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From the president
What's wrong with asking questions?
In the Association's January 2004 newsletter, I wrote "An Open Letter To Those With The Authority And Responsibility For The Secondary School System." My message was that "This System needs creative leadership, people willing to think outside the box, if our schools are going to survive."
Sadly, the letter from the Superintendent of Schools that recently appeared in every teacher's mailbox, continues to dwell on the downside, continues to show a System trapped in the box, while it accuses the ACT leadership of being negative. The Superintendent's letter was a perfect opportunity to answer the question teachers and parents have been asking, namely, where is the tuition money going. Instead, ACT is criticized for asking it. Strangely enough, it is the same question that was raised often during negotiations, but never answered.
To calculate next year's money, ACT used the System's numbers - tuition x students = $$ brought in; constricted positions x salaries and benefit premiums = $$ saved. It doesn't take a mathematician to work the System's numbers. Even with a loss of 566 students, there is $2,000,000 in additional money coming in. The Superintendent also fails to mention the $2,000,000 savings from the 49 teaching positions being cut.
The Superintendent tells you that "the budget is far more complicated than the ACT staff leads you to believe." Well, there is one way to resolve that—let's see the budget.
By the way, what's wrong with asking questions?
It is the Association's job to ask questions. The problem is that information is not always forthcoming from the Office of Catholic Education. One of the most recent questions the Association asked was "What are the projections upon which the System based its 49 Constrictions?" Week after week, we asked the Assistant Superintendent to supply us with these figures. Over a month went by before ACT was finally told "we don't know if we want to release them to you," followed by "we don't know if we have to give them to you." That's when the Association filed the grievance against the Office of Catholic Education.
The Association's job is to monitor Constriction, to make sure the procedure has been properly followed. How can we monitor Constriction if we are not given the numbers the System used to reduce a total of 49 teaching positions in 19 schools?
The Superintendent tells you that the present Constriction Guidelines force the System to cut more teachers. Again, without the Projections, the Association has no way to tell if the System's numbers are correct. The only revision of the Guidelines that the Office of Catholic Education ever asked for was to have a second round of Constrictions later in the spring. Needless to say, the Association did not look very positively on that one.
If anything is "detrimental to our future," if anything is harmful to "the mission of Catholic education," it is the Office of Catholic Education's attitude of "we don't know if we have to give you that information" or "we don't know if we want to release them to you."
No matter how weary the System's officials get, the Association cannot and will not stop asking questions: however, i am almost positive that we will be able to stop writing open letters and probing newsletter articles if those with the authority and responsibility for the Secondary School System provide requested information to the representative of their teachers, information to which the Association and the teachers are entitled.
Rita
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