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School secretaries feted as professionals, union fighters
Jun 5, 2008 3:54 PM
School Secretaries Chapter Leader Jackie Ervolina is flanked by borough honorees (front row, from left) Joan Leykum of Queens, Elloree Brown of Brooklyn, Doreen Berrios of Manhattan, Tony Sciulla of Staten Island and Elaine Mercante of the Bronx. Joining them (back row) are Manhattan Borough Representative Robert Astrowsky and Mona Gonzalez, winner of the Goldie Colodny Award.
They’re the third-largest UFT chapter, after paraprofessionals and retirees, and they had a secret, until speaker after speaker at the school secretaries June 7 awards luncheon gave it away. The secret? It’s the secretaries who keep the schools running. And running well.
They’re also committed unionists, which is no secret.
When it came to defending themselves and others — as they did last winter in preparing and winning a landmark arbitration that ended the abusive practice of paras forced out of the classroom and made to do out-of-title secretarial work — they’re no slouches.
“You stood up,” said Michael Mulgrew, UFT vice president for career and technical education high schools. “You documented 300 incidents proving your case, and you made it clear to the [Department of Education]: Don’t mess with our work.
“That’s a win,” Mulgrew said, “that will resonate for years to come.”
A full table of appreciative paras attending the affair rose to show their thanks.
Secretaries Chapter Chair Jackie Ervolina noted how “the real entrance to a school is at the desk of the school secretary,” where “teachers, students, parents and the community come for direction, advice and assistance. The secretary’s responsibilities range from the mundane daily routine matters to the crises that never cease to arise — and to handle all with skill, diplomacy, warmth and, sometimes, a laugh.”
In introducing one honoree, UFT Vice President of Academic High Schools Leo Casey gave credit to what he called “the secretaries network,” the information mill and underground operation “which the French resistance had nothing on.”
Hadasa Nagi of IS 72 on Staten Island raises a stop sign in response to a reference from the podium about the city’s planned education funding cuts.
The awards ceremony highlighted what the secretaries do, and Mulgrew vouched that Mona Gonzalez, a school secretary at McKee CTE HS on Staten Island, was a model of secretarial acumen and union activism.
Gonzalez — this year’s winner of the Goldie Colodny Award, the chapter’s highest award for service and unionism — was described by Mulgrew as a model for the chapter that itself “exemplifies professionalism, whose members make sure the teachers feel comfortable and get paid, who ensure that when there’s a crisis things are handled well, who calms down an irate parent and who cares for a child.”
Little of this is in the job description, Mulgrew said, “but it’s what you do because you care.”
Recording secretary of the chapter’s executive committee and a delegate to the DA, Gonzalez was also active in several of the 160 public events the union and the anti-budget-cutting Keep the Promises Coalition organized in May and June, including testifying at Staten Island’s Contract for Excellence hearing.
“You were there and you made the Department of Education uncomfortable. That’s one more reason you got this award,” Mulgrew said. “You’re a fighter for secretaries, for teachers and for the children of New York City.”
Secretary of the Year honors went to Elaine B. Mercante of PS 68, the Bronx; Elloree Brown of Brooklyn Passages Academy; Doreen Berrios of PS 146, Manhattan; Joan D. Leykum of PS 60, Queens; and Toni Sciulla of PS 39, Staten Island.
Ervolina (left) and UFT Vice President of Career and Technical Education High Schools Michael Mulgrew with Gonzalez.
Each honoree thanked the chapter and talked about her triumphs, tragedies and headaches at work. Among them, Brown, in a standup routine worthy of any act at Caroline’s Comedy Club, broke the audience up with her war stories, including one where an armed police officer called in a “10-13” or “officer needs immediate assistance,” then brandished her weapon for no apparent reason. It soon became clear that the officer thought Brown was the trouble.
Brown diffused the situation, but only just before what seemed like half the cruisers in Brooklyn arrived.
Sciulla told of a 12-hour round-trip from her home in Staten Island during a blizzard to substitute in a Dyker Heights school for a much-appreciative principal, and Leykum offered a “Top Ten List” of the good and the bad in a school secretary’s life. These included:
- “I know how much everybody makes.”
- “Unlimited access to the principal’s bathroom” (a good thing, she would attest later).
- “Thanks to the bargaining power of the UFT, a salary that doubled in 11 years.”
During a lull in the presentations, with the cool jazz trio “On Tour” entertaining, Aracelia Cook — chapter executive board member, school secretary at PS 72, Brooklyn, and PTA president at both of her children’s public schools — said the best thing that was accomplished this year was “the secretaries making stronger than ever connections with the paras.”
Para Chapter First Vice Chair Doreen Raftery heartily agreed, saying keeping paras in the classroom was a milestone.
Cook thought the best thing about her job was “working with children and seeing them grow.” Worst thing: “The constant bureaucratic changes and [the DOE] not letting any one thing work.”
She said she missed the older district structure, “where you knew who was responsible and who to go to for help.”
Another secretary opined that the best thing about his job was ensuring that people get paid. What was the worst part of the job? “When they don’t get paid.”
