Present: Pam Costain, Tom Madden, Chris Stewart, T Williams, Peggy Flanagan, Lydia Lee, Sharon Henry-Blythe, Emma Hixson, Steve Liss, Bernadeia Johnson, Alan Giles, and Mitch Trockman.

Emma start out passing out some printed material and says that it has been along time since she last presented to the Board.  Emma says that lots of things have happened since they last met, including numerous changes to the negotiation teams. Emma says that one member of the MFT team left due to family problems and that several people have left the district’s team; Von Sheppard, Mike Noble, Carla Steinbach and Armando Carmacho.  Emma says that the district has added Bruce Thillman, Kim Golden (Bancroft), Mitch Throckman and Jerry Pederson (AP at Edison) who was an executive board member of MFT two years ago. 

Emma says that they have been “slogging away” at the negotiations. Emma says that a lot of the things that the teachers have brought forward are really non-issues, but rather just things that teachers are “kvetching” about.

Emma and the other administrators joyfully describe the most recent negotiation session.  Emma says that the negotiation session the previous Friday was the first “real discussion” of teacher transfer and layoff, that they spent the whole day talking about this issue, and that “it was quite the day”.  Emma says that the district met their goal for the day, which was to “sneak in” pieces about the specific staffing model that the administration is looking for.  Emma says that the administration also wanted to give the teachers plenty of opportunity to present their concerns about staffing and they wanted to respond to these concerns in a very careful and considerate way.  Emma says that it was often tempting to not be so considerate.

Steve said that after listening to Rob’s opposition for six hours, Rob at one point said “it’s really just about power, isn’t it?” and this caused Steve to snap at him.  Emma reassures Steve that it was fine, as Linda Silver walked out of the ATPPS discussion yesterday and slammed the door.

Emma says that what they really wanted to achieve was to get the initial discussion under their belt and then “move to brass tacks”.  Emma says that a subcommittee has been established about staffing and that the subcommittee will meet soon and “will be right down to the brass tacks of what we are looking for.”

Emma says that one key challenge that the administration negotiating team has identified is to figure out how to handle layoff in a pure interview-and-select system.  Steve recounts an argument of Jerry Pederson, a former teacher who is a member of the admonition’s negotiating team.  Jerry agues that interview and select should be understood as being about job assignment, and that tenure should not control this.  However, tenure should control your right to a job.  Jerry suggests that the union should start thinking about assignment and right to a job as separate things.

Emma says that we need to look closely at the financial implication of possibly placing unselected excessed teachers as building reserve teachers or coaches.  Emma says that the district previously had building reserve teachers who could function as substitute teachers and these teachers were highly valued by schools.

Emma says that the district laid off about 60 teachers this year, which with an average salary had a total cost about $4.5 million.  Emma suggests that if MFT could cut some of their “expensive benefits”, if having building reserve teachers would reduce the amount needed in the “reserve” fund, and if they could use some ATPPS funds for the coaches, this might be possible.  Emma says that they are trying to assemble something like this into a proposal.

Steve summarize the three options for dealing with unselected excessed teachers (1) finding a position for unselected teachers, (2) layoff the particular unselected teachers, or (3) allow the unselected teachers to bump the most junior teachers in their field.  Emma adds that a system with bumping could protect special programs such as Montessori, IB, and immersion programs.  Steve says that option (3) is a little like the current system, except the bumping happens at the end of the process rather than at the beginning.

Steve says that some of the unselected excessed teachers would be teachers who really shouldn’t be employed by the district (and that improved accountability should help with that), but with building closures happening, where all teachers are excessed, it’s a little random as to who is actually in the excessed pool.  Steve suggests that this means some of those teachers may be in the unselected excessed group “fortuitously” and not because of their performance.  Emma suggests that some of the unselected excessed teachers may not have been selected for positions “just because of the luck of the draw”. Steve says that potentially laid off unselected excessed teachers could have been with the district for 20 years.

Pam asks the administration to pause on their presentation and she invites Board members to ask questions.

Tom says that option (3) is no improvement over the current system.  Tom says it would be nice if the teachers self-identified the lowest performing teachers as layoff candidates.  Emma says that this would never happen and Tom agrees, saying that there is nothing to motivate the teachers to do this because when the district had an opportunity, it did not do the same thing with the principals, some of whom he says are “crap”.

Tom says that the reserve pool is interesting to him.  He says that concern about losing a job can motivate teachers to do well and that’s a good thing for the district, kids and everybody.  Tom says that if we just create lots of holding spots for unplaced teachers, then that shows up as fat on the district.  However, he wonders if somehow the unselected teachers could help with “the class size thing”.  Emma and Bernadeia agree that something like that would be possible and that there could be a number of options about what to do with unselected excessed teachers who were still employed by the district.  Emma says that students would benefit from having more teachers in schools and that different schools would use extra teachers in different ways.

Mitch says that during the years that they had building reserve teachers, no teachers sat unused.  However, he says that such teachers were not used as substitute teachers, rather they were used for reading groups and the like. 

Tom wonders if teachers would be willing to enable a larger number of positions with reduced benefits.  Emma says that they have “an uphill battle all the way” just to get teachers to agree to interview and select.  Steve says that it is clear that MFT is trying to narrow a vision of interview select, with high criteria and narrow circumstances for how it would be applied.  Steve says that “we” have to be careful to not just get interview and select, but to make it really meaningful.”

Emma said that the “fear behind” the layoff piece came through loud and clear in their discussions.  Emma says that the district was “so reassuring” about their intent behind the proposed selection process, but the teachers are worried about who would get laid off.  Emma wonders if the district could potentially assemble a well-structured proposal about layoff if this would help them accept interview and select.

Emma says that the real problem remains what it was from the beginning, Rob.  Emma says that they don’t see any body breaking ranks with Rob in the negotiations and that he is doing almost all of the talking.  Emma says that it seems that the other teacher negotiators have been told not to talk.

T asks if there is an opportunity to request to hear from other teacher negotiators.  T suggests pushing to hear from other teachers, but Emma and Steve quickly respond that they have done that and that they did hear from others.  Emma says that it is very different from prior MFT negotiations.  Emma says that Rob is “clueless”.  Tom says “but he’s still there, so you have got to figure it out” to which Emma agrees.  Emma says that it might be easier for other negotiators to participate when a smaller group meets in subcommittee.

Steve says that the dynamic at the negotiating table is fascinating.  Steve says that the last negotiating session was essentially Rob spending five hours saying “why are we talking about this?”.  Steve says that the administration proposed some brainstorming at one point and a couple teachers said something, but Rob shut it down.  However, at the end of the negotiation session, Rob initiated a brainstorming period, which Emma and Steve wonder may have been motivated by discussions that the teachers had in private throughout the day.

Steve that it was sad to look around the around the table as many of the teachers looked depressed, shell-shocked and beaten.

Pam says that she really doesn’t want to see the negotiations narrow interview and select so that only some schools have it.  Pam says that that idea of protecting jobs but not protecting positions is the way that the St. Paul contract is designed.  Pam suggests to Emma to talk to St. Paul teacher federation president (someone Pam knows), as the St. Paul teachers really love their system.  Emma says that she has talked with the head of HR in St. Paul, who also suggested talking to the St. Paul teacher union president.  Emma says she is reluctant to do that because that person is a good friend of Rob’s.

Pam says that she wants to figure out what realignment has to do with negotiations.  Pam says that she thinks that the district is in a good position on that issue as they offered to not realign, but MFT didn’t accept the offer and that decision is on Rob’s head.  Pam says that she thinks the district has not communicated this very well.  Pam says that teachers need to understand that they have an impediment to their interests in their own organization.

Chris says that the teachers have been clever about this issue and that “it has been hurting his mind” to think about it.  Chris says that the teacher perspective is that they gave up licenses to avoid realignment in December and so now there is a “moral imperative” to not compromise on realignment.

Emma says that pushing the focus of realignment on Rob would be “war” and that at this point it would be a strategic mistake to go to war.  Emma says that they recently sent out a message to teachers about realignment and that resulted in a “mini-war”.  Emma says that they still need to be careful and respectful with the teachers, within reasonable bounds.

Chris asks what the strategy is without going to the mat.  Chris suggests that the district could say “this is what we need, this is what we intend to get, this is what our students need, we are in big trouble with the federal government…”. Emma says that they are not very far from that, but Chris suggests that they need to say it publically.

Emma says that there are a lot of teachers on the negotiating team who are more “understanding of the district’s situation” than Rob and that the administration has to take the time to appeal to them.  Emma says that she won’t be surprised if the next time she meets with the Board they will be at impasse.

Chris mentions that he “talked with Rob for a long time today”.  Chris says he told Rob that everyone in the district is in this together, and that this is not an “us versus him thing”, and that he wanted to hear everybody’s ideas about how we are going to move forward.  Chris says that Rob “did not bite on that very much”.  Chris says that he told Rob that if we become an “AYP district” that will affect everyone.  Chris says that we should make the case to MFT saying “these are our needs and this is what we intend to get.”  Emma says that they have done that.  Steve says that they spent five hours trying to convince him that this is what is necessary for student achievement.  Chris and Emma and Steve and Bernadeia all agree that Rob sees no connection between interview and select and student achievement. Chris says that Rob is an ideaologue and is deeply rooted in yesterday.  Emma agrees and says that he has no experience as well.

Peggy jumps in, stops the conversation and says that she is concerned that Chris had an outside conversation with Rob.  Peggy says that she recalls that Board members were not going the have outside conversations with members of the negotiating team.  Chris says that he doesn’t recall such an agreement and that Rob called him about other matters and Chris just threw out the topic of the negotiations. 

Tom agrees that such conversations make him nervous and says that he has specifically not engaged Rob when Rob has brought up the negotiations.  Tom says that he also has not attended the negotiations because he understood they had an agreement about that.

Alan says that he wants to remind everyone of the importance of speaking with one voice in the negotiations.  Emma tries to restart the conversation, but Pam asks other Board members to weigh in on the topic of outside communication with MFT negotiating team members.  Lydia says that she understood that there was an agreement not to discuss the negotiations with MFT negotiators.  Pam asks if, regardless of the past, the Board could now agree not to have contact with any member of the MFT negotiating team, especially considering the current stage of negotiations.  Tom says that he would be agreeable to that.

Pam says that she understood that they had agreed to speak with the MFT negotiations with one voice through the district’s representatives at the negotiations.  Tom says that he wants to hear from T and Sharon because the Board has had “pissing matches” about another issue recently and this is a bigger issue than that was.  T says that he understood that Board members would not have contact with members of the MFT negotiations team.  T says that he also agreed not to attend the negotiations as he thought it might compromise his discussion of the district’s negotiating strategy.  Sharon says that she recalls discussing not attending meetings and that she just understood that Board members did not communicate with MFT negotiators during the negotiations. (She refers to Rob as “Ron”).

Chris says that Rob suggested that Board members should be present at negotiations.  Pam clarifies that Board members now have an agreement not to talk with MFT negotiators.  Tom notes that a number of the Board members are doing something with Brionna Harder’s class this fall.  Chris points out that would be “contact”. 

Pam says that a number of Board members were surprised by Chris’ discussion with Rob and that she thinks they now have an agreement.  Sharon says that they are having difficulty as a board agreeing on some things. Peggy says that the Board agreed at a retreat two weeks ago that they were going to work on better communication.  Peggy says that it felt as they were working as a team at that point, but since then things have changed and “she doesn’t know what happened”.  Peggy says that she doesn’t have time “to look at my Blackberry and have people tearing each other down”. Peggy says that this is not the way “we are going to be successful in this negotiations process or anything else”. Peggy says “if you have a problem with somebody at this table, just call them and deal with it like a grown-up.”

This exchange is preceded by Peggy indicating that Alan might be uncomfortable about what she says and it is ended by Chris remarking that Alan does not want them to stray from the topic that was the basis for closing the meeting.

After a pause, Pam restarts the conversation, then Tom says that he’s noticed during “Robert’s stonewalling” that Rob is not throwing out any ideas of his own. 

Tom also makes a point about the general increase in cost of living.  Tom says that if you assume that an aggregate cost of living increase is about 3% per year, this includes everything, such as health care benefits, which likely increase much more than the 3%.  Tom suggests that a 3% cost of living increase does not equate with a 3% increase in baseline salary and this needs to come out in the negotiations.

Emma says that they analyze the costs of every item specified in the contract and they “cost” every aspect of every proposal, the increase in base salary, health benefits, and everything else.  Emma says that they start with a costing of the existing contract. 

Emma suggests that the cost increase of the current contract carried into another year is maybe 2%.  Emma says that they are working with an upper limit for negotiations of 4% total cost increase, so Emma says “we have nothing before we even start talking”.  Steve asks if step and lane increases are included in such baseline costing and Emma confirms that the step is costed, which Emma says is about 1.2% and that health care is about another 1.2%.  Emma says that when everything is included that they are “not going to have much of that 4% left, if any.” Emma says that they are running the actual numbers in the next few days and that they are going to give the cost analysis to the teachers at the next negotiation session.

Chris asks about the student discipline issues that are part of the negotiations discussion and he asks about the role of the labor management committee with respect to that issue.   The administrators correct him that the “behavior committee” took on this issue.

Emma says that they finished the behavior part of the contract and that the changes are in the report she handed out. Emma says that they updated the protocols around student behavior to comply with district policy and state law.

Chris asks about a written summary of where the negotiations are on each issue. Emma says that she forwarded the Board the summary notes from the last session but that didn’t really describe which party said what.

Emma notes that I was not at the last negotiation session, but Kate Towle was.  Emma also notes that Kinshasha Kaubui is expected at the next session.  Emma says that “we have had a few visitors but I think it has not been a problem really.”

Emma says that she has been doing “a ton of literature review” and also looking at training that the MFT negotiating team received at their national conference.  Emma says that a lot of the literature is trying to attack teacher collective bargaining as a whole. Emma also says that the training talked about teacher labor relations being “a war” and told teachers that “they are out to get you”. Emma suggests that MFT may seem paranoid about feeling like there are forces out to destroy them, but the literature suggests that this is true to a degree.

Emma says that MFT is very fortunate that they have a supportive district which believes in collective bargaining and that MFT should be “jumping for joy and working with us to keep this a viable district.”

Steve says that Lynn, one of the more moderate MFT voices, is saying “you are out to get us and destroy the union.”  Emma says that Lynn does not have a moderate voice.  Emma says that Lynn has only recently woke up on this issue because she is running for union president. Emma says that Lynn is campaigning as “Rob the Second” and that she is a lot more eloquent and her voice carries more weight than Rob’s.