May 14, 2007 - OBSERVATION

This negotiation session started at 3:00, rather than the 4:30 start time of other recent sessions, presumably because today was a no-student workday for MPS teachers.  I arrived on time, but the session was slow getting started because the normal room was in use by another group, and a different room had to have tables reconfigured to accommodate the 25 person circle of negotiators.  After spending ten or fifteen minutes arranging the tables and setting up the snacks, the State mediator suggested that the meeting begin.

After the mediator called attention to the start of the meeting, he deferred to a teacher who announced that she had arranged a short team-building exercise to start the meeting.  The teacher announced that she had posted images of four animals around the room; a golden retriever, a dolphin, a lion, and an owl.  The teacher invited all of the (recently-seated) negotiators to stand and move by the animal with which they most identified.  As people moved, she asked each group to identify one strength and one weakness of the animal with which they chose to identify.  From the whole group, ten people identified as golden retrievers, five as dolphins, five as lions, and two as owls; district and union people were intermingled at each.  After getting responses from each group, some joking, some serious, the teacher revealed that the four animals were representative of the four Hippocratic humors. The dogs were the phlegmatics, the dolphins were the sanguine, the lions were the cholerics, and the owls were the melancholy.  Hearing this explanation, the group produced a collective shrug of indifference, offered a couple wisecracks, and then returned to their seats.

Levai Babaya, a mediator from the State Bureau of Mediation Services, again led the meeting.  Levai appears to be of recent African heritage, with a strong accent, an even tone, and careful diction. Throughout these meetings, Levai clearly works hard not to offer any leading comments on any topic of negotiation, he only asks questions, and tries to guide the process.  Levai started the work of the meeting by inviting everybody at the table to review their printed copy of the minutes.  He paused, and then asked for a response.  No definite response was produced, so Levai moved on to the next agenda topic.

Levai announced that he had read the notes from the previous meeting and said that he felt the group had trouble identifying real issues at the last meeting, that none of the issues identified last time were really clear enough to be considered issues.  Levai pointed to the issue of "technology", saying that just "technology" was not an issue.  Levai said that the issues need to be defined so that someone who was not at the meeting could tell what the issue really means, and that the issue statements identified by the group last time were really much more "interests" than "issues".

Negotiators from both sides seemed kind of speechless at this assertion, and it took some silence and then sputtering from various negotiators before Rob started up and referred to "the pink packet" which gave guidelines about how issues should be defined.  Rob defended the work produced by the last meeting, saying that it seemed that the group had abided by the direction outlined in the agreed-upon State process.  Levai tried to clarify, asking "what really >>is<< the problem".  A teacher piped up and suggested something like the issue really is "teachers need to be able to use technology".  Levai responded saying that still didn’t define an “issue”, and that an issue needs a clear definition of what is the problem.  Levai asked “Why are you raising the issue of technology?”, implying that the answer to this question would define the real issue.

A teacher proposed another issue statement of "There is a need for greater teacher access...”.  Another teacher asked how specific the issue really needed to be, as the single issue of technology was really the consolidation of three previously-identified issues.  Levai suggested that one general topic, like “technology” may actually contain several “issues”.  The whole room seemed to recoil somewhat at the idea that perhaps the process needed to multiply the number of issues.

At this point, Emma proposed that maybe "technology" is not something we need to negotiate, maybe it could be sent to the Labor/Management committee for resolution outside of the contract negotiation process.  Emma said strongly that she was concerned about how slow the progress of negotiations is.

Emma’s suggestion was not real well received by Rob and the teachers, who seemed insistent that “technology” was a critical issue in their jobs, even though they couldn’t define exactly what the issue is. The teachers steered the conversation back to a discussion of the process by bring up more questions about the larger process to Levai.  Levai said that the group needed to define all the issues and all the associated interests before the group could begin the discussion of issues in detail.  The discussion then moved to the need to be prepared to discuss each of the identified issues, and the teachers pointed out that neither side was prepared to discuss the detail of all seventeen previously-identified issues

One of the teachers brought up the district-identified issue of teacher transfer and layoff.  Apparently stymied by defining the technology issue and ready to turn the tables on the administrators, Rob asked Emma and the district what the real "issue" was behind the district-identified issue of “teacher transfer and layoff”.  Emma offered some response about the need for school control of staffing.  Rob challenged Emma saying that did not define a real "issue", and Emma tried to define it better by saying something about an issue of teachers being placed where they are not the best fit.  Rob again challenged this as not really being an issue, to which Emma said something like “Hey, in this interest-based bargaining model I thought we were supposed to avoid negatives and just speak in general issue terms”.  Rob responded saying he just wanted to define the problem, and not just identify the fact that the district wants interview and select.  Emma said "we will get to the details of this issue in the main discussion" (after we identify all issues and interests), which ended that exchange.  This exchange perhaps made the point that both sides want specific results from this negotiation that are not simply resolutions to clearly-defined problems.  Both sides clearly have specific outcomes they are looking for and are finding that these may not fit the structure of this negotiating process.

With a suggestion from Levai, the group turned its attention to Issue #7; Realignment.  Levai asked why this is an issue.  Emma responded that she thinks the district shares the same interests as what MFT listed (printed on a handout I didn't see) but said that the district also feels part of this issue is retaining staff at our most challenging schools.  Someone at the table suggests that the shared interest is "having staffing stability at our most challenging schools during a time of downsizing".  Further discussion from the union expands this to "having staffing stability and professional discretion over the use of licensure at our most challenging schools during a time of downsizing".  Teachers raise a question about how realignment relates to other things and Emma says that the district feels that realignment is part of the bigger layoff picture.  Someone else from the district offered a suggestion saying something about realignment being about balancing the best interests of the kids or the school staff.  Rob states that he and MFT feel the interests of the kids and the teachers are always aligned.  Emma says during a time of layoff, you can't always do the best for both students and teachers simultaneously.

During this discussion, the district’s interests and the union’s interests related to realignment are also listed.  The union interests are printed on a handout I did not see.  The listed district interests include: Staffing stability in the most challenged schools, Retaining teachers of color, and Retaining less senior teachers (flexibility to retain less senior teachers in licensures of interest).

At this point, Rob suggests a short break for discussions, and there is a suggestion from one of the teachers that the group consider moving to the usual negotiation room, as the air conditioning in the current room is loud and the group previously using the other room may be done.  The group agrees to break and change rooms.  The other room is right next to the first room, but it has tables that need to be rearranged and all the snacks have to be moved, so by the time everybody has settled back down, at least ten minutes have passed.

After Levai gets attention and chatter dies down, Emma asks if meeting can go longer than planned.  Rob responds saying that there are only two more issues for which both sides have identified their interests, so maybe there is not any reason to extend the meeting as we should just get these issues out there, then step back and have each side define their interests.

Emma responds saying that she just wants to get more done, and that she doesn’t know what a bunch of the issues the teachers raised even mean, so doesn’t know how the district could define interests for those.  Emma raises the example of K-5 report cards, saying that she doesn’t even know what the issue with this is.  The teachers make a few comments about the report cards being too complex or long or too much work. Emma acknowledges that she has heard complaints about the report cards, but says she is unable to understand what the issue is with them that the teachers are proposing to discuss in the contract negotiation process.

As conversation on that topic stalled, Levai stood up from the table and brought a flip-chart to the table.  As attention turned to him, Levai said “Let me walk you all the way through one issue to help clarify how the process is supposed to work”.  He also apologized at this point for not being at the last session.

Levai asked the group to give him an issue, preferably an easy one, to use in his demonstration.  A teacher suggests that they use the new-issue cut-off date.  People acknowledge that this isn’t really one of the official “issues”, but consensus is to proceed with the example using this topic.

Levai asks, why is this an ISSUE? A teacher suggests “Because we need to know the point at which we will no longer introduce issues for discussion”.  Someone else suggests “In order to identify an end point”.  A district person says “The sooner we can get a date, the sooner we can focus on issues”.  Levai says, but what really is the cut-off date, and someone finally says “the cut-off date is the last day you can raise an issue”.

Levai then suggests that now having clearly defined the ISSUE, the group can now identify INTERESTS.  The group quickly comes up with these.  TEACHER INTERESTS: making sure the teacher union membership has time for input into the negotiation process.  DISTRICT INTERESTS: wanting to move this process along, a sense of urgency.

Levai then solicits OPTIONS, defining these as thoughts about how the ISSUE can be resolved.  The group quickly produces the dates of the next three scheduled negotiation sessions: May 31, June 22, and June 29.  Hearing no further discussion, Levai solicits STANDARDS, which he defines as criteria for defining the cut-off date.  A list of possible STANDARDS is suggested by the group: Reasonable, Legal, Practical, Democratic, By Consensus, Acceptable.

Levai invites the group to expand on each STANDARD, and to consider if some are not really STANDARDS. The group agrees that “reasonable” is a standard (assuming that reasonableness is ascertained by consensus), and they agree that “legal”, “practical”, and “by consensus” are all acceptable STANDARDS for the same reason.  With encouragement from Levai, the group agrees the “democratic” is not a standard, because it is about process.

Levai then moves to DISCUSSION, and encourages people to discuss the OPTIONS keeping the STANDARDS in mind.  One teacher proposes that May 31 is too early for a cut-off date because school is still in session at that point.  Levai asks if anybody has any objection to this perspective, and nobody says anything.  Levai then suggests discussion of the June 22 option, and two district people speak and say that June 22 should be the cut-off date because that’s enough time.   Levai asks if there is any further discussion or any objection to June 22. Nobody says anything, so Levai suggests that June 22 is the solution and all at the table generally agree.

However, the process clearly left the negotiators with a sense that there was something missing, and it takes a few moments before one of the teachers speaks up.  The teacher points out that the group actually worked the cut-off date issue over pretty well last time, and had all but agreed on a June 22 cut-off date, so the preceding exercise was entirely free of any conflict or difference of opinion.

The group as a whole quickly came to that same realization; that they had just demonstrated that the negotiation process worked to resolve things that weren’t really conflicts.  People agreed and asked how the process would work if there was any actual disagreement or conflict about the issue being discussed.  In response, Levai says that the same process works with contentious issues, but you just have to get people who have conflicting concerns to clearly articulate these, and sometimes you just have to set the issue aside for a while.  The fact that the group could not draw a final conclusion last Thursday about the issue cut-off date, but came to this conclusion easily at this session, was identified as an example of the benefit of setting something aside for a while.

People still seemed less than satisfied with the whole example exercise, but Levai then changed the subject.  He pointed out that in this process, everybody needs to participate and that in the example exercise, it seemed like people were hesitant to speak.  People asked how that would work in a thirty-person negotiation session, and Levai responded that this group was bigger than the optimal size for this process, but that it would work.

One teacher suggested that the reason that not everybody participates is that they have discussed the issues ahead of time, and they defer to their chief negotiators to present their positions.  Levai, never saying any particular thing is “wrong”, suggests that not everybody needs to speak on each issue, but all should have a part of the discussion.

At this point, Emma notes that there are only fifteen minutes left in the scheduled meting time, and she again expresses a desire to move the process forward.  Rob suggests again just covering the interests for the two remaining well-defined issues.  Someone from the district asks the teachers to help the district understand what the all the issues raised by the teaches raised mean, so that the district can define their interests relative to those. 

There is agreement between the negotiators to review the undefined issues, starting with “district initiatives”.  The teachers describe the issue as “There are too many district initiatives to implement successfully”. The teachers say that this is an issue raised by many teachers, and that a group of teaches interested in the topic at one point counted 48 separate district initiatives.  They note that there are no specific problems with any specific initiative, just the fact that they need less initiatives overall.  They want to eliminate or consolidate initiatives.

Levai pipes up and asks if the issue is that there are too many initiatives.  People generally agree with that, but clearly they are still interested in expressing opinions about this issue. Levai sits down and doesn’t speak again until the very end of the meeting.

One teacher notes that Issues #8 (District Initiatives), #9 (Time / Prep), and #12 (Working / learning conditions) on the list all have something to do with each other and should maybe be considered together.  Another teacher offers a story about having recently heard that an African-American male teacher was leaving MPS for another teaching job because he was sick of all the paperwork and meetings associated with things like district initiatives.

A district representative agreed about the excessive number of initiatives, and reported that at a recent MPS leadership retreat the group counted just about as may of them as the teachers had.  The district person agreed that the number of initiatives needed to be reduced.

Emma, apparently now deciding to push the conversation forward, switched topics and asked what the issue “time/prep” meant.  Various teachers responded that this was about “requirements, itinerant staff, loss of prep time to go work on initiatives”.  Someone from the district suggested that working on things like initiatives might be what was prep time was meant for.  A teacher said it would be good to be able to read an article, or meet with other teachers during prep time.  The teacher noted that she had to attend some meeting about some district initiative every day after class hours.

Emma switched the topic to Facilities / work environment / physical space, and asked what that meant.  Rob said it was about not having enough physical room for the size of the classes and not having proper equipment

Emma asked about the issue of Leadership.  Teachers responded that there is lots of talk about teacher accountability, but that they, the teachers, don't know what the process is for leadership accountability and they are not a part of it if there is one.  Teachers said that stability in leadership is also part of this, and some issues about how building leadership is exercised.  The example of this last point was that decisions that are intended to be made by a site council are made other ways.

Emma asked about the issue of Class size and caseload.  The teachers simply responded that class size is too big, as are caseloads of non-classroom teachers.

Emma asked about the issue of ESL/Bilingual.  Teachers responded that they need more support working with the kids, and more support for appropriate interaction with the parents.

Emma asked about the issue of Special Ed. Teachers responded that they need more “due process” time, both daily and during the school year. The teachers also identified funding, lack of prep time, inadequate technology, and some other tings as part of this issue.

Emma asked about the issue of AYP.  Rob responded, saying that was a process question about what happens with AYP schools.  One teacher noted that there are five federally-sanctioned ways to give NCLB-related tests and that MPS currently uses options one, two and five.  The teacher wondered if some students would benefit from options three and four. An administrator said the district was working on those other two options, but the bottleneck was really the State.

Having no more questions from Emma, and having reached the end of the allotted time, the group focused briefly on the next meeting, set for May 31, from 4:30 - 6:30 in the MFT Board Room.  The agenda for the next meeting was concluded to be two topics; "Define interests for all issues", and "Determine order of issues".  Levai proposed picking a few issues to start with, but Rob said that the order of the issues really needed to be fully discussed before any could be identified to start with.  Nobody disagreed, and the meeting concluded again with a one-word summary from each participant.