Workers' Rights

Laws that Protect you! 

1. TENURE: employment status of professional educators achieved after completion of the probationary period pursuant to Education Law §3014(1). This status carries significant protection from unfair employer actions.
   
   

2. PROBATION: Employment status of newly hired professional educators, lasting up to four years. The probationary period may be reduced by a year if the educator previously achieved tenure in another school district, or is entitled to Jarema credit for regular substitute employment of at least a semester in the same district.
   
   

3. JAREMA CREDIT: Education Law §2509(1)(a) allows a teacher who has rendered satisfactory service as a regular substitute for a period of two years immediately prior to his or her probationary period to have a shortened probationary period of one year.
   
   

4. TENURE BY ESTOPPEL: A probationary teacher is entitled to tenure even without action by the Board of Education when the Board accepts the continued services of the teacher, but fails to take the action required by law to grant or deny tenure.
   
   

5. 3020-A: Education Law §3020-a sets forth the procedures that school boards must follow for the discipline of tenured employees, and protects tenured teachers from suspension without pay during the pendency of disciplinary proceedings in most cases.
   
   

6. “CADET” RIGHTS: A tenured teacher may refuse to answer questions at an investigatory interview, where the employee is a target if the investigation.
   A teacher cannot be held as insubordinate for refusing to answer questions in any investigation that precedes a 3020-a hearing. Link
   
   

7. FMLA: Family Medical Leave act of 1993 entitles eligible employees to a total of 12 work weeks of leave time during any 12 month period for the family and medical reasons listed in 29 USC §2612(a)(1). Upon returning to work, the employee is to be restored to his or her previous position.
   
   

8. TAYLOR LAW: The New York Public Employees Fair Employment Act, Civil Service Law §200 et seq.

   1. Grant public employees the right to organize and to be represented by employee organizations of their own choice;

   2. Requires public employers to negotiate and enter into agreements with publics employee organizations regarding their employees’ terms and conditions of employment;

   3. Establishes impasse procedures for the resolution of collective bargaining disputes;

   4. Defines improper practices by public employers and public employee organizations;

   5. Prohibits strikes by public employees; and

   6. Establishes a state agency to administer the Law—the Public Employment Relations Board (PERB).
      
      

9. Improper Practice (IP): An Improper Practice under the Taylor Law. An employer commits an IP when it violates Civil Service Law §209-a.1(a)-(g).
   IP charges are usually filed by unions when the employer has interfered with, restrained, or coerced employees in the exercise of their rights to participate in their union, or when the employer has changed an employment practice not governed by the collective bargaining agreement without bargaining with the union.
   Retaliation against a building rep for advocating on behalf of his or her members is an Improper Practice.
   -information courtesy of the Freeport Teachers Association