Meeting of the NASE Executive Board
Tuesday, November 2, 3:45 PM
over Zoom
In Attendance:
Carl Mead, Paula Rigano-Murray, Kara Sheridan, Erica Lamanna, Heather Brown, Sharon Carlson, Sara Churchill-Winsor, Kate Fontaine, Maria Vega, Michelle Eastman, Cyndie Ouimette, Karen Schiaffo
Minutes:
Note: Remarks attributed to meeting participants are approximations, not quotations.
Heather calls meeting to order at 3:48.
FIRST TOPIC: putting the contracts in Word
Michelle:
I have uploaded Unit A contract so that it’s searchable, but you have to download it and then people could edit their own copies.
Sara:
So they wouldn’t change the one online?
Michelle:
No.
Sara:
It’s been helpful to have it online. Very helpful to have it searchable.
Michelle:
Okay, just wanted to check.
Heather:
It could cause a problem if someone made changes and thought those were the original.
MOTION
that the Communications Officer upload the rest of the contracts to the website via Word.
Moved by Sharon.
Seconded by Sara.
MOTION APPROVED, two abstentions.
NEXT TOPIC: MoA
Heather:
Can you see the comments on the MoA?
Carl:
You need to share the doc with commenting or editing privileges.
Sharon:
I think we hold them to last best offer which wasn’t four hours of work.
Karen:
Do teachers prepare work for regular absences? There’s something in there about how they will prepare work in a manner consistent with how they work for other absent students.
Heather:
We gave them all these examples about how covid absences are different, but they kept coming back to the old language like it were any different,
Karen:
What happens, when a kid’s going to be out for a vacation?
Carl:
I’m dealing with that right now. Parents and students will ask for work in advance sometimes.
Michelle:
It happens at the middle school.
Erica:
A student has missed like thirty days because they were continually in contact with covid cases.
Karen:
Seems you should compensated for that kind of work.
Sharon:
There’s also a difference between that and being online the whole time. Hold them to the last best offer.
Heather:
Would we do harm to our members through holding out on this?
They didn’t give any reason for this change.
Carl:
How was there no reason given?
Kate:
I thought, oh, we could just say no, but that’s also where the covid leave gets tricky.
MOTION
that we decline the School Committee’s proposal for the MoA.
Moved by Sharon.
Seconded by Kate.
Discussion:
Heather:
How do the state’s guaranteed five covid sick days work?
Kate:
You’d be out, and then the district gets the state to reimburse them. Beyond that you take your own sick time.
Heather:
That sounds like a good protection that the state is giving. If they’re not giving us what we as experts are saying, then we can just go with the state language.
Karen:
What about the other provision, if the whole class is quarantined?
Heather:
If we have no agreement…
Kate:
You’re not quarantined, you go to work, and there’s no students there.
MOTION APPROVED, two abstentions.
NEXT TOPIC: ULP
The board reads and discusses the ULP settlement. Kate agrees to take and make comments while Heather deals with internet difficulties.
Erica:
Do we need more time?
Karen:
So the high school folx get a monthly meeting?
Kate:
And admin gets prohibited practice training.
MOTION
that we accept the ULP Settlement.
Moved by Paula.
Seconded by Sharon.
Discussion:
Heather:
Doesn’t the Delegates Committee need to vote on this, not us?
Kate:
I asked Jason. I’ll ask him again.
Cyndie:
So you’re meeting once a month with admin to nip potential grievances in the bud. To have discussions of operational matters so that they avoid becoming grievances. Is that a lot of to-do about nothing?
In my world, it doesn’t make sense because it still makes it formal. And it doesn’t change the timeline.
Heather:
Our ULP filing was about communication problems, and we had a lot of concerns about that, and the agreement was to do this in order to avoid a charge of Unfair Labor Practice.
Kate:
Jason says that the members of the high school should vote to ratify it because he filed it on behalf of the union membership.
Heather:
Okay, we’ll take hands on this first before any amendments to the motion.
Karen:
Is this something that has to be public? We had to have the covid JLMC in public.
Paula:
That was because School Committee members were on that.
Carl:
Sounds like we’re going to have to do a lot informing of membership if we’re bringing this to membership.
Kara:
Yeah, what is allowed to be public in terms of these discussions among membership?
Heather:
We’ll have to make some timelines on this and talk to Jason for guidance about those concerns.
Kara:
What would happen if staff voted it down?
Heather:
Then the unfair labor practice charges would be pursued. (As the settlement is in lieu of those charges.)
Sharon:
That’s true.
Paula:
That’s right, Carl. That was the mediator’s settlement.
MOTION WITHDRAWN (as is the seconding of the motion).
MOTION
to accept the Secretary’s report.
Moved.
Seconded.
Discussion:
Karen:
Is there a reason it’s in this dialogue format?
Carl:
It would be better to find what ideas were presented by whom.
Cydie:
Any other group I’ve been a part of has had the notes more vague.
Heather:
It’s probably efficient.
Sharon:
We’re probably the only ones who read it.
Sara:
I like that we have a secretary who has a way to take notes.
Michelle:
And I’ll be able to post the minutes on the website after we approve that?
Heather:
Yes. Okay.
MOTION APPROVED.
NEXT TOPIC: fair share amendment
Heather:
Unanimous support from Delegates Committee members for fair share amendment. We’ll likely revisit that at that meeting.
Only nineteen responses though.
Paula:
We’re likely just trying to get more people to pledge in support of it.
Carl (in chat):
funny that that bill got full support but the override a few years ago…
NEXT TOPIC: Treasurer’s Report
Sharon:
I’m still trying to figure out how to best do this.
Started the year with 65,304.19, also got 10,345.92 in August for office support.
September, 29,231.12 that came in through HR. October, it was 43,179.32.
August, we spent 1,426.85 from arbitration, checks for teacher luncheons, two for people who didn’t receive checks for being a delegate.
October, we spent 3,415.32 for taxes, state reports, checks to Andrea for Zoom, arbitration, domain name, brag sheet.
In October, we also received 1,050 for our PALs.
By the end of this month, we’ll be paying 60,000-ish.
Carl asks a clarification of the money coming in through HR.
Sharon:
I think there may also be some weird things going on with people being recategorized in terms of the HR withdrawals but without the reason being clear on my end of things.
Karen:
The MTA list is not accurate right now.
Sharon:
Good, that should clarify things.
MOTION
to accept the treasurer’s report.
Moved, by Carl.
Seconded, by Karen.
APPROVED, one abstention.
Heather would like to include PALs in our upcoming Delegates Committee Meeting.
NEXT TOPIC: contract negotiations
Heather:
Most popular date was 11/30.
Discussion continues about the nature of negotiations.
NEXT TOPIC: visiting tour recap
Heather:
Andrea has all the post-it notes, but I’ll do an overview.
A lot of ESP issues, not always raised by ESPs themselves.
Pay was not always the first thing to come up.
The main thing was that “you are not alone.” There’s a lot of misery going around.
Next time I meet with Andrea, we’ll be able to put together a good list.
Paula:
Someone said they were thrilled to show up and hear other people were also having issues.
Erica:
There is a so much concern at Leeds that people have trouble thinking about contract stuff.
Cyndie:
Same concerns at SVAHS.
We want more money.
We have an issue of duty-periods being used as an in-class pull-out to the extent that it’s basically a whole new prep.
People want to have a limit on that.
But people really want more money.
We’ve sent a letter to begin the process, and we’ve been meeting as building delegates.
NEXT TOPIC: Membership officer report
Karen:
The numbers have slowed somewhat.
MOTION
to adjourn.
Moved.
Seconded.
MOTION APPROVED.
Meeting adjourned 5:14pm.
Upcoming meetings:
EC November 9, 3:45 Zoom
EB December 7, 3:45 Zoom
EC December 14, 3:45 Zoom