In our last negotiations, PAT and PPS agreed to end the weekly two-hour staff meeting and shift to fewer meetings of only 90 minutes in duration. In Article 7.10, the language in the contract now reads:

“Professional educators may be required on thirty (30) Tuesdays during the school year to attend meetings or training sessions starting at the beginning of the fifteen (15) minute planning time at the end of the day and continuing for up to one hour and fifteen minutes beyond the workday.”

The reduction in the number of meetings and in the length of the meetings was accompanied with PAT members receiving an additional fifteen minutes of planning time at the end of the day on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays. On Tuesdays the extra 15 minutes become part of the staff meeting.

Finally, in order to make these improvements the PAT agreed (Article 7.10.3) that:

“Professional educators will be responsible for completing four (4) hours of District mandatory on line training outside of scheduled staff meeting time. There will be no staff meetings on at least two (2) Tuesdays between the start of the school year and the due date of the mandatory online training.”

Please remember that there are three staff meetings in September, and each educator has to complete the online training on his/her own time.