Next steps on teacher evaluation

Because of how long it took for the DOE to concede that tenured teachers rated Effective in the 2020-21 school year needed only two informal observations this year, the Measures of Student Learning (MOSL) process timeline had to be compressed. Today is the deadline for making school-level MOSL decisions. You should have formed the MOSL Committee with your administration. The chapter leader should select half the committee members and the principal should select the other half. Be mindful to include a variety of perspectives on the committee. See the MOSL Guide. Your school’s MOSL committee will decide on the measures of student learning for each grade and subject in your school. It will also choose the assessments, the target population and the measure. State assessments are NO longer required for any teacher’s measure of student learning, which gives the committee more latitude to choose measures that align with your school’s instructional program. In addition, individual measures are no longer required so consider using grade and school-wide measures.  All initial planning conferences (IPCs) should be completed by the end of October. Teachers cannot be observed until after their initial planning conference. See the IPC toolkit.

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Special Education Recovery Services

The UFT negotiated additional compensation for its members who provide Special Education Recovery Services. Teachers are to be paid per-session for providing Special Education Recovery Services to students with disabilities after school or on Saturday. The per-session postings were released in early October. Encourage special education teachers to apply for these positions at your school. Special education teachers and related service providers, when applicable, are also supposed to be paid up to two hours of per-session pay (or the applicable hourly rate) per student to prepare an individualized Special Education Recovery Service notice for each student with an IEP and then add the information to SESIS. This work should be conducted outside their regular work day and can be performed at school outside regular work hours or from home at the member’s discretion. If a principal or supervisor requires the member to complete the SERS notices during the school day, you can file an operational issues complaint on the member’s behalf. 

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Election Day PD clarification

In a consultation meeting two weeks ago, we asked the DOE to allow all members to attend Election Day PD remotely and the DOE agreed to that request. Then, a few days later, the DOE reversed its decision without warning. Principals had to notify their staff by last Friday, Oct. 15 if they were requiring them to be in person for professional development on Election Day. We continue to have to deal with this constant miscommunication from the DOE on every level and, in this case, it caused unnecessary confusion. If your members were not told by Oct. 15 to report in person, your Election Day PD will occur remotely. Teachers are not required to provide synchronous instruction on Election Day. Schools have been provided with funding to create and upload appropriate material for asynchronous instruction via digital classrooms: a total of 24 hours of per-session pay for each elementary school, 48 hours for each middle school and 64 hours for each high school. Schools may also offer per-session pay for content creation in non-core subject areas. These per-session activities must be posted at the school level in a manner consistent with the contract and regulations.

Landmark settlement in AFT’s student debt lawsuit

Tens of thousands of public sector workers, including public school educators, may finally see a reduction in or elimination of their crushing burden of student debt thanks to a landmark settlement announced Oct. 13 between the U.S. Department of Education and the American Federation of Teachers. The settlement resolves a lawsuit filed in July 2019 by the AFT and eight of its members — who said they were wrongly denied debt cancellation through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program — against then-Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and the U.S. Education Department. The lawsuit alleged mismanagement of the program. The settlement will give public servants who have been denied loan cancellation a case review and credit for years of past payments. The settlement also requires the government to contact borrowers who may be eligible for the program so they can apply for relief. The UFT has, over the past 2 1/2 years, taken steps to help its members, creating a Student Debt Relief Program while working with the AFT, its national affiliate, to file the lawsuit. 

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Thank you for helping to raise awareness about breast cancer

We want to thank all the chapter leaders who asked their members to come to school in pink on Oct. 13 and organized teams for the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walks on Oct. 10 and Oct. 17. More than 100 schools had UFT teams, and collectively they raised more than $100,000 in online donations. These activities enabled our members to pay tribute to lost loved ones, honor survivors and celebrate their commitment to fighting for a cure to breast cancer. This devastating disease strikes one in seven women over the course of their lifetime. We also want to thank all of you who shared photos with us and on your own social media accounts. You can see our Making Strides Against Breast Cancer photos and our Go Pink photos on the UFT website. Read our story about the Making Strides walks.