For Experienced Teachers The Open Market Transfer System Is A Joke

The Open Market Transfer System (OMTS) is now open.  However, if you are a veteran teacher, the OMTS is simply a joke since principals are only looking for cheap and "newbie" teachers.  This is because the DOE inspired Fair Student Funding penalizes principals who hire veteran teachers.

While the DOE and UFT will not admit it, the OMTS is only successfully used by untenured teachers.  Few veteran teachers can use the OMTS to transfer to another school.

Ask any veteran teacher if they were able to transfer to another school, using the OMTS  if they have ten or more years of teaching experience and you will find out that the numbers are few.  Many veteran teachers can't even get a simple interview least a job offer!.

The OTMS is only useful for inexperienced and untenured teachers, experienced teachers need not apply.

The Open Market Transfer System Is Still A Joke For Veteran Teachers.

The summer of 2018 is a time when teachers, dissatisfied with their existing school, can seek to transfer to another school.  However, since the implementation of school based Fair Student Funding (fsf) only teachers with less than five years of experience, especially if they are not tenured, are able to be hired since the more experienced teachers are too much of a hit on the school budget,

Ask any teacher who has ten or more years of experience if they are even offered an interview?  The answer is probably no.  The Open Market Transfer System (OMTS) is simply a sick joke when it  comes to experienced teachers.  While there are always some exceptions, like hiring a bilingual Special Education teacher for example.  For the vast majority of experienced teachers it's a futile process and despite a new Chancellor, nothing has changed since the OMTS started in 2006.

Interestingly, the DOE and the UFT refuse to publish the demographic breakdown of theteachers hired through the OMTS and for good reason as the OTMS statistics would most certainly show a pattern of discrimination against veteran teachers.

The bottom line is that the OMTS is just a sick joke,  You can read my previous artices on the Open Market Transfer System Here, Here, Here, and Here.

What Do The DOE And Silicon Valley Have In Common? Hiring Cheap.

Tonight, CBS's 60 minuets will have a story how the many Silicon Valley technology companies abuse the H-IB visa that allows companies the ability to hire foreign Engineers and Scientists who have a specific skill set that Americans don't have.  However, the truth is that the Silicon Valley Tech businesses has hardly bothered to seek out Americans when there are thousands of foreign workers who are willing to fill the positions at a much lower salary and less benefits.

The DOE does not significantly participate in the H-IB visa program.  However, the DOE has their own version by forming policies that encourage the hiring of cheaper teachers.  These policies are the school-based "fair student funding" and the "Open Market Transfer System".  Moreover, the results of these two failed programs has caused a pool of excessed educators of approximately 1,500 annually, with the average age in the 50s and salary close to $90,000. They are known as ATRs.  Finally, the DOE encourages school administrators to harass and push out veteran teachers, through resignation, retirement, or termination through 3020-a charges. Every veteran teacher that leaves is replaced by a much cheaper "newbie" with a lower salary, and an inferior Tier VI pension, assuming they make it through their vesting period.

Obviously, the Silicon Valley tech companies and the DOE have similar hiring policies and that is the cheaper the better.

Why Won't The Union Or DOE Publish A Breakdown Of The Open Market Transfer System Statistics?

Previously Gene J. Mann spouted the Unity line how successful the Open Market Transfer System (OMTS) was.  He rattled off how 4,000 educators transferred annually,  compared to 300 before the OMTS was instituted.  Of course, Mr. Mann, a Unity retiree in good standing, failed to mention that for veteran teachers the OMTS was a sick joke,  Moreover, he also failed to mention how it ensured that untenured teachers would leave struggling schools in droves through the OMTS, resulting in high teacher turnover, and an unstable educational environment for these schools.  Just look at the renewal schools where "newbie" teachers are hired only to leave as quickly as possible, ensuring their continued failure.  Finally, Mr. Mann failed to provide the statistical breakdown of those teachers who obtained positions through the OMTS, based on years of experience, salary, age, and tenure.  All this I have written about previously. However, what I failed to include was why there were so many teachers (mostly untenured) who used the OMTS than before there was one?

The answer to that question is quite simple.  Before the OMTS, all excessed teachers in the District had to be first placed in vacancies before the vacancies could be filled by other teachers. That significantly reduced the amount of vacancies available for other teachers to transfer to.  Moreover, about 50% of the vacancies were hidden and if too many teachers left a school, the Principal could refuse to release the teacher.  The combination of these three factors, excessed teachers filling a vacancy, hidden positions, and Principal refusal to release the teacher kept actual teacher transfers to a minimum. However, except for archaic or discontinued titles (typing teacher, home economics teacher, shop teacher, etc.) there were few excessed teachers in the school system.

Thanks to the terrible 2005 contract that all changed.  The OMTS was developed and with disincentives like the school-based "fair student funding", it resulted in the explosion of the Absent Teacher Reserve (ATR).  Add that to the closing of 163 schools under the Bloomberg administration and we now have between 1,000 to 2,000 ATRs (excessed teachers) in the school system, many of them "quality teachers" who because of their age, salary, and experience cannot find a permanent position.

Before hailing the success of the OMTS Mr Mann should obtain and publish a statistical breakdown that both the union and the DOE has available but refuses to release.  The reason for not releasing the information is that both are guilty of discrimination on a massive scale. If they object to my conclusion than produce the statistical breakdown and let us see the truth.

The Open Market Transfer System Is A Joke For Veteran Teachers.

I received my online edition of the "Organizer" and I was struck how the author, a "Unity" retiree is drinking the leadership's "kool-ade" on how the Open Market Transfer System (OMTS) is a success. The author, Gene J. Mann, states that the OMTS allows 4,000 teachers to transfer yearly, compared to only 300 annually before the OMTS.  While, I do not dispute his union supplied figures, my question is what is the actual experience breakdown of the 4,000 teachers in the OMTS who change schools?

My educated guess is that few of the 4,000 teachers who change schools through the OMTS are veteran teachers with ten or more years of service.  In fact, I believe the vast majority of the OMTS  are actually untenured teachers who make less money that the average teacher salary of the receiving school which allows the Principal to have extra money to spend in his or her budget.  Moreover, with schools receiving no more than 92% of the "fair student funding", few principals are willing to hire veteran teachers. Of course neither our union leadership or the DOE are willing to supply the nreakdown of teacher experience who successfully transferred to another school.

One of the more unaddressed issues of the OMTS is the failure of struggling schools and schools with a challenging student population to retain their better teachers.  The OTMS allows for a mass exodus of teachers from the schools who are in most need of good teachers and transfer to the better schools in the system.  The result is that the struggling schools suffer from high teacher turnover, and an unstable school environment, not conducive for student academic achievement.  In other words, the OMTS ensures that struggling schools continues to struggle.

Interestingly, as these struggling schools hire an inexperienced teacher corp annually to replace the departing teachers, averaging 5,000 in the last couple of years, there are almost 2,000 ATRs languishing without a permanent position. The ATRs cost the DOE over $100 million annually and the union's failure to demand that the DOE "do the right thing" and offer the ATR a permanent placement in their district. Instead, our disconnected union leadership allowed the DOE to become "second class citizens", subject to field supervisor "flyby observations" and potential termination.

While retiree Gene J. Mann can write about how great the OMTS is, the truth is that its basically a useless tool for veteran teachers.

The Open Market Transfer System Ensures High Teacher Turnover In Deep Poverty Schools.

In the aftermath of the infamous 2005 contract the DOE, with the approval of the UFT leadership, developed and implemented the Open Market Transfer System (OMTS) that allowed teachers to move from one school to another without the approval of the Principal.  On the surface this appeared to be a good idea, except it came with some very serious consequences that resulted in the elimination of the seniority transfer system and the creation of the ATR crisis,   Furthermore, few highly experienced teachers are being offered positions in the OMTS, due to budgetary considerations.  However, what was not anticipated has turned out to be the most serious issue of all, and that is the high teacher turnover in struggling schools with deep poverty.

A study done in 2013 by the Research Alliance For New York City Schools found that an astonishing 66% of teachers hired between 2002 and 2009 left their middle school within five years, For high schools it was 65% and 59% for elementary schools.  The article stated that schools with high poverty students were more likely to see their recently hired teachers move to other schools.

Interestingly, the researchers, Marinell and Coca, found that the main factors in teachers leaving these schools had more to do with three issues:

• Administrative trust and support.
• Social and Collaborative staff.
• Firm and fair student discipline.

By far, the most likely reason for teachers to leave their school was lack of respect for or by the school administration who failed to provide support and relevant guidance to help the teacher in the classroom.  Moreover, teachers who left complained of the school administration's lack of trustworthiness and unfair evaluation practices. Finally, if the Principal was not considered a "strong instructional leader" and was not supportive of the staff, their schools suffered from high teacher turnover.

Another problem with schools that suffered from high teacher turnover was the lack of a collaborative staff.  Many of these struggling schools hire new teachers on a continuous basis and that destabilizes the school.  These teachers lack qualified mentors and since each of these teachers are under great stress to understand the curriculum and develop classroom management skills, there is no time to share "best practices" with other teachers.  Furthermore, the constant teacher turnover does not allow for social interaction as many of these teachers spend most of their time taking required courses, making lesson plans, and doing the obscene amount of paperwork required by the DOE.  Therefore, Collegial relationships that make the terrible working conditions somewhat tolerable is lacking in those schools with high teacher turnover.

Quite a number of teachers did leave due to student discipline issues.  Unfortunately, too many students lack respect for teachers, have chronic absenteeism, and have extremely poor work habits.  In  many of these schools the school administration would have an uneven and even unfair student discipline policy that made the classroom a even more hostile environment.

In summary many teachers stayed or left based upon a combination of these factors;

• Social working conditions.
• The quality of school leadership.
• The caliber of collegial relationships.
• School culture.

The OMTS is really the "wild west" where teachers dissatisfied with their school can go on the system and get another position, regardless if the teacher was rated unsatisfactory or had their probation extended which means that struggling schools in deep poverty neighborhoods have little or no chance to retain their teaching staff since many of these schools are run by "Leadership Academy Principals" with little classroom experience and are poor instructional leaders.  Moreover, since many experienced teachers will not willingly take a position in these schools, the students are exposed to a continuing line of inexperienced teachers that will negatively affect their academic outcomes.  Until the DOE changes the ideology that allows weak and vindictive leadership to run these struggling schools, look for the recently hired teachers to leave those schools, thanks to the OMTS, a real Trojan horse when it comes to deep poverty schools.