District, Teachers Union Disagree on Allocation of 20 New Teachers

After steady class size increases over the past years, the Redwood City School District will hire 20 new teachers for the upcoming trimester on Jan. 3 to lower the student to teacher ratio. The district will spend about $1 million of the $1.6 million from federal funding granted in September from the Education Jobs Fund and Medicaid Assistance Act of 2010, according to Deputy Superintendent John Baker.

In a district where the average K-3 class size is around 30 students, parents, teachers and the district all want to reduce that ratio. The current contract with the union stipulates that a class can have a maximum of 32 students. To avoid reaching this maximum number, schools would receive 0.5 to 2.5 teachers, with the exception of Taft and Fair Oaks. These schools received additional teachers funded through the Quality Education Investment Act (QEIA).Interviews begin as early as Wednesday.

But the district and the Redwood City Teachers Association are at odds with how to allocate the teachers.

"It's not a one size fits all," said Bret Baird, president-elect of the Redwood City Teachers Association. "We should let the teachers who are working with the kids decide."

"One teacher, one vote," added Bill Crow, the Redwood City Teachers Association President. "It should be a collaborative decision."

Baird, a Kennedy Middle School teacher, said that he was first hired two months into the school year.

"I have first hand experience with coming in the middle of the year, and I can say that the kids will adapt," he said. "We're all suffering from large class sizes and we need to reduce them." He added that the more individual attention given to students would benefit them in the long-run.

The district said it was hesitant to embrace this option because student achievement declined among students who were moved mid-year as a result of classroom reorganizations similar to those proposed by the union.

"It could cause distress among students," Baker said. "We believe this could be a disruption to students and parents, especially when children have bonded with their current teachers."

Crow said the union distributed surveys to all the teachers in the district and 87 voted in favor of reducing K-3 class sizes and eliminating combination classes, or classes with two or more grades. Twenty-two teachers chose option B, the push-in/pull-out resource program that would send the 20 teachers into the classrooms to work with the current teachers to alleviate any stress. This program, supported by the district, would provide the extra help and support inside and outside the classroom, Baker said.

But the Association believes this method wouldn't be as effective. Crow said this could create even more additional work for current teachers.

"We feel that we're professionals and we should be able to collaborate instead of being dictated to by the district," Crow said. "We recognize that all schools may not be able to draw students out from current classrooms into new ones, and if it doesn't work, they'll figure that out pretty quickly." 

Further disagreements ensued about which party has the right to make the final decision. According to three articles in the contract between the district and the association, the district said that it has the authority to:

• 19.1.2 direct the work of its employees;
• 19.1.4 determine the kinds and levels of services to be provided;
• 19.1.7 determine the number and kinds of personnel required

But the union cited that any federal funds provided after the spring had to be negotiated with the parties involved.

The district will present the discussions to the Board of Supervisors at Wednesday's meeting. Should the Board vote for the push-in/pull-out model recommended by the district, an impasse could follow.