UFT - FAQ: Know Your Rights

Q. I heard about "Peak Load" secretary time. What does this mean?: Peak load is a contractual right. Refer to Article 7D. Basically, the Board will provide 10 days per year of secretarial service for each non-special service elementary school, 15 days per year of secretarial service for each special service elementary school, each junior high school and for each high school, and up to six days per year for each alternative high school, and six days for City-Wide Programs and CSE. District/Superintendencies are required to provide contractual days, however, they may provide additional days upon request. Per diem substitute school secretaries who are available for less than a full day’s work may be assigned for peak period services. Funds available for peak load days that are unused because of the unavailability of substitute school secretaries may be converted to per session hours on a dollar equivalency basis. A school secretary who is employed on the basis of such converted days is not filling a per session position for purposes of Article G. *Note: Conversion requires a request in writing to the appropriate personnel officer. The formula for conversion is one peak load day equals 4 per session hours. Therefore, in a school where 15 peak load days are available, and no substitute is available, the 15 peak load days may be converted to 60 per session secretary hours.

Q. Students are left in the office when they are sick or misbehaving. Am I responsible for them?: Article 7B in your contract states that School Secretaries are not required to take custodial care of children. Sometimes, administrators are not aware of this provision. Alert your Chapter Leader.

Q. I work in a school where the office is located on the second floor of the building and the school safety officer is downstairs near the entrance. There are times when I am alone in the office and I feel unsafe. Do I have to work where I think I am not safe?: Appendix A of the School Secretaries' contract states that the principal is responsible for providing "... for the presence (during the work day) within the school premises, of the principal or his designated representative, who shall be accessible to the area where the school secretaries are stationed." Alert your Chapter Leader.

Q. How can I get help with shorthand/speedwriting practice?: There are courses for college credit through Katherine Gibbs that can be used for fulfilling license requirements. These are listed in the UFT course bulletins in the spring, fall and summer. Also, there is a phone number to call for dictation practice to build up your speed. Call 212-619-6084. Call your UFT borough office and ask if there are courses being offered in your borough.

Q. Where else should I look for courses for School Secretaries?: Look for the in-service catalogue mailed to schools in the fall and spring. Also, the New York Teacher newspaper, a U.F.T. publication, lists courses and is mailed to your home. In addition, if you do not have your differentials, you may be eligible to take a Professional Credit course (P course). The U.F.T. in collaboration with the Board offers low or no cost courses to secretaries. An eligibility letter and the course catalogue are mailed to your home. Register quickly as courses may be cancelled due to lack of registration.

In order to obtain your permanent secretarial license, you must have 30 college credits within 5 years. Most people think the time begins when you receive your license. Please advise when the five year time frame begins?: The five year clock starts ticking on the closing date of the filing period for the regular license as spelled out in the examianation announcement for which the candidate applied. It is NOT from the time you receive your license.

Can a School Secretary sit on the Selection Committe for an Assistant Principal or Principal in the C30 process?: Yes. The Chancellor's Regulation On Pedagogical Personnel Regulation Governing the Selection, Assignment and Appointment of Pedagogical Supervisors and Administrators, dated 3/21/97, pp. l3 and 14, state that the committee shall include two UFT representatives. As UFT members, School Secretaries are eligible to sit as representatives of their union. Good luck!

Can a school secretary be a member of the School Leadership Team? Is is beneficial to her or the school to be a member?: Hi Loveycc, Yes, a School Secretary can be a member of the School Leadership Team. Guidelines indicate that certain persons must be a part of the Team, for example the Principal,the UFT Chapter Leader and parents. However, members from every constituency in the school may be represented on the Team. Each constituency can meaningfully contribute to the educational process and functioning of the school based on his/her unique perspective and needs. If you wish to participate, I encourage you to pursue becoming a member. School Secretaries can be a valuable asset to a school's Leadership Team. Certainly, you will derive a great deal of satisfaction to know that you are a part of the planning and decision-making function of your school. Good luck! Jackie Ervolina

Tenure - How do you acquire it? Is it automatic after a prescribed term of service? Is it required to retire?: Hi punroch, The Board of Education grants tenure to pedagogues after they have satisfactorily served a probationery period. The standard period of probation is three years of active service. During each year of service, the pedagogue is evaluated by the Principal who either recommends continuance or discontinuance of probation and finally completion of probation. The probationary period may be reduced by Jarema Credit (for teachers only at present) or Travelling Tenure (having been tenured in another license). After having served a successful probationary period and after completing all requirements for licensure, the Chancellor or the Community Superintendent grants tenure. Jackie Ervolina

We have been told we can't use our per session if it's less than a half hour. Is this so?: Hi deedeekee, The regulation governing per session work does not state that it must be done in blocks of any length of time. However, one must be reasonable when submitting time for per session work to insure that you are submitting productive work time. For example, if you submit 2 minutes one day and 3 minutes another day, the Principal would probably question how productive you can be in such a short timeframe. But, you can do per session work am or pm (if there is Security in the School) but not on your lunch hour in any block of productive time that real work is done. Good luck, Jackie

Are there job descriptions for secretaries working in high schools? More and more jobs are being given to paras and aides in my school. It seems secretaries are going to eventually all be replaced by them and there's nothing we can do about it.: Hi Bratmommy, The job description for School Secretaries is Special Circular 31, dated November 8, 1976. It is old but serves us well because we have used it repeatedly in grievances to have School Aides removed from doing a Secretary's job. The high schools are notorious for hiring School Aides because they are less expensive than Secretaries. If this is happening to you, you should be stating clearly to everyone and anyone about the work being done by out-of-license personnel and discussing the problem with your school's Chapter Leader and your District Rep. If a UFT para is doing a Secretary's job, please let me know and I will talk to her Chapter Chairperson. I will be taking a hard look at this situation in the fall. Thanks for your input. I appreciate hearing about conditions such as this. Jackie

I began work as a school secretary 9-82 but was given a 1-82 date for time I worked at the D.O. When should my 20 year longevity salary become effective?: HI Ladydu730, Congratulations on approaching 20 years with the Board of Education. Please access 7.4.1 on EIS and you will see when your longevity will be effective. If you don't do payroll, ask the payroll secretary or you can call your borough's Secretary Coordinator and give her your file number and she will be able to give you the information. Good luck! Jackie

With all the extra work created in high schools due to hepatitis B requirements and deadlines, there are many extra hours required and no overtime being offered. Are pupil accounting secretaries required to enter immunization information and hepatitis B shot records into the system at this extremely busy time. I have already had over 200 over the counter admits and hundreds of discharges not to mention everything else related to the job. How can I squeeze anymore jobs into the workday? Am I obligated or is the health aide responsible? Please respond and suggest a solution. The workload is impossible.: As you may be aware, our Chapter is working to have the health related work removed from the Secretaries' desk and given to either a health aide or Department of Health employee. If you have a health aide in your school, then that person should be doing the work. If you are made to do it, you might consider filing a workload dispute form. Your remedy would be to have the health aide do the work. Talk to the Chapter Leader in your school. He/she has the form, instructions and timeline that you must follow. Call your borough's Secretary Coordinator after 3:30 to discuss your situation. Good luck. Jackie

I need my 2 credits for the School Records and Account to submit my license requirements but the UFT did not offer this course this fall. Kingsborough College offers this course but the traveling is so far since I work in Washington Heights, Manhattan and I get off work at 4 PM. Is the UFT going to offer this course in the Spring for secretaries? I know a few secretaries that need this course for license requirement. Thank you: I have been working to have the UFT offer the course in the Spring. I will post the information to our Website as well as on ATS NEWS as soon as I get confirmation.

What is FMLA and if I apply for it, will I have to take the time consecutively or will I be able to take is as needed to care for my husband that is undergoing chemotherapy?: FMLA is the Family Medical Leave Act that was passed into law several years ago. For detailed information regarding its provisions, please ask the payroll secretary for the memo that should be in every school office regarding FMLA. One of the qualifying events that would allow you to take a Family Medical Leave is for care of a sick family member. The length of the leave is 12 weeks and can be taken on an intermittent basis. For questions, please call your UFT Secretary Coordinator after 3:30 p.m. in your borough's UFT office. She will be glad to give you more information. In addition, you may want to call the CancerHelpline at the Manhattan UFT (212)777-7500, for information and support.

Can we secretaries forfeit our two ten-minute breaks and leave 20 minutes earlier or come in 20 minutes later? If so, is this written in the new contract?: When we approved the provisions of our new contract last school year, we agreed to work additional time for a 6% increase in our salaries. Therefore, we must work an additional 20 minutes a day by coming in early, staying later or working through one or both of our two 10-minute breaks. You cannot leave early if you do not take your breaks. The way in which you work your additional 20 minutes a day must be decided in collaboration with your principal.

I just read your answer to the high school secretary with regard to school aides taking over secretary jobs. I find that since the principals got the job of budgeting they do what they want when they want. As secretaries retire or leave for better jobs, their work load is given to already overworked secretaries or to school aides. The very idea of hiring a replacement secretary is never thought of. The union should deal with that!: Fortunately, we now have the Workload Dispute provision in our Contract to deal with unmanageable workloads. In some cases, Principals will assign additional work to Secretaries when a School Aide is removed from a secretarial position. This is often an unfair solution to getting the work done. The Secretary can then file a workload dispute and ask for additional secretarial help or per session. So far, we have seen some favorable workload resolutions in this new process and I hope to see more in the future.

How can you apply for the secretarial assistant or secretary intern positions? What are the requirements? Who can you contact?: The Secretary Assistant and Intern positons are not currently being filled. We would hope that all School Secretaries are in full-time permanent positions where they can gain appointment and attain tenure.

Is the Re-Evaluation 6A to 6B for teachers only? If "Yes" why weren't secretaries included? Please let me know as soon as possible because if secretaries are eligible then I can apply. Thank you for your cooperation. If secretaries aren't included that's not fair and the rule should be changed.: The re-evaluation of 6A to 8B is for teachers only at present. While the UFT tried to negotiate the additional prior experience credit for all members, the City agreed to extend the credit only for teachers as a recruitment tool. We will, of course, continue to request this for all other members.

Can a secretary buy back time if she goes on a leave of absence without pay, but works 2/5th or 3/5th for at least six months during the leave?: Please call a UFT pension advisor after 3:30 p.m. in your borough's UFT office about buyback time.

Hi Jackie. I am 1 of 3 secretaries in our school. I have the least amount of seniority of the three, but one of the secretaries has less building seniority (she was a District transfer). If she wants my position, can she bump me, even though I have 2 years building seniority? Please let me know, this is a major concern to me. Thank you.: When a school declares a secretarial position in excess, the least senior secretary (as he/she appears on the seniorty list) will be excessed. The district will then place the excessed secretary into another position in the district.

Which are the classes that we need to take to fulfill 6 mandatory credits needed for permanent license? Will they be offered this fall? Where?: The six mandatory specified courses we must take to fulfill our maximum requirements are 2 credits in "School Records and Accounts" and 4 credits in education courses. The UFT will offer "School Records and Accounts" in the fall. Look for the listing in the NYTeacher that will be mailed to you in the late summer for information. The course is also offered through Queenborough and Kingsborough Community Colleges. Call the colleges directly for information. The 4 credits in education can be taken anywhere including the UFT, Kingsborough and Queensborough who have education courses especially for secretaries.

I am a appointed secretary in a small collaborative High School in the South Bronx. I would like to apply for a secretarial position in a Queens High School. Do I loose any seniority years. Please let me know. Its rather crucial for decision making since by interview is 7/8. Thanks: You do not lose seniority credit when you take an SBO or seniority transfer.

I worked as a school safety agent before and immediately after they switched over to the NYPD. During that time, I performed secretarial duties. Why is that not considered as experience and why can I not receive credit towards my step placement. I am not the only secretary in this situation.: The DOE grants credit towards the secretary's step for full-time, paid secretarial work. Generally, a school safety agent does not perform full-time secretarial work. The DOE investigates all prior experience by contacting past employers to verify the type and amount of work performed by the applicant. If you think your work experience applies, contact a salary representative in your borough's UFT office in September to pursue your claim.

The date on my secretarial license is February 2002. How do I know when I need my 30 credits by?: You must meet your maximum requirements of 30 college credits five years from the date on your regular conditional license. If you do not have a copy of the announcement and do not know the date, call the Validation's Unit at the DOE@ (718)935-2462.

Hi Jackie, I received my license on 2/5/03. Since that time I have been in search of a position as an appointed school secretary. I am currently working, per session, for the summer. Is there any way that I can transfer over to a permanent position for the fall? If so, please let me know the steps that I would have to take. Thank you.: There are several ways to explore job possibilities for the coming school year. First, you should access the link on our website for secretarial positions and apply to any that interest you. Also, you should be sending your resume to as many schools/regional offices as possible now in order to secure interviews for positions that may become available in the fall. Also, if you access the "Ask Jackie" feature and send me your name, address, telephone number and file number and where you have been working and wish to work, I can pass your name along when positions are made known to me.