Colleagues:

Today, February 25, 2021, was a date your PAT Team had agreed would be an extended bargaining session with PPS.  Yesterday we realized that continuing to meet with PPS while it actively ignored PAT member positions was a futile endeavor, and therefore we canceled the bargaining session.

In bargaining on the 22nd, PPS continued to suggest that the “simulcast/concurrent learning” instructional model was only one option for K-5 instruction this spring, and was simply being presented to show one idea.  Unfortunately, at the PPS School Board Meeting, the tone and comments during the presentation of the simulcast/concurrent learning model did not indicate that it was simply an idea.  The District’s $1.5 million purchase of camera equipment, completed before ever mentioning the concept of a simulcast hybrid model to PAT, appears to be another strong indication of their intentions to act unilaterally.  In addition, based on the data presented to our Team on Monday, PAT believes that the District’s highly flawed family interest survey data, as presented to the School Board on Tuesday, was a less than fully honest portrayal of the results. 

Your PAT Bargaining Team has been absolutely direct with PPS on multiple occasions, that 93% of the PAT membership believes the simulcast/concurrent learning model is terrible, and that the PAT Team would never accept such an approach.  In spite of this, PPS is pushing that exact plan without offering any alternatives.  We canceled today’s bargaining session because your Team will not allow PPS to ignore the clearly stated beliefs of the overwhelming majority of PAT professional educators.   

This afternoon, PAT Organizers, the PAT Bargaining Team, and PAT Leadership are meeting to plan our next steps.  Very soon you will receive a survey which we hope to have everyone complete, and your Building Organizer will reach out for other forms of member feedback related to the return to in-person instruction. 

Your PAT Bargaining Team follows the will of our members, and we will only take a position when we know what the majority of our members believe.  We look forward to hearing from all of you through our survey and the Building Organizers.

As always, we succeed in moving your interests forward when all of us stand together.

In Unity –

Your PAT Bargaining Team

Steve Lancaster, Chair

Emy Markewitz

Francisca Alvarez

Charity Powell

Andre Hawkins

Thea Keith