feb-march_advisor

PRIORITIZING

4 CEA ADVISOR FEBRUARY–MARCH 2019

CONNECTICUT’S 2019 LEGISLATIVE SESSION WHAT ARE TEACHERS FIGHTING FOR? Retirement security, safe classrooms, well-resourced public schools With the 2019 Connecticut General Assembly session underway and a new governor in place, schools, securing teacher pensions, ensuring safe and healthy classrooms, recruiting and retaining minority teachers, protecting teachers’ reputations against a growing number of unsubstantiated DCF claims, and more. CEA is also closely watching many proposals, such as those to weaken unions, establish school vouchers, and regionalize or consolidate school districts. “Success in passing pro-public education measures depends on strong involvement from our teachers,” says CEA President Jeff Leake. “Legislators will not necessarily pass education-friendly

Answer the call Take action when you receive CEA Action Alert emails on teacher pensions, classroom safety, and other key issues. Action Alerts will give you the status of a certain legislative proposal and let you know how you can help defeat it or move it forward. Actions that teachers can take include emailing their legislators, making phone calls, testifying in writing or in person, and attending teacher- legislator get-togethers organized by CEA and local associations in their districts. Hearing directly from teachers makes a tremendous impact on the decision-makers elected to represent you. Many of them have great respect for educators but have no idea about the day-to-day challenges you face, the resources you need to do your job effectively, or how to ensure that you can retire with dignity. When they hear your stories firsthand, elected officials begin to understand your reality and how to help. They also come to recognize that the teachers they represent in their home districts are watching how they vote. Visit cea.org/politics/priorities for more information on CEA’s legislative priorities. Stay current on the issues by subscribing to blogcea.org .

teachers are working closely with elected and appointed officials on legislation critical to public education. Together with CEA leaders and staff, teachers on CEA’s Legislative Commission and various working groups have been addressing issues including investing in public

bills if we all sit quietly on the sidelines. Get involved with your fellow CEA members and leaders, and use your teacher voice. Educate legislators about creating a brighter future for Connecticut’s students, teachers, and public schools.”

Investing in Public Schools For years, traditional neighborhood public schools have been plagued by insufficient and inequitable funding, a pattern that has had real repercussions for students. On top of state funding cuts to cities and towns, public dollars have been diverted to charter school management companies at the expense of students. This results in neighborhood public schools losing critical supplies and resources, arts and foreign language classes, enrichment programs, summer school classes, and teachers and counselors. “It’s time to make our public schools and children—Connecticut’s greatest assets—our top priority again,” says CEA President Jeff Leake. To ensure that education funding meets the needs of all students in every community, CEA members and leaders are advocating for a number of measures, including • Safeguarding education cost share (ECS) funding in a lockbox • Prohibiting the diversion of local public school dollars through corporate schemes, such as tax credits for private school tuition • Placing a moratorium on charter school expansion and ending millions of dollars in management fees paid to private charter school management companies • Addressing the rising costs of special education by implementing equitable, evidence-based cost controls to share their experiences related to these issues and has coordinated meetings between legislators and teachers so that those who set policy are aware of the problems facing teachers and students and the solutions that need to be put into place. Among other things, CEA staff, members, and leaders are lobbying for • Mandatory support services and interventions for aggressive students • Teacher input into district plans and responses that address violent students’ behaviors • Additional resources, such as social workers and other specialists, as well as minimum staffing ratios of certified staff and trained behavior intervention specialists • Adoption of National School Climate Standards Minority Teacher Recruitment According to data from the State Department of Education, 82 percent of the nearly 2,500 students enrolled in teacher prep programs in Connecticut colleges during the 2016-2017 school year were white. Only 4 percent were black, and 8 percent were Hispanic. Compare that to the makeup of the state’s student body, and the need for more minority teachers is clear. To recruit and retain more minority teachers, CEA is advocating for • Teaching internships for students from historically black colleges and colleges in Puerto Rico • Grow-your-own programs that provide a teaching career pipeline for high school students (see page 3) • Innovative public-school-designed and teacher-driven education prep programs for candidates with bachelor’s degrees, without diminishing high standards for teacher licensure and certification Ensuring Safe Classrooms “It goes without saying that classrooms need to be safe places to learn,” says CEA President Jeff Leake. Unfortunately, a combination of factors—ranging from aging school facilities to a rise in aggressive student behavior—have created conditions in many schools that are unconducive to working and learning. (See page 7.) CEA has convened working groups of teachers around the state

Securing Teacher Pensions “Teachers have spent their careers paying into their retirement system, and they deserve to retire with dignity,” says CEA Retirement Specialist Robyn Kaplan-Cho. Even early-career educators, such as Torrington’s Michael McCotter, have expressed concerns about the state’s failure to adequately fund teacher pensions. McCotter, who is in his fifth year at Southwest Elementary School, says, “As a fairly new teacher with bills and student loans to pay, I don’t have a lot of extra money to put toward my future, so my retirement fund is critically important.” Over many decades, the state paid less than what was needed to fulfill its obligation to the teachers’ pension fund. From 1991 through 2005 alone, the state failed to pay $979 million in required contributions. In 2018, the state legislature established the Connecticut Pension Sustainability Commission to study the feasibility of placing state capital assets in a trust for the benefit of the state pension system. CEA’s Kaplan-Cho serves on the commission, representing teachers, and the group has been hard at work since last summer, investigating ways to address the pension shortfall. At press time, the commission is expected to review final recommendations, with a vote planned for early March.

One of the proposals CEA has asked legislators to explore is placing a state asset, such as the Connecticut lottery, into the teachers’ retirement fund. This would ensure the fund’s long-term solvency, stability, and benefit structure and allow the state to fulfill its obligation to fully finance the state teachers’ retirement fund. It would also allow a repeal of the unfair payroll tax imposed on teachers in 2017— a tax that resulted in lower paychecks for teachers at a time of rising costs and intensifying job demands. Teachers’ concerns have been

CEA’s Robyn Kaplan-Cho represents teachers on the state’s Pension Sustainability Commission.

addressed, in part, in Governor Lamont’s budget proposal (see story on page 5), which pledges to stabilize the teachers’ pension fund. The governor’s plan, however, also calls for a cost shift onto cities and towns—a move that CEA continues to oppose. South Windsor teacher Bill Myers, an active CEA member representative on the State Teachers’ Retirement Board, has testified numerous times before the Appropriations Committee in favor of full funding of the pension and retiree health funds. He has also served on CEA’s Retirement Commission. “I encourage every single teacher to do his or her part when CEA calls for action on these measures,” he says. DCF Unsubstantiated Claims It can be shockingly easy for an upstanding educator to face unfounded accusations that prompt an investigation by the Department of Children and Families. As the law now stands, even when cleared of all wrongdoing, teachers who are investigated by DCF still face the stigma of being labeled “alleged perpetrators.” Unfortunately, innocent educators are increasingly caught up in DCF investigations, and unsubstantiated allegations remain in their personnel files—which are available to the public—for up to five years. When those records stay in an educator’s file, they can prevent a teacher from being hired by another school district. CEA is working to pass legislation that • Requires all DCF unsubstantiated reports against teachers to be removed from their personnel records and any other records or files relating to them • Prohibits the use of any unsubstantiated claim report against a teacher for any employment- related purpose • Removes the names of teachers with unsubstantiated claims from the DCF list of offenders