An open letter to our Friends and Families:
The Educators of 205 and Knox/Warren Special Ed hope to reach a settlement concerning the issues that remain unaddressed in our contract. Our Teachers and Paraprofessionals have spent countless hours fighting to resolve this before school ended this past year. Some in the media imply that the “Union Leaders” want a work stoppage. This could not be further from the truth. We believe no one on either side wants that. However, it is lazy, uninformed, and irresponsible journalism to blame the “union.” The days of Jimmy Hoffa and the big Chicago Unions are long gone. How quickly people choose to forget that these “Union Leaders” are the same ones you wave to in your neighborhoods; the ones you say hi to at the store or gas station; the people you ask how your student is doing in class while eating with your family at a local restaurant; the people who have children and peers in the same classes or sports teams together. This “union” is made up of the people who care for your children. They are the people who will step in front of a gunman to protect your child; the people who teach your children to read, write, do math, play an instrument, and be a good citizen; the people who give a growing amount of their own money to make sure every child has the resources they need in school. We buy school supplies for those who have none. We buy coats, shoes, and clothes for children that have none. We wash clothes of the children who come to school dirty. We feed the children who come to school hungry. We buy the cookies and candles so your children can go on trips. We spend countless hours outside the work day so your children can have all the experiences possible to them. We sit for hours after an event waiting with a child and don’t leave until every child is safely picked up. We love these children as if they were our own.
Many say that educators are always wanting more when they don’t even work in the summer. Our days are not 8 hour days during the school year and many of us work throughout the summer preparing to better teach your children every year. We pay for our education and workshops to improve our teaching, we run camps for your kids to attend and improve in a myriad of things. Not to mention, we have never had one paid vacation day. We are solely paid for the days we teach . . . nothing else.
Our Teachers and Paraprofessionals have fought to come to a compromise. For over a decade we have fought for compromise only to be met with delay tactics until the last second. Our love for your children is continually used as a weapon against us; to require us to do more with less; to continually give up more of our own family time. We are continually chastised “it’s what’s best for students” and told if we care about them we’ll give more. We are forced into manufactured panic and stress in an effort to make us give in to the things we are begging for at a time when all we want to be doing is getting ready to greet your children in our classrooms. We believe our students and teachers should be told if they are in danger. We believe our students and teachers deserve the real support of the Administration with classroom discipline to ensure everyone has the opportunity to learn. We believe our teachers and Paraprofessionals, like our students, should be free from being bullied and abused at school; but instead should be treated with respect and dignity. IF they are not, we believe the individuals doing the bullying should be addressed and not rewarded. We believe we deserve to have in writing a set number of days and hours we are expected to work. We believe we devote our lives to the children of our community and should not be fired without a real reason. We believe those of us who have given our lives to the school should not have backs turned to us when it comes time to retire. Our teachers and Paraprofessionals have paid for and have earned our retirement.
The educational world continues to ask more of us and we are up for the task. We believe our students’ and our family time is important. During the last contract negotiation we agreed to less salary in exchange for additional work time. These came in the form of ‘early-out days’. We agree with the Board that after actually implementing these, some adjustments need to happen. Although the number of hours only begins to compensate us for the additional work load that is being placed on our teachers and paraprofessionals, there are too many early out days. We recognize the early out days can create a hardship for our students’ families. We believe we can maintain the overall number of hours while still allowing students to receive lunch and have PALs available to them. By eliminating and combining days while protecting them from pointless administrative assigned tasks, the educators can get the time needed to do the work that is required of them without creating additional costs for substitute teachers and hardships for families.
Every school year our teachers work hard to educate your children. We hear in public statements how great of a job we do. Boasting how our District spends the least to educate while still being competitive in test scores. This only happens at the expense of our Teachers and Paraprofessionals. We willingly take on the unrealistic and unachieveable standards forced upon our students while quietly watching facts and numbers manipulated for public consumption. We’ve seen assurances and promises broken. We believe our people and classrooms are what make a school succeed. These should be as high as a priority as stadiums, Astro-turf, or technology. We are happy to give all that we have every day and only ask to be treated fairly and with respect.
Please support the people that actually teach your children.
Do NOT attempt to incorrectly login more than three times or you will be locked out! If you can’t remember your username and/or password use the “Forgot Password” link.