Special Education programs. The testimony they shared was powerful and brought several of us in the room to tears.  We sincerely hope to see counter proposals from management that demonstrate they are prepared to meaningfully respond to the extreme needs of students and educators that were highlighted in today’s testimonials. 

We know the last two years have been financially challenging for everyone. The District’s unwillingness to recognize that reality with the proposals they made is an insult to our hardworking educators who’ve been so deeply impacted by the increasing cost of living in Portland.

We will be back at the table on April 4th, 2023. You can always watch us live on our YouTube page and catch up with the sessions from today 1, 2, 3.

In Solidarity,

Steve Lancaster, Chair

Francisca Alvarez

Samara Bockelman

Julia Fogg

Thea Keith

Charity Powell

Hello Educators,

Today your PAT Bargaining Team met with PPS management for our 4th bargaining session. PAT has already presented our full package of proposals to PPS management along with several counter-proposals.

Our team was disappointed to learn that, despite promising to bring their financial proposals to our session today, PPS management showed up empty-handed. As such, we are still waiting to hear how PPS management is planning to address some of our member’s biggest issues, including compensation (Article 12) and retirement (Article 15).

We have offered PPS management 19 additional dates for bargaining. They have only agreed to 4 additional dates, 5 if we accept their offer to meet outside of our work year on June 22nd.

These actions demonstrate that PPS management is either unable or unwilling to take these negotiations seriously. Although we were ready to discuss a number of different topics, we ultimately had to walk away from the table owing to PPS management’s lack of preparation.

We understand the dire situation our educators, students and school communities are facing. We support educators demanding safe, sustainable and equitable schools for every student. We cannot achieve this goal if the District is unwilling to meet more than once every 2-3 weeks.

PPS management repeatedly claims we have “shared values.” However, it is hard to believe what they say when we see what they do. 

We have been told there will be about 250 un-assignments this year. That is 250 educators without a defined position for next year. 250 educators waiting to see if this contract will lead to better working and learning conditions. 

Our next full day of bargaining is on Tuesday, March 7th.  We sincerely hope that PPS management will bring their full financial proposal to the table.

In Solidarity,
Your PAT Bargaining Team
Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockelman
Julia Fogg
Thea Keith
Charity Powell

Portland Association of Teachers
http://www.pdxteachers.org/

Hello Educator,

Today your PAT bargaining team met with District administrators. We spent most of the session discussing academic freedom and the impact of testing on instructional time.

As professionals, we know that it’s our job to teach in a way that reaches every student. This is why we’ve fought so hard for our academic freedom, so we can determine the best materials, instructional practices and assessments for our students. 

Unfortunately, as we explained to the District’s team, their rigid implementation of new curricula is making it harder for educators to serve our students, to ensure they can see themselves in the books we read, or to adapt the way students demonstrate understanding. It was disturbing to hear PPS management suggest that adopted texts with racist depictions of different groups can be used as a “learning experience”.

From PPS' Wit and Wisdom Adoption Page

We also stressed how many hours we are losing to unnecessary standardized tests and were surprised to hear District administrators claim that we only spend between 4 to 12 hours a year, on average, administering standardized tests across PPS.

Today’s session made it clear how far apart both sides are at this stage. We highly encourage everyone to tune into our next session, Wednesday February 22, when the District team will be presenting their financial proposals.

You can watch today’s session online and read more about our proposals on the PAT website.

In Solidarity,
Your PAT Bargaining Team
Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockelman
Julia Fogg
Thea Keith
Charity Powell

Portland Association of Teachers
http://www.pdxteachers.org/

Dear Educator,

We hope you have had a chance to check out our 2023 Bargaining Platform, and all the critical improvements we’ll be fighting for this year. You can find out more on our website http://www.pdxteachers.org/bargainingvision including:

• Our 2023 Bargaining Platform (2 pages)
• PAT President Angela Bonilla’s video summary (language starts at 5:23)
• Slides highlighting key improvements
• Full text of all PAT contract proposals

Today we met with PPS administrators to hear their proposed changes for our collective bargaining agreement. You can watch the session on our PAT YouTube channel.

One big elephant in the room was the District budget. Although their team was not ready to present any specific economic proposals, there was plenty of handwringing over inadequate state education funding and how that will impact bargaining. 

Many of you got a picture of this in today’s staffing discussion, where among other things we’ve heard they’re closing one school and phasing out 50 TOSA positions.

But there’s plenty to be worried about in what they did present. 

PPS administrators want to:

• Eliminate the internal round of hiring.
• Extend the length of the school year on a school-by-school basis (adding up to 3 Professional Development days and 3 Instructional days).
• Eliminate the PAT Sick Leave Bank and force educators to rely on Oregon’s paid family leave law.
• Gut just cause protections, removing an educator’s ability to go to arbitration for dismissals and terminations.

It’s clear that if we want to make big changes in PPS, we’ve got our work cut out for us, so please make sure and sign the petition supporting our PAT Bargaining platform and start talking to your colleagues about what’s at stake in these negotiations. We really hope you’ll take time to share your story or even make a 30 second video illustrating how these issues are affecting you and how our proposals will benefit your students.

We know that if we stand together it’s possible to address the critical issues facing students, educators and our school communities.  

Tune in February 14 for our next bargaining session, where we’re fighting for smaller class sizes and hard caps, increased planning time, expanded mental health supports, additional special education services, racial equity and restorative justice.

In Solidarity,

PAT Bargaining Team
Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockleman
Julia Fogg
Thea Keith
Charity Powell
Portland Association of Teachers
http://www.pdxteachers.org/

Hello Educator,

Today your PAT bargaining team met with PPS administrators and shared PAT's vision for great public schools.

Our comprehensive package of proposals reflect the priorities you’ve shared over the past few months, through bargaining surveys, listening sessions, and school site meetings, including:

• Smaller Class Sizes and Caseloads, With Hard Caps
• Safe and Healthy Schools
• Racial Equity and Restorative Justice
• Competitive Salaries and Benefits
• Expanded Early Learning and Preschool
• More Teaching, Less Testing
• Additional Special Education Services
• Expanded Mental Health Services
• Housing Assistance for At-Risk Families
• Real Community Connections

We encourage you to review our bargaining platform, watch our video about the proposals (language starts at 5:23), the slideshow with the proposals and sign the petition supporting these demands. For those who want to dive deeper, you can review our comprehensive package of proposals online.

We know the stakes couldn’t be higher. 

Our students and communities are grappling with more urgent, unmet needs than ever. We can’t simply go back to the way schools were before the pandemic because, as educators know firsthand, the status quo over the past two decades has severely short changed our students and we cannot allow current conditions to stand.

Our bargaining proposals address these skyrocketing needs of our students in a number of areas, including mental health, special education, housing, and racial equity. We know what it will take for public schools to become an anchor for safe, stable, and equitable communities, and our proposals lay that foundation.

These proposals also address what it will take to recruit and retain great educators. Our profession is already undercompensated. Without cost of living adjustments that are at least equal to inflation, professional educators will fall even further behind.

Our proposals will ensure educators have enough time to do their job, with more time to plan, grade, communicate and collaborate with meaningful increases in educator directed time to support students.

Finally, our proposals call for hard caps to class size/case load to ensure that educators are able to give students the individual attention they need and deserve.

As we come out of the turbulence of the last three years, there is an understandable desire to return to normal, but the old normal wasn’t working. The new normal we are living now absolutely cannot be allowed to stand. 

We have to change the conversation, and our bargaining proposals reflect this goal. Our proposal is without question ambitious, but our students deserve nothing less.

In Solidarity,
PAT Bargaining Team
Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockleman
Julia Fogg
Thea Keith
Charity Powell
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Hello Educators,

Yesterday, your bargaining team met with the District for our final session focused solely on student support, discipline and safety (contained in Article 9 of the PAT-PPS contract). You can watch the bargaining session on the PAT YouTube channel. Later this month we will start bargaining over changes to our entire contract. 

In yesterday’s session, PAT bargaining members finished presenting our key questions for the District, including:

Causing Harm or Threat of Harm to an Educator: While the District continues to criticize our current contract language that requires a 5 day suspension when a student harms or threatens to harm an educator, they have yet to provide an alternative. How will the district ensure that we have the time and staffing to support students who have threatened or caused harm to educators? Right now, the District’s answer: “It will be at the Administrator’s discretion”. 

Appropriate Duty Schedule: How can we make sure our Mental Health support teams are not the sole or primary staff on duty? More duty ensures they will write a disproportionate level of disciplinary referrals, which can negatively impact their relationships with the students they counsel. How can we ensure we have enough staff on duty to keep students and staff safe? How can we keep the relationship between students and our Mental Health support team members supportive and therapeutic?

Environmental Safety: PPS rejected our language around basic building cleanliness, along with specific temperature and safety standards. PPS’ lawyer made it clear: The District is only interested in addressing environmental issues in our buildings if they are an “immediate danger created by an unsafe working condition when such danger threatens substantial bodily injury or would be a significant health hazard” (current contract language). Otherwise, educators could consider a “dusty room” or a room at “59 degrees” a hazard under our proposal and will “routinely” close classrooms.

It’s interesting that the District’s own recently concluded Facilities Report found that we are operating with less than half of the maintenance staff required to manage the number of buildings in PPS (see pp 15-18) so it’s no wonder we consistently have school temperature and so many other issues across the District! How many leaks in our classrooms until it is seen as a hazard? How many mornings of cleaning rat feces from student desks? How many days of freezing classrooms? How many sick days taken due to mold will be enough? How many more threats? How many more excuses?

Basic Classroom Safety: We need working phones at all times in every location an educator may be asked to work. When the electricity and internet is out, we need alternative communication options. We need doors that lock from the inside. We need basic safety standards across our sites, but the District has not yet agreed to add most of these common sense measures to their language.

Accountability and Support for Special Education: Educators shared how often we’ve been told by administrators that students cannot be held accountable for their behaviors if they have an IEP. When pushed to explain where in the law that is stated, Mr. Buno, the former Head of Special Education and current Head of Multi-Tiered Systems of Support at PPS, was unable to provide any clarification. Our students with IEPs should not be held to a higher standard or be excused from disciplinary processes. Just like all of our students, they deserve accountability and support.

At the end of the day, we know that our students and our communities deserve better. They deserve spaces that are clean and safe. They deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. They deserve to be believed when they share that their spaces are not a safe place to teach and learn.

This is why we will be broadening our bargaining later this month to address not just the unresolved issues around student support, discipline and safety, but ALL the critical issues facing our schools.

In Solidarity,

PAT Bargaining Team
Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockleman
Julia Fogg
Thea Keith
Charity Powell

Portland Association of Teachers
http://www.pdxteachers.org/

Hello Educators,

On Tuesday, December 13th, PPS and PAT held their last Article 9 Bargaining Session of the year. PAT heard the District’s responses and counter-proposals for Article 9. There are several concepts where we have agreement, especially around the need for trauma-informed and restorative practices. The District has also proposed that the Special Education article in our contract be moved into Article 8 instead of completely removed from the contract. Thank you all for your advocacy around Special Education!

Nevertheless, it was evident during our session that the District’s team does not understand the lived experience of educators and students in our buildings. For example:

The District is opposed to designated intervention spaces for students: PPS did not incorporate our language around the intervention spaces. Again, their concerns were that students will use this space inappropriately or be a place to “warehouse” students, particularly our students of color.

However, we know that students are already leaving classes and relying on behavior to communicate their need for support. Educators and other building staff are responding in the hallways, in the counselor’s office or the admin’s office, without any privacy or dignity for students. We need identified space, staff, and materials to support students if we want to utilize real restorative practices.

The District struggled to define the different levels or “tiers” of  instruction and behavior supports: Our bargaining team had to help District leaders understand the difference between the basic, first tier of support that we provide to all students, and the second tier that we provide to some students within our classrooms, but above and beyond what we can provide to all students in a class. 

We pushed to add “implementing” to the current contract language: “Identifying appropriate Tier 2 and Tier 3 evidence-based behavior interventions to support schools,” since it is not enough to identify these supports, we need a commitment to them implementing those Tier 2 and Tier 3 supports across the District for each school. Unfortunately, the District wasn’t willing to incorporate this into their most recent proposal.

We are currently lining up additional dates for January, and we encourage you to check out all our bargaining sessions on the PAT YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/@pdxteachers. 

In Solidarity,

Your PAT Bargaining Team:
Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockelman
Julia Fogg
Thea Keith
Charity Powell

Portland Association of Teachers
http://www.pdxteachers.org/

Hello PAT Educators,

Yesterday our bargaining team met with PPS leaders to continue our discussion of the safety and behavior issues affecting so many of our buildings (watch the full session on the PAT youtube channel).

Many thanks to special education teachers Ginger Huizar (formally from George Middle School & now at Atkinson Elementary School) and Nate Farrell (from Marysville Elementary School) for sharing their firsthand experiences of what’s actually happening in special education classrooms across PPS. They detailed how special education staffing shortages and lack of supports are now impacting entire buildings, and what frontline educators need to truly serve our students. 

Our bargaining team finished presenting the changes we want to see in our contract related to safety and discipline (see PAT’s full Article 9 proposal), including setting environmental standards for all our buildings. 

No one should have to sidestep rat droppings on the way to a student’s desk or teach in a room without electricity or where the temperature is below 60 degrees or above 90 degrees. 

But meeting even these basic standards is proving to be a challenge for PPS, as we’ve seen firsthand in many of our buildings this week.

Unfortunately, the District has a very different plan for how to address these issues, which boils down to putting even more of the responsibility on classroom educators (see the District’s full proposal for Article 9).

Stay tuned for more details on our next bargaining session in two weeks, and thanks to the many buildings that are posting their “PAT Blue” pictures online. We’re all in this together.

In Solidarity,

Your PAT Bargaining Team

Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockelman
Julia Fogg
Thea Keith
Charity Powell
http://www.pdxteachers.org/

Hello Educator,

Today educators met with District leaders to address two pressing issues—what to do about the sharp rise in safety and behavior issues across PPS and how to best meet the needs of our special education students, who now account for close to 1 out of every 5 students enrolled in PPS.

Unfortunately, after today’s discussion it appears that PPS administrators are more concerned with managing their image than doing what’s best for our students. For example, one administrator expressed concern about the stigma associated with having an intervention space to support students who are struggling, failing to recognize that those students are already receiving interventions in public spaces outside the classroom–in the hallways, in the special education classrooms, at the secretary’s desk, or in administrative offices.

We cannot stand by and let District leaders gaslight our colleagues or the families we serve. The District’s current practices and their bargaining proposal will make schools less safe and widen educational inequalities within PPS. Cynically accusing educators of perpetuating systemic racism will not change that fact.

As educators, we believe that every student deserves a classroom environment where they can learn and thrive, particularly our special education students who face such unique and varied challenges.  We will steadfastly oppose any effort by PPS to warehouse our students with a cookie-cutter approach to special education placements. 

When student behavior disrupts the learning environment, appropriate, trauma-informed responses are necessary. And we believe our current contract already contains the tools to address these problems, if the District would simply follow our existing agreement. We want to build on this framework by implementing a consistent, fully resourced District-wide approach to student support grounded in restorative justice practices. 

Despite today’s response from the District, we will continue to fight for a system that provides  the fully resourced and equitably implemented trauma-informed supports necessary to help students remain in school and learning, and to minimize the classroom disruptions that are mushrooming across PPS. 

As PAT Bargaining Team Chair Steve Lancaster said in bargaining, “It’s important to recognize the gap between what a classroom educator can be expected to do and what kids need– students need lower class sizes, intervention coaches, and many other resources; contract language changes alone cannot fix all needs of students.”

Students, families, and frontline educators are in the best position to determine the classroom environment that will help our special education students thrive, and we will continue to push the District to create these individualized learning environments.

Not only is it our legal obligation, it’s the only way to create true educational equity in PPS.

Thank you to all the members who showed up to support out bargaining team today, and Julia Fogg and Dr. Vincent Chirimwami for being our expert guests.

Read our proposal HERE. Watch the video of bargaining here: Part 1 and Part 2. See our presentation HERE.

Take care,
PAT Bargaining Team
Steve Lancaster (Chair), Francisca Alvarez, Samara Bockelman, Thea Keith & Charity Powell

Portland Association of Teachers
http://www.pdxteachers.org/

Dear Educator:

After agreeing to negotiate over the Safety and Student Discipline article (Article 9) in the PAT-PPS contract, the District recently informed PAT that they are unilaterally implementing a new "Disciplinary Matrix." 

As you know first hand, safety is already a major challenge in our buildings, and the District’s changes would make matters much worse. 

Because the Discipline Matrix is part of the Student Rights and Responsibilities Handbook, which the District cannot legally alter without bargaining with our union, your PAT Bargaining Team met with District leaders today to hear why they believe these changes are necessary and what problems they will solve. 

While we share the District’s broad goals of ending disproportionate discipline for Black, Native American, and Latinx/e students, as well as ensuring every student has appropriate support, PPS has repeatedly failed to implement its existing programs or deliver long-promised resources. In fact, the district proposed removing our contract language ensuring a “Full Continuum of Special Education Services” in a year when our Special Educators are already struggling to keep students safe and provide appropriate services for each student. 

Today’s presentation (which you can watch on the PAT youtube channel) did little to inspire confidence that things might be different this time. Once again, PPS leaders seem focused on the wrong end of the problem, trying to wish away the fact that many of our buildings are experiencing serious safety issues like students punching their peers or throwing chairs at school staff. 

Educators know we will never be able to prevent such behavior by focusing solely on the consequences proscribed in the student handbook. What we need are real personnel and supports in place on the front-end, so we can head off disruptive behaviors, and ensure all our students enjoy a classroom environment that makes learning possible.

And over the past five years we’ve pushed to incorporate these kinds of supports and systems into our contract–everything from training for staff around anti-racism, implicit bias, and culturally responsive practices to fully fleshed-out Multi-Tiered Systems of Support that are consistently implemented across the District  and don’t put everything on the teacher’s back. 

Unfortunately, the District has dropped the ball time and time again implementing these programs, and their current proposal doesn’t even provide for training or any identified supports for students or educators, despite Superintendent Guerrero’s claims. 

We will continue to stand up for what our students need, and to ensure programs like restorative justice are implemented the way they were designed. But until the District is willing to make a long-term commitment, with real resources and follow-through, our students and our school safety will continue to suffer. 

We will continue to update members as we bargain over safety and student discipline. But fortunately, we will start bargaining changes in our full contract this school year, which gives every educator across PPS a chance to make their voice heard and set PPS on a better course.

In Solidarity,
PAT Bargaining Team
Steve Lancaster, Chair
Francisca Alvarez
Samara Bockelman
Thea Keith
Charity Powell