Yet another charter school wants UFT representation

The staff from the Bronx Academy of Promise Charter School are united in their intentions to join the UFT.

After a month-long organizing drive, teachers and staff at the Bronx Academy of Promise Charter School in the South Bronx publicly announced on March 12 their intention to join the UFT as a new collective-bargaining unit.

All 22 teaching and professional staff members at the school have signed union authorization cards.

“We are very pleased to welcome the teachers and staff of the Bronx Academy of Promise Charter School into the UFT family and proud that they have chosen us to represent them,” said UFT President Michael Mulgrew.

The teachers made their intentions known in a letter hand-delivered to the school’s principal, Jennifer Ciavirella, and a letter faxed to its board. Both letters cited the teachers’ desire “to establish a formal collective voice within our school community” to ensure the quality of students’ education and their wish to move forward in a spirit of collaboration with administrators and board members.

“The recognition of the teaching and professional staff as respected partners in BAOP is fundamental to the success of our school and to the realization of the mission of our charter: helping kids get the education they deserve,” the teachers wrote.

Simultaneously, the UFT filed a formal petition with the school’s board and notified the state’s Public Employment Relations Board that the teachers are seeking union recognition.

As indicated in their letters, the teachers hope that the board will grant them voluntary recognition. However, if the board does not do so within 30 days, the UFT can ask PERB to certify the bargaining unit on the basis of the authorization cards.

In his letter to the school board chairman, Rev. Dr. Sixto Michael Carrion, Mulgrew noted that the teachers at the school are part of a growing movement of charter teachers who have sought union representation to ensure the quality of their students’ education and improve their schools. Mulgrew also expressed his hopes that Carrion and the board will recognize the value of a union for the school community.

“Across the country, union-member charter school educators are demonstrating that workplace voice, respectful treatment, and fair pay are prerequisites for sustaining high levels of student achievement,” Mulgrew wrote. “I fully anticipate that Bronx Academy of Promise Charter School will be no different.”

According to second-year music teacher Reagan Fletcher, job security is high on the list of priorities for the teaching staff.

“We are all looking for job security. We would like to have just cause when they fire somebody as opposed to being at-will employees,” she said. Fletcher said that the teachers also want a voice in their school. The teachers know what is best for their students because they spend the entire day with them, Fletcher said. “We deserve a voice in policy decisions that will affect them.”

In addition, the teachers say they want to unionize to secure better communication with management, fairer treatment and the respect that membership in a union will bring.