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Agreement should give more ATRs permanent assignments

by Deidre McFadyen

Nov 20, 2008 4:13 PM

‘This is my job’ By ELLIE SPIELBERG Opening up young minds to the beauty of mathematics has always been an essential part of Irina Dynkina’s life, whether teaching in her native Ukraine or for the past 12 years in New York City. Dynkina was teaching at Brooklyn’s South Shore HS when it began phasing out in June. A versatile S-rated teacher and an asset in a city where math and science are shortage areas, Dynkina became an ATR and was temporarily placed at the Brooklyn School for Music and Theater, where she’s sailing through a full day of classes in math, physics and ecology. And an English class. And not to mention a special education class, where she’s one half of a CTT duo. Whether teaching in her native Ukraine or for the past 12 years in New York City, opening young minds to the beauty of mathematics has always been an essential part of Irina Dynkina’s life. “It’s scary because my future is unclear,” said Dynkina, who hasn’t been working enough years to retire even if she wanted to. “This is my job, this is what I alway did. Now, I don’t know. I might have to start all over again. I’m very upset.” When Dynkina asked the AP at her current school for the opportunity to apply if a position opened, she got a positive response, she said, adding that she’ll do her best there, hope a position opens and keep up her job search. She’s been applying on the open market and going to schools on her own to inquire. But when the math ace adds up the results of 35 applications, she keeps coming up with zero. It’s not the first time Dynkina felt the odds were against her. “When I was a new teacher, I was almost hired at FDR HS but then they said according to the contract they had to place an excessed teacher and said goodbye to me,” she said. “Now, I’m an excessed teacher and principals want to hire new teachers, and say goodbye to me.” Let Us Teach! The new agreement was designed to help the teachers, guidance counselors, secretaries, psychologists and social workers in the Absent Teacher Reserve (ATR) who lost their classroom assignments because of shrinking enrollments, school closings or the elimination of programs. The subject of this profile was intereviewed prior to the agreement as part of the union’s “Let Us Teach!” public relations campaign on behalf of ATRs.

Two months after launching its “Let Us Teach” campaign on behalf of excessed educators in the Absent Teacher Reserve, the UFT reached an agreement with the Department of Education that should result in many more excessed educators securing permanent assignments.

The side agreement, which leaves the main agreement fully intact, was overwhelmingly approved by the UFT executive board on Nov. 18. It eliminates the financial disincentives that the union has long claimed have dissuaded principals from hiring ATRs while continuing to safeguard all the rights in the existing contract, including the job security of ATRs and preventing forced transfers. Going forward, principals will now have a strong incentive to fill vacancies using the qualified and experienced educators who have languished in the ATR pool.

“This is a terrific agreement that benefits everyone,” said UFT President Randi Weingarten. “By eliminating the financial obstacles that have prevented principals from hiring ATRs, we should see more permanent placements, and that in turn should reduce the size of the ATR pool and save the school system millions of dollars at a moment of economic distress. Best of all, thousands of kids will get the benefit of these great teachers.”

There are 829 teachers serving as ATRs on the central payroll and 529 teaching vacancies in the city, according to the DOE. Another 270 guidance counselors, psychologists, secretaries and social workers are also serving as ATRs and are centrally funded. Another 400 people are excessed, but on school payroll.

Educators who were excessed and became ATRs — through no fault of their own — maintain their salary and benefits and cannot be fired or laid off thanks to a job-security guarantee that the UFT secured in the 2005 contract. Yet frustration grew as many educators spent months in limbo serving as short-term or long-term substitutes, sometimes in the very school from which they had been excessed.

Weingarten first called for a moratorium on new hiring over a year ago. Decrying the waste of money, talent and experience, she said ATRs with the appropriate license should be used to fill vacancies and lower class size. Instead, the DOE hired 5,400 new teachers this September, despite having nearly 1,400 teachers from closed or downsized schools serving as ATRs.

While the union sought ways to solve the issue, and launched its “Let Us Teach” campaign in September after making no headway, the DOE stigmatized ATRs and evidently used the New Teacher Project, an entity that receives significant funding from the DOE, to brand ATRs as unqualified, lazy and a waste of money in an effort to generate public pressure to fire them.

As the political and economic landscape shifted in recent weeks, the union was able to work intensely on the ATR issue with the Bloomberg administration and the DOE. Throughout the negotiations, UFT officials maintained that the way to solve budget problems was by working together and listening to each other’s concerns.

Under the new agreement, which covers all job titles, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein will now urge principals to fill vacancies with ATRs before considering other candidates.

Schools that hire centrally funded ATRs — those from closing schools or programs or from schools that experienced a significant drop in enrollment — will receive two subsidies. The DOE will pay schools that hire educators from the ATR pool the difference between the salary of a new teacher as he or she moves up the pay scale and the actual cost of the ATR educator’s salary for eight years. The DOE will also give the school a one-time lump sum payment equal to half of a new hire’s salary.

Forced placements continue to be barred. The agreement preserves the right of mutual consent by both school and teacher in hiring and placement.

Previously, acting on the financial incentives built into the new school budget system, many principals did not hire ATRs. Instead, they opted to hire new teachers at lower salaries while benefiting from the services of ATRs posted at their school but paid by the central administration.

The new agreement also furnishes an opportunity for a principal and an ATR to see if the match works before fully committing to it. Principals can hire an ATR for up to a year on a provisional basis, with the subsidies kicking in only if the assignment becomes a permanent placement. If the principal or educator decide that it is not a good fit, the educator returns to the ATR pool.

The agreement also facilitates assigning ATRs in schools where they are most needed. The DOE will create a list of schools where ATRs may be needed, based on factors such as school size and teacher absences, to which educators in the ATR pool can apply for assignment. The principal would have to accept the qualified ATR with the greatest citywide seniority.

The UFT agreed to put its arbitration on behalf of ATRs on hold to see if this agreement solves the problem.

There are issues still outstanding regarding the teaching fellows hired in September who face termination on Dec. 5 because they have no full-time teaching assignments. Weingarten vowed to continue fighting on their behalf.