Know Your Rights

Feb 6, 2007 10:44 AM

Harassment by Supervisors (Special Complaint)

It’s sad to say, but UFT members sometimes report that supervisors have harassed them. This may take the form of sexual harassment, biased acts or remarks, public ridicule, etc. It may be due to anti-union animus, personal grudges or just power trips.

You do not have to — nor should you — tolerate such harassment. A special complaint process was negotiated in the 1990s to protect you from coercion and intimidation by your supervisors. If you believe that you are the victim of supervisory harassment, tell your chapter leader immediately.

The first thing you should do is keep an anecdotal log indicating the place, time, date and witnesses of every incident.

Health Benefits

There are two parts to UFT members’ health coverage. As an employee with a regular assignment in the Department of Education, you are entitled to a choice of several health plans offered by the City of New York. Your choice will provide you and your dependents with both medical and hospital care. Eligible dependents include: legally married spouse, domestic partner and unmarried children to age 19, or 23 if a full-time student. Details of the health plans are published in the New York Teacher each fall during the transfer period (when you can change your insurance provider) and are available at www.uft.org. — click on Member Services and then Publications and go to Health Benefits to read “Before You Choose, Know.”

To supplement the health plan, our UFT Welfare Fund provides coverage to eligible members and their dependents for prescription drugs, dental, optical, hearing aid, disability (including maternity) and other supplementary benefits.

There are no waiting periods for eligible UFT members for both the city coverage and the Welfare Fund. Coverage begins with your initial day of employment; therefore it is important to enroll in both with your payroll secretary (for the city health plan) and the UFT Welfare Fund (enrollment forms are available online at www.uftwf.org). Until you receive your UFT Welfare Fund drug card, you should purchase the prescription drugs you and your dependents may need, and once their card arrives, submit the original receipts to the Fund for reimbursement.

For further information see the “Red Apple,” at www.uftwf.org — click on Red Apple (in service) on the left.

Homeroom

Homerooms have faded from most high schools but are still popular in many junior high schools. These periods are generally used to establish the tone for the school day. During this time, teachers do administrative tasks, such as taking attendance, distributing notices for parents and making announcements.

If you are assigned a homeroom, you are relieved of selecting a professional menu activity to perform during your professional period. If you are not assigned a homeroom but are asked to cover a homeroom for an absent teacher, you will be paid at the contractual coverage rate of pay as soon as you have completed the equivalent of a full teaching period.

Also see Professional Activity Options.

Injury in the Line of Duty (ILOD)

On-the-job injuries may occur due to accident or assault. Whatever the cause, you must notify your principal or his or her designee within 24 hours of the injury and complete the DOE’s Occurance Report. If possible, you should report the injury before you leave school on the day the injury occurs.

You are required to fill out a Comprehensive Injury Report and the superintendent is required to approve it within five school days of the occurrence. If the superintendent fails to approve the Injury Report, you should speak to your chapter leader about filing a grievance.

If you were assaulted, you also should complete a UFT Safety/ Incident Report and contact the UFT’s Victim Support Program (1-212-598-6853). If your injury prohibits you from writing, your chapter leader or a colleague may assist you. If there were witnesses to the injury, they should write statements and attach them to the Comprehensive Injury Report.

Your chapter leader and district representative can explain your rights with respect to any absences that may result from the injury or assault. Your UFT borough office, as well as the union’s Victim Support Program, can advise you about your right to sue, bring charges, request a medical leave of absence and all the other options available to you as a result of your injury. If you have received injury- in-the-line-of-duty status from the medical bureau, the DOE will reimburse you for up to $750 in medical expenses related to the injury that were not paid by your insurance carrier. There is no limit on the reimbursement of medical expenses if you were assaulted.

Also see Assaults, Medical Arbitration.

Insubordination

Failure to follow an administrator’s directive could be considered an act of insubordination and could lead to disciplinary action against you. If an administrator gives you a directive that you know violates the contract, you must obey it and then file a grievance. Through the grievance process, the union will seek a remedy that will deter your supervisor from continuing the contractual violation. The only exception to the “obey now and grieve later” rule is if obeying the directive would put your safety or the safety of others in real danger, or if it would violate the law. However, before disobeying any directive, be sure to speak to your chapter leader.

Jarema Credit, see Probationary Period.

Job Security

Although teachers are not “guaranteed a job for life,” as critics often say, it is true that, after completing a probationary period, teachers in New York State may generally not be fired except in two instances: The first is for serious cause, defined in state law, that must be substantiated by the DOE in a due process hearing before an independent arbitration panel. The second has been a “reduction in force” — layoffs because positions have been eliminated, usually due to funding cuts. In the past, recently hired New York City teachers often found themselves without jobs whenever student enrollment declined, even if only temporarily.

Step by step, the UFT has negotiated greater and greater protections into its contracts to provide qualified pedagogues with the reasonable expectation that their jobs will be secure. In 2005 the union negotiated a new excessing and transfer plan that effectively guaranteed every satisfactorily rated educator a position, despite school closings and funding swings. Except in the rare case of a citywide fiscal emergency (such as last occurred for teachers in 1975), teachers whose positions have been eliminated and have failed to secure another placement may remain in Absent Teacher Reserves in or near their old school at full pay until an appropriate position becomes available.

Also see Excessing, Disciplinary Actions, Tenure.

Jury Duty

You are entitled to full pay for time spent on jury duty. Your time away from school is classified as a nonattendance day.