Wait for vaccines to reopen schools, St. Paul educators say

January 18, 2021 by

Hamza Dirie, 9, shows support for teachers’ safety during a car rally staged by the St. Paul Federation of Educators.

St. Paul educators, parents and community members wary of the district’s plan to resume in-person learning staged a car rally Jan. 12, calling on administrators to hold off on reopening buildings until COVID-19 vaccines are available to school staff.

St. Paul Public Schools plans to begin a phased-in reopening of elementary schools and some other programs Feb. 1, with new guidelines, protocols and facilities upgrades in place to prevent the virus’ spread among students and staff.

Those measures drew skepticism from rally-goers like Brittany Livaccar, an emergency-room nurse at United Hospital who drove to the rally with her family of five. She said district leaders should reconsider their timeline now that restaurants, bars and gyms are open, and a more contagious strain of the virus is spreading.

“Our hospitals are going to be overwhelmed soon, so it’s really important we keep our students and teachers safe,” said Livaccar, a member of the Minnesota Nurses Association. “I know it’s difficult, but we can’t go backwards now, when our COVID numbers are still high and we don’t have a vaccine for everyone.”

The SPPS plan for reopening received a vote of no confidence from members of the St. Paul Federation of Educators Executive Board, the union’s president told supporters at the car rally.

“We want to keep our community safe, we want to keep our students safe and we want to keep our members safe,” SPFE President Nick Faber said. “That’s why we are here tonight.”

Union members and supporters will be back in the streets tomorrow, Jan. 19, rallying outside Central high school from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. The district’s Board of Education is scheduled to meet later that evening.

Vaccines are coming

After across-the-board shutdowns last spring, Minnesota school districts have navigated COVID-19 differently during the 2020-21 school year. But none of the myriad local learning models has managed to avoid disruptions and frustrations resulting from the outbreak.

To create more certainty for the state’s youngest learners, Gov. Tim Walz in December eased guidelines for opening elementary schools, allowing districts to reopen classrooms even if community spread of the virus is higher than previously allowed.

But educators warn that, regardless of guidelines, community spread will impact schools’ ability to remain open – at least until their frontline workers are vaccinated.

SPFE President Nick Faber speaks at the rally, which was livestreamed on Facebook and Zoom for supporters in their cars.
United Hospital nurse Brittany Livaccar and her family join the SPFE rally.
SPFE members Mandi Jung (L) and Peggy Cobbins

“One of the hard lessons we’ve all learned from this pandemic is that you can’t operate schools when the virus is spreading too fast through the community because too many educators get sick or go into quarantine,” Education Minnesota President Denise Specht said. “Wearing masks, washing hands, keeping your distance – these are the choices that will decide when our school buildings reopen and stay open.”

Educators got some good news Jan. 18, when Walz’s administration unveiled a pilot program to prioritize vaccination of school staff and child care workers. But officials emphasized that the state’s allotment of vaccine doses from the federal government remains limited.

“While we do not have enough doses for everyone who wants a vaccine to receive one right away, we are building the system and structure so that once we receive those additional doses from the federal government, we can move quickly to support our school staff and bring even more students back into our classrooms,” Deputy Education Commissioner Heather Mueller said.

A plea for patience

At the rally in St. Paul last week, union members and parents urged district leaders to hold off on in-person learning until it’s clear students and educators returning to the classroom are there to stay.

“We are so close to finally feeling comfortable returning to our classrooms,” Bridge View elementary teacher Christin Fleming said. “Being vaccinated would be an absolute game changer.”

Reopening before it’s safe, SPFE leaders warned, will cost the district qualified educators at a time when they are in short supply.

Results of an Education Minnesota survey released last fall showed a majority of members who responded said teaching during the pandemic has left them stressed, anxious and overwhelmed. Nearly three in 10 were thinking about quitting or retiring, and applications for pension benefits were on the rise.

A post on SPFE’s social-media account in the days following the car rally reported that two kindergarten teachers assigned to in-person learning at one elementary school in the district already have resigned.

Janet Nelson has seen the attrition firsthand while working in the district’s child-care program for essential workers’ families. The SPFE member said staff turnover is a “constant challenge” for the program. Among staff assigned to the site when the school year began in September, Nelson said, she’s the only one still working there.

Faber and other union leaders pledged to keep pressure on SPPS to alter its course, urging supporters to sign an online petition to Superintendent Joe Gothard and contact members of the school board individually.

“It is not too late to turn this around,” Faber said.

Filed Under: Community, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

As new school year draws near, unions push districts for answers

August 24, 2020 by

Members of the White Bear Lake Area Educators rally before a school board meeting, urging the district to delay its plan to return to in-person classes.

As school districts across Minnesota prepare for a school year unlike any other, the union members who work in public education are pushing for a voice in decisions impacting their health – and the health of their communities.

State guidelines announced by Gov. Tim Walz in July set the ground rules for reopening public school buildings during the COVID-19 pandemic, but allow districts leeway to craft their own protocols.

What should not be optional, unions say, is collaboration and communication with their employees. But in several districts across the metro, union members are calling out administrators for looking past workers’ concerns as they push forward with plans to reopen.

“The communication that is received by staff and families is vague at best and non-existent at worst,” said Karin Hogan, an educator in the White Bear Lake Area Schools, where union members rallied before the school board tonight.

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“Educators are feeling extremely wary, scared and nervous about going back to school because of all of our unanswered questions surrounding safety, consistency, and educational quality,” Hogan said.

Until they get specific answers to those questions, union members want administrators to pump the brakes on in-person learning, set to begin Sept. 8 with a hybrid approach that combines in-person and at-home learning. In a survey of union members, 74% said they prefer distance learning to start the year.

“Our union is appreciative of the cooperation that the administration is currently showing with our negotiations committee. It is more than many other districts,” Hogan said. “However, it is not enough to address and alay our concerns.”

Unions representing school employees initially praised the governor’s reopening guidelines as data-driven and based in science.

But Denise Specht, president of Education Minnesota, stressed that readying school buildings would take a “tremendous amount of work,” and she cautioned local districts against settling for “safe enough” to meet arbitrary deadlines for starting classes.

“We know we have a lot of work to do before school can start this fall,” Kelly Gibbons, president of SEIU Local 284, added. “We are committed to doing everything in our power to make sure every district in the state, no matter what their plan may be, is putting the health and safety of students, staff and our communities before everything else.”

Already, local unions are reporting problems.

A White Bear Lake school board member listens as one of the district’s educators explains her concerns about plans to reopen school buildings.

Under Walz’s executive order, districts are required to accommodate staff members with health conditions that put them at elevated risk to COVID-19.

But Specht has said she is “deeply troubled” that educators’ requests for accommodation haven’t always been taken seriously. In a public statement, she listed several examples of complaints – some “plainly illegal” – Education Minnesota has heard from its members.

“We can and must do better,” Specht said. “Education Minnesota calls on school districts in this state to be model employers.”

The American Federation of Teachers has authorized educators to go on “safety strikes” during the pandemic as a last resort in efforts to secure certain protections on the job. But some metro districts are doing better by their employees without large-scale worker mobilizations.

In St. Paul, where the coronavirus cut short a contentious educator strike in March, administrators not only invited members of the St. Paul Federation of Educators to join work groups charged with planning for the fall semester, but took their input seriously, SPFE President Nick Faber said.

“Most of the discussion was around hybrid and returning to classrooms, what it would look like to go back,” Faber said. “It seemed like every time we answered a question or concern, it just opened up 50 more. It was just not logistically possible to do it safely.”

Tiffany Dittrich, president of the White Bear Lake Area Educators, speaks at the rally.

The St. Paul Public Schools will begin the school year with remote learning for all students, a move Faber characterized as the least-bad option on the table for SPFE members.

“Our members aren’t crazy about having to go back to teaching over a computer screen, often while their own kids are in the house somewhere,” he said. “But they know this is the safest way.”

Other metro-area school districts, including Roseville and Bloomington, have recently come to similar conclusions, postponing their initial plans for in-person classes due to safety concerns.

Tiffany Dittrich, president of the White Bear Lake educators union, hopes her district will do the same. Two weeks ago, she presented administrators with a list of over 100 questions about the safety and quality of instruction under the district’s back-to-school plan. Most remain unanswered, Dittrich said.

“I’m proud of the tireless work of our district leaders and teacher leaders throughout the entire summer to set the stage for our return this fall,” she said. “Yet there is much work that must still be done … and time is running far too short.”

Filed Under: Community, Politics, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Nick Faber: Strike, contract campaign led to real gains for St. Paul schools

April 1, 2020 by

SPFE President Nick Faber (R) spoke at a union rally outside district headquarters.

– Nick Faber is president of the St. Paul Federation of Educators. He wrote this column for the April 2020 edition of The St. Paul Union Advocate newspaper.

No one should doubt St. Paul educators’ unwavering commitment to our students. We care so much about what our children need, we were willing to strike for them.  

And the short-term sacrifices we made during the three-day strike were worth the long-term gains made for our students and families and the collective power we built as educators.  

Our strike was about getting our students the resources they deserve and breaking down racial disparities in our schools, so all students, no matter what they look like or where they are from, can thrive and succeed.   

The contract ratified March 20 by members of the St. Paul Federation of Educators puts the St. Paul Public Schools on the path to building the schools our students deserve. 

The new contract guarantees the district will spend an additional $5 million to hire more counselors, social workers, intervention specialists, nurses, psychologists and bilingual educational assistants next school year to give students the mental health and multilingual support they need. 

Educators understand how important these supports are to the health and well-being of our students and families. In the 2019 Minnesota Student Survey, 19 percent of eighth-grade girls in St. Paul Public Schools said they seriously considered suicide in the last year. And 40 percent of fifth-graders agreed with the statement, “I worry a lot.” We need more staff to tend to these increasing mental-health needs. 

Hiring more staff who speak different languages also is critical so all families feel welcome and supported at their school. Families in St. Paul schools speak 129 different languages, but many don’t have access to multilingual staff to help them feel welcome and fully participate in their school community. SPPS only has 13 full-time Spanish interpreter positions working in 63 schools and nine Somali interpreters in 45 schools that need them.  

This isn’t just important for our families, but our multilingual staff as well. Many are people of color, some immigrants themselves, who are being pulled away from their primary duties working with students to interpret because there just isn’t enough staff. 

Educators also won on another important issue – expanding restorative practices across the district to end the school-to-prison pipeline. Restorative practices are one way to build community and a positive school climate without pushing students of color out of school.  

We knew the community had our backs in the days leading up to the strike. St. Paul has long valued public education – our schools are always at the heart of our community. But once we went on strike, the support was truly overwhelming. Students came out in droves – some even whipped up pancakes from the back of minivans. Parents brought their babies, future SPPS students, sporting SPFEonesies and buttons to rallies. St. Paul businesses fed educators on the picket lines. I could go on and on. 

The strike empowered St. Paul educators. But we’re not done yet. We’re not done advocating for our students – this is just the beginning.  

Educators across the nation are frustrated. Policymakers need to start listening to the experts – educators and parents – when decisions are made about our public schools.  

Closing our state’s racial and economic disparities requires real investments – a multi-billion-dollar increase in state funding for public schools – so we can provide every student with the resources they need. No exceptions. 

And St. Paul educators will demand to be heard at the local level. Budgets reflect priorities. We are with our students every day and know we need to focus first on hiring more adults who work directly with our children.  

Elected officials at all levels should be on notice. Educators are willing to take mass action to get the schools our students deserve. 

 

Filed Under: Labor Voices Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Mounds View paras stick together with strike vote

March 6, 2020 by

(SEIU photo)

More Twin Cities workers are making preparations for a possible strike.

The union representing nearly 400 para-educators in the Mounds View Public Schools today announced its members voted overwhelmingly to authorize a 24-hour strike if contract negotiations continue to stall.

Para-educators are the first district employees to take a strike vote in 40 years, according to their union, Local 284 of the Service Employees International Union.

“It’s sad we had to go this route,” said Local 284 member Melissa Grewe, who works with special-ed students at Reach Academy. “But we’re united, we’re standing together and we’re hopeful we can get this done.”

Bargaining with the district began nine months ago, but for union members, progress has been slow on key issues like affordable health insurance.

Para-educators pay a greater share of health-insurance premiums than other bargaining units in the district. Equity, para-educator Cathy Springhorn said, is long overdue.

“Paras are the people who always put others before themselves,” Springhorn said. “But now we’re standing up in a way we never have before. We deserve to get the same health insurance as everyone else, and we need the tools to make sure every student reaches their highest potential.”

Para-educators also are fighting the school district’s attempt to eliminate a provision allowing them to spread their pay over 12 months.

Other union demands reflect the changing nature of para-educators’ work.

Before bargaining began last June, Local 284 circulated surveys asking members to list their top concerns. Many said they lacked the time needed to keep up with new responsibilities, like third-party billing, communicating with families and filling out reports. Others felt they could better serve students with more time to plan and collaborate with teachers.

Contract proposals developed out of those concerns, Grewe said, have gone nowhere in negotiations so far.

“We have no time built into our day to get these tasks done, so a lot of people are either doing them after school on their own time or during their break time, their lunch time,” she said. “It’s frustrating, and members don’t feel respected or valued by the district.

“I think that shows by the number of people who came out to vote.”

About 90% of union members participated in the strike-authorization vote, held at school facilities earlier this week, and 80.7% voted “yes,” according to the union. Grewe said she hopes district leaders got the message.

“Come to the table and actually bargaining with us,” she said. “We do this because we love kids. And with a fair contract, we can make the kids’ experience even better than what it is.”

Para-educators have not set a strike date. They are required to provide the district with 10-days notice before going on strike.

The two sides are scheduled to resume mediated talks March 31.

Some 4,000 janitors across the metro and 3,600 St. Paul educators are in last-ditch negotiations this week. If they are unable to reach an agreement, janitors plan to begin an open-ended strike over unfair labor practices March 9. Educators would begin their strike a day later.

Filed Under: Organizing, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,
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