District Administration - July 2007 - (Page 38)

HUMAN RESOURCES tion. The best professional development is what teachers choose at the local level to meet student needs, Raabe says. “So while it’s good to have professional development from national organizations like the NEA or the AFT for people to draw upon, the best thing that can happen is for local school districts and their school employee unions to sit down and talk about the professional development that we need to meet our needs so that we can meet the needs of other schools and the students in our district,” Raabe says. The Toledo Federation of Teachers (TFT) successfully bargained for language to be included in its contract that ential determinant in student achievement, along with home environment, says Francine Lawrence, TFT president. “The Reading Academy is not a building—it’s people,” she says. “It’s a collaborative eﬀort between the union and the district. We jointly select the individuals [who will serve as literacy support teachers] and jointly guide the process within the district. When there’s ownership by both the union’s members and management, the opportunity for success is much greater.” School Improvement Since it takes more than professional development courses to impact the learn- “We take a lot of difﬁcult work off their shoulders. They still have the right to come into the classroom.” —Susan Taylor, president, Cincinnati Federation of Teachers requires changes in curricula or education programs to be developed in partnership with the federation. Having been given a voice, union representatives negotiated for the district to use the AFT’s researchbased ER&D reading program as a key component of teacher training and professional development. The Reading Academy program, which kicked oﬀ in 2000, provides key resources ranging from a rigorous summer school curriculum designed for thirdgraders who have failed the state’s reading test to an intensive intervention program known as ACE, or Achieving Content Excellence, for struggling elementary and junior high students. As a result of their eﬀorts, the Toledo district’s test scores have improved dramatically. In August 2004, the district moved up two notches on the state accountability system, from “academic emergency,” or the lowest level, to “continuous improvement,” and Toledo is now the leading urban district in reading in Ohio. Teacher quality is the single most inﬂu38 July 2007 ing environment, teacher unions also bargain to add language to the contract to address other school improvement issues. Some districts have negotiated for the right to create school improvement teams to address problems at the local level. For instance, representatives from Rochester’s administration, teachers, parents and high school students all have seats at the negotiating table to discuss matters that aﬀect teaching and learning at the school, from requiring uniforms to adding a rigorous International Baccalaureate degree program. Each school’s joint council has the ﬁnal say over any issue involving teaching and learning at the school. “Instead of centralized decision making at the headquarters or [by the] principal, teachers, parents and high school students are invested in these decisions, and therefore they increase the likelihood that the implementation will be enthusiastic and supported by all constituents,” Urbanski says. In Toledo, two teachers and one administrator partner to form a school improvement team, which meets with administrators at schools struggling with student achievement to facilitate changes at the site. “We believe, and it’s a guiding principle of the Toledo Federation, that teachers are instructional leaders,” Lawrence says. “My view is that if teachers need to look to someone who doesn’t teach for expertise, there’s little opportunity to advance classroom practice and even less to realize student achievement gains.” The fact that Toledo is the leading district in student achievement among Ohio’s urban schools is not an accident, Lawrence adds. It’s a result of genuine collaboration between labor and management. When teachers are part of the decision-making process and take ownership, then implementation is much more realistic and possible, she says. East Orange Education Association, a 12,000-student urban district in New Jersey, took a bricks-and-mortar approach when negotiating for school improvements in 2000. The union bargained for the creation of a health, safety and security committee, which addresses members’ concerns from mold in the building or potholes in the parking lot to malfunctioning thermostats in the classroom or rodents in the kitchen. The committee, which meets at least ﬁve times each year, consists of four members appointed by the association and four members appointed by the superintendent—typically the district’s directors of the security, maintenance and custodial departments. By gaining direct access to the key decision-makers regarding health, safety and security issues, the union found that it could address the concerns of its members more quickly and eﬃciently. “When I call the head of the maintenance department, if he doesn’t call me right back, he will send somebody to deal with the situation,” says Clarence A. Osborne, vice president of the East Orange group. “The trust factor has increased to the point where we feel more conﬁdent that things will get done if they are within District Administration

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of District Administration - July 2007

Contents
Editor’s Letter
Letters
News Update
Facilities/Construction Update
Curriculum Update
Inside the Law
Administrator Profile
District Profile
Cover Story: Rethinking School Bus Safety
Broadening Collective Bargaining
Searching for Subs
Jersey City’s Broad Appeal
Improving Nutrition in Schools
New Products
Computer Literature
How Well Does This Web Site Work?
Research Corner
Problem Solution
Online Edge
Speaking Out
Supervisor’s Opinion
Calendar of Events
Understanding the Times

District Administration - July 2007