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Rank privileges: D.C. schools to pay 68 idle teachers, staff $5.4 million
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(Michael Riccio/For The Examiner)
Members of the Washington Teachers’ Union throw their garbage into an overflowing waste bin Thursday during an annual union meeting in the Washington Convention Center. D.C. Public Schools will pay nearly $5.4 million in full-time salaries to 68 teachers and staff who won’t work full-time jobs this year, schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee told The Examiner on Thursday. The teachers, aides and assistant principals don’t fit into Rhee’s reform plans, but they have accrued years of service in the city’s beleaguered school system. The city’s contract with the staff unions require that younger teachers and staff be laid off before senior ones. Rhee told The Examiner in a phone interview Thursday that she doesn’t want to lay off young staff to make room for their veteran colleagues. “That’s not the message I want to send,” she said. “It communicates to other new teachers who may eventually want to teach with us that they should probably think twice about it.” But that means paying teachers and administrators for nothing. They have been told to report to schools when classes start Monday, but they don’t have specific duties, Rhee said. The teachers union contract expires Sept. 30, and those close to Rhee say the seniority rules are high on her bargaining wish list. Rhee’s boss, Mayor Adrian Fenty, has staked his reputation on rescuing the schools from generations of sloth, waste and corruption. But he swept to power thanks in part to the legwork of activist unions, such as the Washington Teachers’ Union, which expected Fenty to be more friendly to its cause than his predecessor, Anthony Williams. The Washington Teachers’ Union endorsed Fenty and D.C. Council Chairman Vincent Gray, D, last year, and it’s doubtful that union leaders will look kindly on efforts to trim their hard-fought seniority privileges. Union Vice President Nathan Saunders insisted to The Examiner on Thursday that all 68 teachers and staff will be in productive jobs next week. “I know that these individuals went into schools,” Saunders said. “They’re not in limbo; they have definitive places of employment.” Money for nothing? » 55 teachers » 3 aides » 10 assistant principals » Total salaries: $5.38 million Source: D.C. Public Schools Examiner columnist Jonetta Rose Barras contributed to this report. bmyers@dcexaminer.com dlevitz@dcexaminer.com |