Know your rights
Letter in the file: More and different tools
May 21, 2009 2:50 PM
UFT members have many different tools at their disposal when an administrator puts a negative letter in their personnel file. Prior to 2005, members had the right to grieve such letters, but in 95 to 98 percent of those grievances, the arbitrator rewrote the letter to make it fair and accurate (the contractual standard at the time) and the letter remained in the file forever. Observation reports were virtually never removed from a member’s file because, in deference to the 1979 Leass arbitration, an arbitrator would not substitute his or her judgment for that of the supervisor.
Since 2005, members have both retained important rights and gained new rights established in the 2005 contract and subsequent
arbitrations with respect to letters in the file.
Those rights, however, are only meaningful if they are understood and enforced. The following outline of members’ rights
concerning letters in the file and the six strategies that members may use when dealing with a letter in the file are based upon UFT Grievance Director Howard Solomon’s presentation at the May 13 Delegate Assembly.
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Know your rightsSince 2005, we have gained new, superior rights to deal with unfair and inaccurate letters in the file. Of course you must use these rights in order to benefit from them. Here are six strategies for utilizing your new and continuing rights. Strategy #1:Monitor your file. Check your official file twice a year for all material that is more than three years old and inform the principal of all material to be removed from the file. Never go alone to review your file. Strategy #2:You are entitled to discuss a complaint with your immediate supervisor. If you are denied that meeting, you can file a grievance under Article 1. Strategy #3:Check your file for any counseling memos that are over three years old and need to be removed. Strategy #4:File an objective response to each letter so that a third party would have a clear picture of what happened from your viewpoint. Strategy #5:If you can show that a contractual article or a chancellor’s regulation was violated, as a remedy that letter should be removed from your file. This utilizes the Todd Friedman award.Examples in this category include (but are not limited to) letters on: attendance, observations, and bulletin boards, classroom furniture/length of lesson units. Strategy #6: Supervisors have three months from the date of an incident to place a letter in the file, exclusive of summer vacation. |
