YOU ARE THE RGNEA.   

Become a building representative; let your voice be heard by joining district committees that are making the decisions that will move us forward.  It is up to you to be the change that our students, our community, our teachers, and our district needs.

Please read the latest note from our local president, Rich Thies:

A quick recap of the Board of Education Meeting tonight…….

First, the good news.  Your VOICE was heard loud and clear by the Administration and Board of Education through your emails and attendance at the district meetings regarding the 403b.  The administration and Board of Education has dropped the idea of going to a one benefit provider for your retirement savings (403b).   The district will continue to allow the current choice of providers that can adequately meet the new requirements. 

Second, the not so good news.  The Board of Education still seems committed to spend the district money on Navential consultants rather than invest the money on the district needs to improve all aspects of our school district.  There was no vote, but there is still work to do.  A vote will be coming up in the future.  To hear more details and discussion about what happened, you may join us for our monthly RGNEA Meeting.  The information about the meeting is below:

RGNEA Building Representative Meeting

Corner Coffee House

100 North Florissant Road

Ferguson, Missouri

Wednesday, October 21^st, 2009

4:20pm

All RGNEA Members are invited.  Please come and be a part of the discussion.

Heating and Cooling Issues

I am aware that we are having some cooling issues once again this year in many of the school buildings.  Many people have reported this problem to me and I continue to hear of many hot rooms I have not heard from members about.  If you are experiencing a classroom that is not at a proper temperature level, here are the steps you need to take in order to put the accountability on the administration and off of you.  This helps me in the struggle to get things accomplished.

• Send an email to the administrator and copy it to your secretary in the building asking for a work order to be placed to correct the problem.  In the email, have a brief, clear description of the problem.  This MUST be done in email form.  This leaves you with a solid documentation trail including a date and time stamp.  I always recommend this email be cc’ed to me as well so I have it in the event the issue is not followed through and becomes a major issue.  Sending an email everyday is not a bad thing to do.  Creates a more solid trail.

• After 2-3 days, there should have been somebody to look at the situation and either fix it or inform you what the problem is with a timeframe for fixing it.  At this point, I’d like to be made aware of the problem if it continues.  If the timeframe for fixing is short, we may give another day or two.  If it is a longer timeframe, let me know and I’ll send an email to the proper people to get make the awareness of the RGNEA watching and demand an answer on when it will be corrected and secure it in writing.  At this point, to help push things along, get a thermometer and place it in your room.  Take a picture of the thermometer with the temperature reading and email it to me.  We consider a temperature outside of a 68-75 degrees the normal temperature range.  These pictures seem to help move things along quicker.  Again, if nobody responds back to your with any information about the problem, don’t be afraid to send follow-up emails as needed letting them know the situation still exists and ask again for a work order again in an attempt to get the problem rectified.  Remember, that is putting the accountability off of you and on the administration solidifying your case even more.  You can determine with your building when emails are enough.  Minimum, send one every couple days.

• After an adequate paper trail is laid and there still is no fix, we can file the problem through with C.O. with the grievance process.  This process has been successful in the past.

Planning Time

We have begun to see problems with the building planning.  The negotiations this year gave the teachers a minimum of 250 minutes of uninterrupted planning time in the weekly schedule.  The administration may only take your planning time for meetings or PD if it is in excess of 250 minutes in a week.  A building with 300 minutes of planning time a week may use 50 minutes for whatever meeting or training they choose.  If there is a situation where this 250 minutes of planning time is violated, try to work it out in house first, but if that fails, please let me know and we will deal with it through the RGNEA.  Again, a solid paper trail is needed prior to our involvement.

Classroom Sizes

Your RGNEA has been made aware of many classrooms stuffed with students over the recommended DESE standards that the district has agreed to abide by.  We will continue to monitor as the district goes through the process of determining the needs, going through the hiring process, and getting the board approval for the hires to alleviate the overcrowding situation.  The district continually monitors the class sizes, so they are aware, but they always seem to need a push and the process seems to take a while.  After the number settle, we will compile a list of large class sizes and see what we can do to get you the answers and solutions you deserve.

New Salary Schedule

On August 20^th you will receive your first paycheck on the new contract.  Finally you will notice an increase on that check for the first time in 3 years.  Your negotiation team worked hard with the administration to implement a new salary schedule.  There were many problems and errors on that original scale put out, but the teams worked together to come to an agreement on each problem.  Although something like this never is perfect, your negotiation team has done an excellent job representing the members in getting the members the best package available.  Just so all of you understand, what we have received is a one step movement on the salary scale this year with with a 0% cost of living raise. There was a money adjustment that was given to each staff member for the adjustment from the old salary scale to the new salary scale that may have been as much as 1.2% in a few cases.   Although the money increase for the step movement looks good after so long stretch of time without one, it is nowhere near what the other local school district employees have seen. The administration has agreed that when the money comes in from the state for the correction to the “formula fix”, the district would reopen financial talks.  You can trust that your negotiation team will work to get you our share of the money that comes in and apply that to the teachers/staff salary in some way.

No Bargained Agreement

Although the RGNEA feels as though we have made some significant gains, the RGSD teachers are still working without a bargained agreement for this coming year.  At the end of May, the administration cut off the negotiations leaving many of the vital issues affecting the membership not even discussed.  We go into the school year without any or little discussion on bargaining recognition, work conditions including class sizes and discipline, and employee rights including tight language on the grievance procedures and the collective bargaining processes.  We are working with a verbal agreement only on Salary, Benefits, Professional Development and Planning Time.  Although there are areas we have made gains in and the administration has so far stood by the verbal agreements, our agreement is not binding if the district decides to change their mind.  Your team has continued to push to restart the bargaining process all summer, but the request has fallen on deaf ears.  Unless this process begins again soon and we see some real attempt to work toward a bargained agreement, we may be asking for membership step up and support a move to get the administration back to the negotiation table.  That may include attendance to a board meeting or something informational to gain community support.

RGNEA News

It seems to become harder and harder to keep up with the demands of keeping the RGNEA web page updated.  We will make the effort to do just that over the next two week in getting information more current, especially the contact information in the event you need support.  That web address again is:

http://rgneamain.googlepages.com/

President’s Message

I am honored to again serve as your president for 2009-2010 school year and will continue to provide the support and leadership for you, the membership of our district.  Your executive team continues to work to build the trust and respect with the administration and board of education to pursue the goals of the association and protect the rights of you, the members.  Although the executive officers fight the big battles, I can’t say the following this enough.  The RGNEA is NOT a small group of elected people that make all of the decisions for you.  It is a group of people that listen to all of the membership and make the decisions that guide our direction based on that feedback from you.  The more membership that gets involved and lets their opinion and voices heard, the more powerful we become in achieving our goals.

Let me know if there is anything the RGNEA can do for any of you.  I am a phone call or an email away.  Have a great year everyone.

Richard Thies

RGNEA President