Once again we have had to set up a new SAUSD corruption thread as the last one started to run slow with all the comments on it.
Our schools are in crisis today – not just here in Santa Ana but all over the state. The only thing we know for sure is that we are going to take more budget hits.
I am amazed that the SAUSD hired back all their laid off administrators. How crazy is that? Class sizes are growing, good teachers are laid off, and the union, as usual, is asleep at the wheel.
We will continue to reason through all this here at the Orange Juice blog! We can but hope for the best…
I live and teach in SA so you know I am a good teacher!
Give me a flipping break! Now you have to live in the city you teach to be a good teacher? What is going on with you people? I am a parent who was told to go on this website and see what the teachers are talking about. I write better english than I speak. My daughter is helping me write this. She is a student at Saddleback-a low performing school. She graduates this year. I am so ashamed at what I am hearing. My daughter has 2 teachers that I know do not live in Santa Ana and they r great. My other 2 kids attend Monte Vista. I don’t care where you people live! As long as you come to work and care about my kids. Maybe I should move out of Santa Ana and move to Irvine. I am sure people there will tell me to move back to Santa Ana.. When will it all stop? Stop blaming where anyone lives on all this mess. I didn’t want to complain to district cause parents say it does no good. but now i want to beacause of what I now see what teachers think and now you think it has to do where anyone lives. and you put the blame on each other? You should be ashamed.
Mrs. Sanchez-Proud parent
Ok I agree my comment was a little outrageous…I was tired and just sick of this economy…my apologies. I know teachers who live in other cities who are great so my comment was just based on feelings at 2am..
And my comment was just me being facetious, in response to trex comment, sorry if you took that seriously. I think most teachers just need a diversion from the horrible news lately and I apologize for all of us if it was misunderstood by a parent. I live in Santa Ana, teach in Santa Ana and have two kids in Santa Ana schools and I know that where a person lives has nothing to do with the quality of their teaching.
Mrs. Sanchez,
Thank you for your comment and support. And a BIG Congratulations to you and your daughter on her graduation.
Please don’t believe everything you read on this blog. Some teachers won’t even read it as there is a lot of misinformation here (and negativity) here. I hope you realize that this is just ONE individual who made that disparaging comment. We’ve had a particularly rough year as teachers because we do know how the economy has hit everyone hard and especially those less fortunate than we. Our school has never seen more families in financial distress and with health issues. I guess the old adage, when it rains, it pours applied to our families this year. I’ve seen many teachers in tears over situations that kids and their families are facing, especially this year. And we do something about it even if it is only connecting them with agencies that can help. Often, we personally help with the problem, whether it be academic, financial, or spiritual. Most teachers (in all districts) care a lot, and that is why they went into this field.
I am very frustrated that I will most likely not get hired back again this year. If I hear that teachers get a pay raise or anything of that matter, I will be so livid. Nothing has been done to help those who were laid off from last year. Yet they still lay off this year. I can’t believe they laid off again. They had 80 plus from last year and now they add more to it. Due to being laid off, I have had a very tough time finding jobs out of teaching and of course in teaching as well. I would love to get hired back. I miss working with the students, but not working with our district that is for sure.
Still Laid Off,
I am so sorry about your job. You can be assured that NO ONE is getting a raise next year and I would bet probably not for several years. About all we have to look forward to is the possibility of furlough days and pay cuts. I hope that the number of retirees reduces this year’s RIF’s and that future retirees will enable you to get your job back as soon as possible. Meanwhile, I have never in over 20 years seen so many student teachers and they will be out there looking for the few new jobs that will be available countywide. It’s pretty sad out there right now.
tmare,
You are so right on the student teachers. It makes me wonder why they still even have the program open. I am sure they have it open so those professors can get paid. I mean who in their right mind would go into teaching now? I sure would not want to. I went to CSUF’S Teacher Job Fair on Monday and met many job seekers who were just finishing the program. I felt so pretty bad for them. I have two years ahead of them and I can’t even find a job. I may have to go out of state. I have a job interview coming up next week 30 minutes past Bakersfield in an area that is not greatly populated and is 80% hispanic. I really do not even want to go to it, but will most likely go to see what happens. At least Bakersfield is a quick ride home for the weekend if I get offered the job.
I have actually heard that at least in the areas of math and special education, there are still jobs in many of the small, rural districts in the state. Obviously, it doesn’t seem as though you would like to go there, I hope that you are able to keep an open mind. I do think that people in your position are pretty close to getting your jobs back though. I know at least 25% of the staff at my school are within 5 years of retirement and this should be a small sign of light for those in the difficult position you are in right now. I guess the huge jump in student teachers is also a sign of the times, many people feel as though they may as well get their teaching credential since they have exhausted so many other options. I believe that many of them will be headed out of state within one year.
I actually got accepted to CSUF’S Special Education Program to become an intern. However, I have found that it may be hard to get even an internship now in it because many students last year decided to go into the program. They will be done by June and will have their credential of which I do not have yet. I was told by many districts that they will look at interns only if they need to do so and that they may not have to do it as much as they use to in the past. All of this just makes me so sad. It is like I missed the boat yet again. I have started to apply to jobs that say they are not taking interns. I figure I have nothing to lose to apply to it anyways. I am on edjoin on a daily basis 4 or more times a day. There are many multiple subject teachers who are also going to try and be interns now too. I just hope something changes in SAUSD and I get my job back next year. I would be in heaven if I did. I would work at any school, in any classroom, with 40 plus students just to have a job again. Heck I would even work outside or on the rooftop if I had to.
Stay in there ‘Still laid off’. Children continue to come; teachers retire and leave. You’ll be back in. There should be enough substitute positions to hold you over in the meantime. We do have insure that these sub positions are assigned correctly. There have been problems here.
Still Laid Off,
I agree with tmare on the amount of teachers that will retire soon. In my case at our school, I can think of at least 25% that will retire in probably 3 years and sooner if the district gives a great incentive. We, too, are working longer than we thought we would due to the economy. Fortunately, I still love teaching, but have to give myself a pep talk every day to put up with what’s going on in education. Thank goodness when I go into the classroom, for the most part I love it, and can put the stupid political bureaucrats out of my mind – unless one does a walk-through! haha!
Still laid off,
The people here who are telling you to “hang in there” are unaware of the economy to come. According to California State Controller John Chiang (http://www.contracostatimes.com/california/ci_14781989), the worst has yet to come for California’s economy. I can’t get the link to work at the moment but from what I remember from reading this article he says that there are a lot of taxes that are due to be expiring in the next few years. With that in mind there is nobody in today’s economy or in their right mind that would vote to raises their taxes after all the corruption and waste that has come to the surface. No one in this economy would inflict on themselves another tax hike when most of them are barely making it on what they have now. Knowing this I would say that it will be 5 to 10 years before anyone sees any confidence in what government is doing to allow them to raise taxes again. Think about this also, were are probably going to be taxed even more now that Obama has put through healthcare legislation that will raise our taxes. Do you think people in California will want to raise vote in MORE taxes knowing this. People of California will be HAPPY when these taxes expire! Guess what Still Laid Off will have to work in Baker or some far away place because the greedy teachers and administration here in Santa Ana and in many other places in the state won’t agree to a salary reduction or any type of reduction. Again like I’ve stated before they only care for themselves and not education.
Mrs. Sanchez –
Thanks for the thougtful post. It was direct and to the point. However, there’s one comment you posted that continues to linger ….. ” I didn’t want to complain to district cause parents say it does no good.
That’s part of the problem. Too many SAUSD parents are content to sit back and do nohing! Your complacency has helped enable the district to achieve itd status as an underachieving district.
Parents are powerful. The shennigans that take place in SAUSD would never take place in Irvine.
It saddens me when parents do not actively advocate for their children. If you don’t, who will?
Yes, parents actively involved, united in purpose, and independent of school administration hegemony would absolutely change this school district for the better.
The fossil is blathering again. Trex, your expertise is quite overwhelming. Perhaps you should work for the Register-oops, bankrupt. I hope you aren’t a teacher. It would be a terrible disservice to any student.
SAHS Teach- well said.
Anonplz, is that what you have to say about our budget? Its no wonder why SAUSD is in this financial mess. Like you they don’t even look at the facts but instead keep on wasting away.
You hope I’m not a teacher? Why because I actually care about education and where its going right now? If you haven’t noticed its going down the financial hole because no one, mostly teachers like yourself, takes responsibility for all the cuts in education. Instead all you care about is your salaries, benefits, and your pensions. If you took the time to read the short article I posted Anonplz you could easily assume that 30 to 1 is coming to 1st and 2nd grades again soon. We might even have 35 to 1 sometime soon also. Furloughs are coming too people, so get ready for those.
Oh and look just what’s in the news, combining grade levels to save money (http://www.omaha.com/article/20100405/NEWS01/704059931). Looks like more greedy teachers rather watch their colleague’s lose their jobs so they can keep their salaries, benefits, and pensions.
Sorry for the 3rd consecutive post…won’t happen again. But I had to focus on one point made in this article by a teacher, “Turner, a 23-year teaching veteran, likes the multigrade approach. She said she has seen students develop academically and socially. Students develop leadership and interpersonal skills because they work in numerous small groups.”
Obviously she LOVES the multi-grade approach. She gets to keep her salary! Her reasoning is so delusional and full of holes.
trex, I’m not a teacher, but you make it sound like teachers should teach for free, or give up their job so someone else can have it. Your statements are so broad and ill informed. Our budget crisis was not created by the averaged salaried employee. You need to focus your energy on the polititians and their personal agendas, and those in upper management who have mismanaged and misappropriated funds.
Fed-up, you do have good points on how we need to focus on politicians, personal agendas, and those in upper management. But when I see SO MANY teachers focused on their own salaries and benefits that they are ok with watching their colleagues lose their jobs. Many of their colleagues have kids, homes, cars, etc. Yet many teachers who are hired continue to pound away at their salaries and benefits. They really don’t care about their colleagues, they only care about themselves.
Trex, given your age, you must be at the at the top of the salary scale…if you retired we could git half a dozen young velociraptors fr the price of yer geez. All this self sacrifice stuff sounds like commynism to me, I read about that from Aleister and Terry Crowley, they say it is a bad thing, commynism and self righteous self sacrificing commy libruls, you are wanting to make us all share one toothbrush like in Russia. You are bad pepul!
This “thread” is titled: SAUSD Corruption, not teacher bashing.
Please, let’s try to keep to the intent of this thread.
We shouldn’t put anything in this blog that will keep citizens who need/want to share, like Ms. Sanchez, from seeing this blog to be informative.
For instance, SAUSD took away three “inservice days” without the necessary contract arbitration. They reduced all certificated staff’s salaries by approx. 1.5% without any union or staff approval. [I’m not one to complain, because I HATED those moronic inservices. I’ll happily take the pay cut to avoid the inanity.] How does SAUSD get away with taking away salary that is guaranteed by contract? Obviously because they can.
I’m for saving all the jobs possible. Whatever % pay reduction the District administrators are willing to take, I will take the same % even though they are WAY OVERPAID for their incompetence.
Are there any schools that DIDN’T have their school site funds taken from them so a TOSA, a quasi administrator could be funded? You could have had tutoring, aids, or anything you wanted to buy but couldn’t. Perhaps Mrs. Sanchez is already aware that the district believes that best use of teachers time is to eliminate 1 hour a week (on Wednesdays) so teachers could talk among themselves instead of teaching your child. This was union driven for some reason, not from the teachers. For some reason the district thought it was a good idea. Before you look at teachers compensation to cut, is there any reason why there is still a department dedicated to beginning teachers BTSA. There are 5 people in that department that could pay for a few more classroom teachers. Does the administration need 8 (eight) assistant superintendents? Talk about poor utilization of resources. To the Wilson teacher, it is not corruption but at least a cousin.
#1024 anonplz – have I been missing comments this funny all this time? I’ll have to come over to this thread more often.
if you retired we could git half a dozen young velociraptors fr the price of yer geez. All this self sacrifice stuff sounds like commynism to me, I read about that from Aleister and Terry Crowley, they say it is a bad thing, commynism and self righteous self sacrificing commy libruls, you are wanting to make us all share one toothbrush like in Russia. You are bad pepul!
#1026, The Outsider, is correct. The BTSA program is a waste of money [always has been], there are far too many assistant superintendents, and the “buy back days/Wednesdays” are a joke too.
Don’t forget the big bucks for the TOSA who is just a “quasi administrator” as pointed out by the “Outsider”. Couldn’t we get someone a little less expensive to run the principal’s errands, photocopy, and make certificates? That’s just a few of the unimportant duties of our TOSA. They aren’t even suppose to work with students (by job definition), but to our TOSA’s credit, our students have had groups for at least 10 hours this year (and I’m talking the whole year! SARCASM in case parents and community members think we are happy with this). I wish some parents would speak up at board meetings and to the district about all of the incredible waste of student funds that go on in this district. Oh that’s right, I forgot, the ONLY parents who are involved are hand-picked by Jane and other administrators to do their bidding. Teacher’s have SO TRIED AND IT’S LIKE THEY (admin.) ARE COMPLETELY IGNORING US – CHANGING THE SUBJECT ASAP. I truly think we should have held a strike the last time with the 4% pay cut, but it is not easy to convince a teacher to strike due to their strong concern and involvement with the students. The present economy would not lend itself well to a strike and would be misunderstood by the general public (as teacher selfishness, which we’ve heard so much about) and not as an attempt to get some reform from the district (which we all know they could and should do).
Teachers, you are backed into a corner and the options are few. You never thought you would be here and many of you still can’t bring yourself to fathom the reality.
You keep blaming others. Others keep blaming you and yet we have very few solutions. What will the silver bullet be this time?
Are charter schools the answer? Furloughs? Reduced pay? Less Administrators? Longer school days? Bigger classes? Smaller classes? Whole language? Phonics? Back to the basics? More ESL? Bilingual education? English only? More accountability? etc. etc…
It seems we’ve run the gamut and now we’ve come full circle. As educators we know what our job is and how to do it. Presently, we have too many cooks in the kitchen. The problem is how are we going to convince everyone else that we are worthy and capable chefs?
RE: 1029
Lest not forget when you buy a TOSA you are also paying for their medical insurance, STRS, and other assorted taxes. For that alone, you could buy (for example) a Roomba vacuum cleaner or printer for almost every classroom. When you buy a product, you have it year after year opposed to labor.
JJ, well said! Education is backed into a corner, yet many just keep pointing the finger elsewhere.
Thanks for the very valid posts 1030, 1031, and (even trex) 1032. If only trex could understand that of the 23 years I have been in this district, very seldom have I encountered a teacher that is the “problem”. I will say that it does happen once in a great while! But 95% of the time, it is the bloated and incompetent bureaucracy.
But many times these “bureaucrats” are teachers themselves. Which affirms my belief that most of these administartors should have stayed in the classroom and were only lured out of it for more pay. That’s shameful especially considering that they probably were better at teaching.
I agree w/grad18 that we are top heavy w/administration. We need to revise the model: trim the bureaucracy but the teachers have to take up the slack and of course the compensation.
Sadly I really feel that the state of California REALLY needs to hit the RESET button (bankruptcy). This economy is showing the ugly head of the unions(teachers union) and all contracts made and promised. Administration is not innocent either, but when you couple in promises made to prison guards unions, state employee unions, and all other pensions and promises made then we won’t be able to find a way out of this mess. I think many of us just got carried away with contracts and promises, now we’re stuck because if we breach any of these promises or contracts then we are threatened with lawsuits (more costly). Time to start fresh…
graduate grade 18,
I don’t feel teachers are the “problem,” I just feel that when they’re complaining that they had a 1.5% cut (3 buy back days or whatever) its a very small hit to their salaries. Beginning teachers are still making $46,000 and most teachers with 10 or more years are still making $50,000+, then you add in benefits and summers to make more money. I wonder why they’re complaining so much about it. Most of them are watching their peers get pinked slipped, laid off, and it seems as though they turn a blind eye to it. They say “oh I feel bad for you” but then they go drive off to their dinner parties in their SUV’s while their colleagues have to drive home wondering how they’re going to make it through the next year earning around 75% less ($18,000 at most if you sub everyday, before taxes!).
I don’t really think that teachers would complain about the 1.5% pay cut and loss of the three days. The issue is the manner in which the district imposed this without any discussion or negotiation, it was truly done in an illegal manner. If the union allows them to do things like this without filing grievances or unfair labor practices, we will see them do far more than this. If the union would have allowed this, it would have become precedent for other actions and the district could point to this as justification for changing the contract without negotiations. Had they tried to negotiate this, I really have no doubt that the membership would most likely have given in due to the current financial climate. There is a process for these types of things and until that process changes, the district should abide by the rules.
All this talk about teacher compensation is so selfish. We are very well paid. I haven’t heard anyone at my site complaining about our “reduced year” cut. We simply aren’t required to work those 3 days, so why should we expect to be paid?
I am upset that as a union “unit member” I was not even given the opportunity to take a pay cut in order to save jobs and keep class sizes down. It wasn’t even discussed. I also believe that the union is involved in many backdoor deals that we don’t hear about until they are set in stone. The union that is supposed to represent us, is not doing a good job. It’s not even doing a mediocre job.
Many of my friends have had their careers, outside of education, severely impacted by the current economy. We teachers, have given up very little.
Furlough days would be the fair way to go as well – to save jobs. I even called the union about donating furlough days, left messages, and never heard from them. I know many teachers who would have done this. As I have stated earlier on this blog, the district has a way of signing on with STRS so that a certain amount of furlough days would not affect retirement (i.e. teachers would get credit for a full year). Anyway, I SO HAVE TO AGREE with the points made by #1038, SAUSD teacher. Also, at my school, no one is complaining about the 3 reduced days, just the way it came about, and we all “let that go” quite some time ago. Our rep is aware of that, too.
#1038 & #1039, I agree. Teachers at my site don’t miss the three days and everyone who has joined the discussion is okay with giving up days to save jobs.
Just about everybody I know is satisfied with the loss of the three buy back days. Nobody ever thought they were effective anyway. The fact that our union is grieving this just shows how selfish and out of touch they are. It makes teachers look bad. #1037 Tmare — I respect the professionalism of your posts, but your post #1037 could have been taken right out of Susan Mercer’s talking points. The fact is that the buy back days should be gone, and good riddance to them. Susan can conjure up whatever bull___ she wants to justify what she is doing, but she is WRONG. The union’s time and money could be better spent supporting riffed teachers than clawing greedily and unnecessarily for money that the district was paying out for no good purpose. How can Susan sleep at night while 100 teachers are still laid off from last year and 50 more on the chopping block this year? Her priorities are bass ackwards. She should be ashamed of herself. Losing the buy back days was a fair trade off for the small pay reduction. I hope they stay gone.
http://orangejuiceblog.com/2010/04/cusd-parents-going-on-strike-tomorrow/
SAUSD teachers – – –
Who votes your union leadership into office?
As everyone is probably aware of by now, the union won the arbitration regarding the three buy back days. While I am sure plenty of people here will not be happy about this, I would ask that everyone takes a breath and thinks about the bigger issue. The district made a unilateral decision that they could change the contract without negotiation and a judge decided in no uncertain terms that they were wrong. How this will play out is still to be decided but the decision is binding upon the district. Hopefully, the next time they think that they can bypass the contract, they will think twice. Every teacher still has the option to not complete these three days and of course, let the district keep the money.
The Willard faculty took a union vote today on changing to an 8 period for the 2010-11 school year. It was voted down.
I think the big issue is that there are going to be more teachers without jobs because of a greedy union leadership that wants to force the district to spend money for no good reason. I would like to hear from one person who thinks that the buy back days add value for the students of Santa Ana. The only thing they add value to is the linings of the teachers pockets.
I’m just curious what the percentage of the vote against the eight period day was at Willard. Does anyone have that number? I also heard that Spurgeon would be voting also. There is still the possibility that it will be imposed but hopefully the district will not do that in light of their recent loss. The union would definitely file a major grievance due to a change in working conditions if they do that.
There were a total of 49 votes. 27 voted yes (for block schedule). 22 voted no (keep the 7 periods that we have now). It was not enough votes to change to block (35 votes were needed).Therefore, next year’s schedule will be 7 periods like we have this year.
44% voted no. 55% voted yes. 70% of staff voting yes was needed to change the schedule to an 8 period day.
It’s interesting that more than half of the staff wants to go to an eight period day. Why do you think that more than half of the staff has been convinced and how do you feel about it?
Not my own personal rules. We went by guidelines written into the contract (which is a good thing).
My own opinion, it’s not a good idea to vote wavers effecting our hard fought contract.
I guess I’m just curious why half of the staff would vote to decrease their prep time and increase their class load. In addition to that I am curious why people believe that “making up” an elective without a curriculum or guidelines is in their best interest. I do agree with you, I’m just trying to understand how the district or administration has managed to convince so many staff members.
Yay, see the big problem here in the district was those buy back days! Thank you Susan for “fighting for us” on this issue!! I was SO concerned that we wouldn’t get those buy back days!
I mean fighting to rehire those 100+ teachers without jobs is not that important! We need our $600 of buy back days so I can buy new leather shoes…again thank you Susan for MORE money into my pocket!