Holding the line in Portland

THE 3,200 teachers, counselors and librarians represented by the Portland Association of Teachers (PAT) have been without a new contract for over 18 months. But recent actions show that they are willing to fight for their jobs and have the support of the community.

The original contract expired June 30, 2008 and has been extended while the district and PAT bargaining teams remain at an impasse. The main disputes are over health care, wages, workload and layoff language.

Under the banner of cost-saving, a 2008 law required almost all of Oregon's K-12 school districts to enter a new statewide insurance pool for all school employees, with exemptions for certain school districts, including the Portland Public Schools (PPS).

Foreseeing this law back in 2003, in exchange for reduced benefits and higher health insurance costs, the union added to the contract a clause stating that any savings from the district deciding to join the statewide pool would go toward teachers' salaries. Now that the district is thinking about joining the pool, management wants to eliminate the clause. PAT's latest counter-offer is to use the savings to reduce premium costs.

The Portland Public School Board also wants to assign duties such as hallway monitoring to teachers during the 15 minutes before and after the school day, while the union is counter-offering with 7.5 minutes. In the most recent negotiations, the union agreed to give the district the power to implement two unpaid furlough days. The district is also proposing to change layoff language in order to disadvantage experienced teachers who switch subjects from retaining their seniority rights. So far, the union has refused to accept this.

The biggest sticking point, however, is over salaries. Currently, teacher pay at PPS ranges from $34,493 to $68,884 depending on education and years of experience. In the most recent proposal, PAT is asking for a very modest 2 percent raise in the first and third years, and a 2 percent raise for those at the top step--about 51 percent of PPS teachers--in year two.

Despite the fact that the PAT proposal is less than teachers in nearby districts have received, the school board is countering with a proposal of raises of 2 percent, 0 percent, and 0 to 2.5 percent in the first, second and third years respectively, tied to the Consumer Price Index (CPI).

Nancy Arlington, a PAT union staffer, told the Northwest Labor Press that the "third-year raise offer is disingenuous because it's based on the CPI for 2009, which is expected to be 0 percent, and PPS isn't proposing to use the CPI for 2007 and 2008 for the first two raises, because it would generate raises of 3.5 and 3.3 percent. In short, teachers would fall behind inflation under the PPS proposal."

THE CONTRACT battle is occurring within the larger framework of neoliberal school "reform," which has frustrated many teachers and parents throughout the district.

As Steve Rawley, editor of the PPS Equity Web site, described in an extensive article, the district reorganizing efforts began in the early 2000s under the leadership of former superintendent Vicki Phillips. Her administration pushed through market-based restructuring strategies using "school choice" and corporate grants to reconfigure high schools in poor neighborhoods.

This retreat from a neighborhood-based system led to an exodus away from the poorest schools in Portland. As Rawley writes:

Jefferson High School, Oregon's only majority black high school, had an attendance area population of just over 1,500 in fall of 2008. Approximately 500 high school students enrolled that year, with nearly 1,000 transferring out under the district's liberal school choice policies. Then, as now, Jefferson's course catalog reflected this loss of enrollment and funding. At the former arts magnet school, there were no music classes offered, no advanced placement classes, no chemistry, physics, or calculus, and no world languages other than Spanish.

For her fantastic work increasing the achievement gap in Portland public schools, Phillips was given the job of head of education for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Now, the new superintendent Carole Smith is moving toward a "large campus" model, which aims to close three to four of the newly under-attended schools in the district and create six to seven "mega-schools," divided into different "academies."

But all the credit for the PPS restructuring disaster doesn't rest with the two superintendents. As Rawley points out, they were helped by hired hacks from the Broad Foundation.

Eli Broad, a Los Angeles real estate magnate began his foundation in the 1960s with the mission to transform "urban K-12 public education through better governance, management, labor relations and competition."

The Broad Residency in Urban Education offers young business majors a full-time, senior-level management position in a large urban school district. For two years, the Broad foundation pays half of their salary, and after that, the district is supposed to foots the bill. According to Rawley:

Portland Public Schools has hosted four Broad Residents. One left after his residency, one is still in her residency, and two hold key strategic leadership roles overseeing the future of our schools.

Sarah Singer came to PPS five years out of graduate school in 2007, and led the high school system redesign planning over the past year or so...Singer has two master's degrees, but no prior professional experience in K-12 education. She makes $90,000 a year. (Top of scale for a teacher, with a PhD and 12 years' experience, is around $70,000.)

The other is Sara Allan, who came to PPS as a Broad Resident in 2005, and worked at first in human resources and as a project manager. The K-8 Action Team was her first high-profile project. As an executive director she currently works part-time (80 percent), and is paid $90,000 a year. Her base salary of $112,500 is twice what many teachers make with an equivalent level of education. She never worked in a school or school district prior to joining PPS, and has no professional training in K-12 education.

On top of this the school board has given a pay raise of over $13,000--the equivalent of one-third of what a teacher makes after four years of experience--to each of its three new "deputy superintendents." And of course, the business-minded district has signed on to the state's recent Race to the Top application that aims to connect student test scores to teacher evaluations for the first time in Oregon's history.

THIS TEAM of corporate reformers is fueling the anger of many Portland teachers and their allies.

PAT has held multiple large and well-attended rallies at recent school board meetings. On October 12, the school board meeting opened with a heartfelt rendition of "Solidarity Forever," sung by over 300 teachers and community allies.

On November 16, an impressive 1,500 teachers, parents and students marched on the school board meeting demanding "Contract now!" During the meeting, angry teachers and staff members addressed the board, including Curtis Wilson III, who lost his job in 2002 when the entire staff of PPS janitors was illegally fired and their work was outsourced.

Most recently, the school board was scared out of their meeting room on December 14 by 1,000 vocal and angry teachers. When the school board returned, they were presented with Jobs with Justice's local "Grinch of the Year" award for not settling the teachers' contract.

These actions have shown that there is widespread support for the union and that the bargaining team should stop making concessions and continue to use mass action to pressure the district into guaranteeing a fair contract.