Saturday, April 29, 2017

Educators Served With 3020-a Termination Charges Remain High During The De Blasio Years.



























When Mayor Bill de Blasio took over there was hope that the confrontational actions at the DOE would change to collaboration.   However, once he selected Carmen Farina as Chancellor with her anti-veteran teacher attitude and her deep ties to the Bloomberg years as a Deputy Chancellor, most educators knew deep down that nothing will change and the "gotcha system" would continue.  Under the new Chancellor, she retained 80% of the Bloomberg policymakers at the DOE and instead of reducing the amount of lawyers at the Office of Legal Services and the data mining Accountability Managers, they actually increased. In fact under Mayor Bill de Blasio there has been a doubling of high-salaried bureaucrats at the DOE while school budgets are tight and essentially remained flat.

When it came to teacher discipline, the change in the Mayor's Office hardly affected the punitive process from the Bloomberg years.  Every year there are over 350 educators who are served with 3020-a termination charges.  In fact the number of educators served with 3020-a termination charges under the de Blasio/Farina tenure are as follows:

2014..........366
2015..........392
2016..........381

Interestingly during the Bloomberg years, from 2002 to 2013,  the average was 271 educators charged under 3020-a and that includes the 2006-7 years when it averaged 636.   Historically, before the Bloomberg years 3020-a charges were served on educators averaged 90 yearly.   However, just like during the Bloomberg administration years, not all educators went through their 3020-a hearings.  Quite a few, the majority in fact, took settlements ranging from a fine and exile into the ATR pool to irrevocable resignation or retirement.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that three out of every four settlements result in the educator irrevocably resigning or forced into retirement.

In 2016, independent State arbitrators issued 93 decisions or approximately 24% of all educators served with 3020-a charges. Of the 93 cases the arbitrators ruled on, 23 resulted in the educator's termination (25%) and 9 were found innocent (9%).  It should be noted that educators found innocent was only 2.5% of all charged educators.   The remainder resulted in either fines or suspensions (67%).

If we take the last year of data, 2016, there was 381 educators charged under 3020-a but only 93 resulted in an arbitrator ruling.  Meaning that 288 educators took settlements and since 75% of these settlements resulted in the educator irrevocably resigning or retiring.  The DOE was able to remove 239 educators from the DOE payroll or 63% of the 381 educators served with their 3020-a charges.  This is slightly higher than the 55% figure in the last two years of the Bloomberg administration.

A major reason for the higher numbers is that many veteran teachers took the settlement to irrevocably retire rather than fight the 3020-a charges was the language in the 2014 UFT contract that allows the City to eliminate the educator's retro and lump sum payment if the arbitrator recommends termination.  Therefore, to protect their up to $50,000 payments owed, they elected to take the settlement rather than risk losing the money.

When you combine the ingredients of the anti-veteran Chancellor with the 2014 UFT contract and add a pinch of the "gotcha system", you have a recipe for continued attacks on  veteran teachers as the 3020-a numbers readily show.

23 comments:

Anonymous said...

And the UFT backs mayoral control of the schools - this with more educators being terminated than when Bloomberg was in office. Did you know Weingarten backed mayoral control of the schools under Bloomberg? These two bozos should be sent on a one way ticket to Mars, instead of sending us into the trash via Marx, I mean DeBlasio.

Anonymous said...

And they are all older teachers, I wonder why?. Did they become too expensive Mulgrew?

Anonymous said...

While the DOE is still going after veteran teachers, and ATRs with field supervisors. Unfortunately they are going to need the ATRs after abusing them for so many years. I guess our leaders are clueless. FariƱa, when are you going to really do your job?

Anonymous said...

Thought Farina was leaving in June!

Anonymous said...

ATRS have been waiting a long time for this degrading situation to be rectified!

Gatinvisible said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

The UFT is setting up ATRs for failure since they agreed with the DOE to have ATRs observed. Just a sham and a fiasco.

Anonymous said...

Chaz,

Have you heard any rumblings on how bad new atr deal is?

Anonymous said...

Atr's can't wait to be placed in Sept. I would like to float some more though.

Anonymous said...

Chaz...

Research how many of ATR Supervisor Justin Stark's ATR's have been served 3020A papers. Last year alone it was 15!

Anonymous said...

The DOE wants to place ATRs because they cannot find enough cheap teachers.

Anonymous said...

ATR Field supervisors are getting ready to terminate ATRs, at the same time new teachers are getting hired.

Anonymous said...

Mulgrew is your time to retire.

Anonymous said...

Yes! There are not enough newbie teachers so now they need the ATRs! We are the solid rocks of the DOE!!! Kick us but we never fall!!

Anonymous said...

Good job Stark now that the city needs teachers.

Anonymous said...

Let's see if the newbies can put up for 5 years.

Anonymous said...

Field supervisors have a blank check to go after ATRs, they know that the UFT will not challenge any type of observations on ATRs, or unfair circumstances. Out of license, in a bad class, students the ATR just met, ATRs having close to 8 days absent or excessive days absent.... Everything even unfair observations, and circumstances are good to terminate an ATR. Any reason is good to make an ATR uncomfortable.

As long as these field supervisors can carry their dirty agenda on high expectations that are unreachable everybody is happy. At the same time they need to hire new inexperienced fellow teachers to replace all those experienced teachers that are becoming ATRs. It is a perfect plan designed by our leaders and Union. The plan is to make ATRs useless, overwhelmed and discouraged.

For the ATRs its bad enough that the DOE wants to terminate us but it seems the UFT leadership is helping the DOE thin the ATR herd by stabbing us in the back. That is why the DOE and UFT agreed to the field supervisors in 2012 as another chance to make the ATR problem go away. Again everybody is happy. Our Union knows everything is fine.

Anonymous said...

Justin "the axe" Stark is dumb enough to have a facebook page with his children's pics.

Anonymous said...

The UFT Queens office is totally useless, and dishonest.

Anonymous said...

The discrimination and abusiveness on ATRs will stop, only when they can no longer find enough inexperienced and less qualified teachers which is starting to happen. The ATR pool is in nature discriminatory against the most veteran workforce. Most schools that have pushed out their most experienced workforce are now in trouble. Many principals went after experienced teachers, unfortunately now they realized it was a big mistake. They are going to have problems recruiting and retaining new teachers. Our Union is helping in discrminating older teachers.

Anonymous said...

A waste of resources and nonsense.

Xela said...

I am a nyc teacherfor 24 years and 2 months.I can retire in 10/31/2018. My principal is bringing me a 3020 with charges for a fabricated case of verbal abuse. I have a Developing for 2 consecutive years. Can I retire before without losing my benefits, the retrocactive, and my full pension?

Anonymous said...

Xela,

First of all, even if you were terminated, you would still get your full pension and benefits for the time you worked. Second, with only 9 months to go, the DOE would probably offer you a settlement to become an ATR and retire on October 31. Even if they didn't, it would probably take at least that long (if not longer) to receive the charges, go through the trial and get a decision. Just get out of this shitful system and move on.