The Racial Equity Task Force is hosting a Happy Hour/Social for PAT educators of color on Thursday, December 7^th from 4:30-6:30 PM at the PAT office: 345 NE 8^th Ave.

The Racial Equity Task Force is working on recommendations to PAT and PPS outlining how to advance racial equity in our schools. In order to better advocate for our members of color, we need to understand what issues you are facing at work. We want to hear from you!

The event is primarily our social, but please RSVP so we can tailor the event to your expectations, and order enough food.   

We have completed a PERS Bubble Agreement for this school year.  This Agreement allows members to retire and work until the end of the school year while collecting PERS benefits.  Members may start as early as December 1, 2017.  To retire by December 1^st, you must submit your intent to retire by November 6^th.  Please review the complete PERS Bubble Agreement for more details.  

PAT and the District have finalized three memoranda of Agreement (MOAs).  They can be accessed here:

• PERS Bubble Agreement
• School Mergers and Closures
• ACA Compliance
• PK-5 First Quarter Report Cards and Parent Teachers Conferences 

One of the most important events that PAT hosts is Teacher For a Day. We invite policy makers, community leaders, and other partners to see our classrooms first-hand.   This year, it will take place on Tuesday, December 12th. If you are interested in hosting a guest teacher in your classroom, or if you would like to nominate a colleague as a host, please sign up here or contact Madeleine Allen at [email protected]. 

Do you have a plan that could enhance your classroom skills or boost student achievement? An idea for a site-based professional development activity that could build partnerships? OEA’s Center for Great Public Schools awards Promising Practice Grants to individual PAT members. 

There are four $500 grants available to PAT members.  To apply, please complete the short application form available online. 

The completed grant application form must be sent to [email protected]  by December 11^th.

Applications are open for OEA/NEA sponsored California Casualty’s Athletics Grant. Sign up at www.calcasathleticsgrant.com. The deadline for consideration is January 15, 2018, with 2017/2018 recipients announced in April.

Grants are typically between $1,000 and $3,000. In recent years, PAT members have obtained grants for much-needed uniforms, shoes and athletic gear at Franklin, Roosevelt, and Pioneer High Schools. 

Now Middle Schools are eligible for grants to fund athletics programs too.

Contact PAT’s California Casualty Representative, Sherry Hanacek, if you have questions: [email protected] or 971-226-8966.

Please join the Critical Educators Collective and Portland Association of Teachers for Social Movement Unionism: Hope in Hard Times, a six session Inquiry to Action Groups (ItAG) where we will meet to learn how other educators have used their unions to become forces for justice, and develop action plans that achieve this vision.  Click here to RSVP! Space is limited: RSVP by November 5^th to save your spot.

Do you have a house you would like to rent?  Furniture you would like to sell? A side job you would like to promote?  

During the 2016-17 school year, PAT members helped 30 colleagues in need thanks to contributions to the PAT Sick Leave Bank.  These colleagues had exhausted their accumulated leave balances, but were unable to work due to extended or recurring personal illness. But thanks to our contributions to the Sick Leave Bank, they were able to avoid the additional hardships of lost salary and lost insurance coverage.

Download a PDF of the Bargaining Brief

Future Mediation Dates

There are several bargaining dates scheduled in November. We have agreed to three mediation dates on November 2^nd, 15^th, and 16^th. In addition, we have scheduled multiple small group meetings between HR representatives and PAT staff to work on the mechanics of the proposals. We should have a good idea by November 17^th whether we are making progress towards a settlement.

PAT President Suzanne Cohen welcomes new superintendent at the School Board 10/3/17

The Advocate - October 20, 2017

• Add Your Own Flair to Organizing and Make it Shine
• PAT Supports Puerto Rico
• Help PAT Engage!
• Donate to the Sick Leave Bank
• Advancing on the Salary Schedule – Upcoming Deadline October 31^st
• PERS Bubble and Mid-Year Retirement
• Attendance at Staff Meetings

Download the PDF

Buttons! We’ve asked you to wear them, but I wanted to highlight some examples of creativity and collective solidarity we’ve seen as part of this campaign.

Hurricane Maria’s devastating impact on Puerto Rico is still unfolding, but one thing is certain—the island's most vulnerable communities have been pummeled the hardest and face the longest road to recovery. That’s why your Executive Board voted to contribute $1,000 to support frontline Puerto Rican communities in the recovery from Hurricane Maria.

Have you heard? PAT is doing a listening campaign and we need your help.

With so much going on in our district, and in education nationwide, there couldn’t be a better time to talk seriously with our members about the challenges they’re facing and their hopes for the future.

During the 2016-17 school year, PAT members helped 30 colleagues in need thanks to contributions to the PAT Sick Leave Bank.  These colleagues had exhausted their accumulated leave balances, but were unable to work due to extended or recurring personal illness. But thanks to our contributions to the Sick Leave Bank, they were able to avoid the additional hardships of lost salary and lost insurance coverage.

If you have earned enough credit to advance to another column on the salary schedule, our contract requires the District to pay you at this new level within twenty (20) days of the time you supplied the transcripts or other required verification to the District.  The salary advancements will not be retroactive. However credits verified by October 31^st will be retroactive to the beginning of the school year. Check to make sure that PPS has received your verification and get an email, a receipt, or some other written confirmation from PPS that they have received the verification. 

We have completed a PERS Bubble Agreement for this school year.  This Agreement allows members to retire and work until the end of the school year while collecting PERS benefits.  Members may start as early as December 1, 2017.  To retire by December 1^st, you must submit your intent to retire by November 6^th.  Please review the complete PERS Bubble Agreement for more details.  

Professional educators are generally required to attend staff meetings or trainings for up to two hours beyond the workday on Tuesdays.  Such meetings are a part of the workweek and attendance is a professional responsibility.  Any educator who establishes a pattern of non-attendance may subject him/herself to potential disciplinary action. 

However, an educator may have to be absent from a staff meeting/training for a medical appointment, personal matter, or other reason.  On such occasions, the educator is not required to use accumulated leave if they miss all or a part of a Tuesday afternoon meeting/training.  Please see new contract language in Article 14.A.1.d. which makes that clear.    

 The Advocate - October 4, 2017

• PAT Welcomes New Superintendent
• Victory for PAT Substitutes
• Supreme Court to Hear Anti-Union Case
• Help PAT Engage!
• Donate to the Sick Leave Bank!
• Congratulations to Oregon's Teacher of the Year
• Advancing on the Salary Schedule – Upcoming Deadline October 31^st
• National Board Certification Workshop, October 5^th
• OEA Advocacy Conference - October 6^th and 7^th

Download the PDF

Yesterday, October 3rd, a group of educators attended the school board meeting to welcome our new Superintendent, Guadalupe Guerrero, and lay out our union’s vision for public education. 

The Oregon Employment Relations Board (ERB) recently ruled in favor of the Portland Association of Teachers and against PPS. The case definitively established that substitute teachers are entitled to sick leave under the same law as regular contracted educators represented by the PAT. PPS must now withdraw all illegal contract proposals, including one that offers less sick leave than mandated by law. 

The United States Supreme Court officially announced they will take up a case called Janus v. AFSCME, which challenges “fair share” fees paid by non-members who benefit from union-bargained contracts. This case challenges the same issue as the Friedrichs case two years ago.

We are so excited to launch a listening campaign this fall.

With so much going on in our District, and in education nationwide, there couldn’t be a better time to talk seriously with our members about the challenges they’re facing and their hopes for the future.

We’ve set an ambitious goal of talking with 75 percent of our members this fall about what‘s working in our schools, and what’s getting in the way of teaching and learning.

We will be regularly updating you with progress. If you are interested in being a listener please sign up here.