Whether defended or despised, public school teacher contracts are critical documents that set out what we expect from our teachers and what they can expect from us as their employers. Yet, the public and its elected representatives have almost no information about or influence over the contract negotiation process.
Closed-door negotiations to agree on a new three-year Providence teachers’ contract to run through August of 2027 began earlier this month. The teachers are represented by a team led by Providence Teachers Union (PTU) President Maribeth Calabro. The Providence Public School Department (PPSD) team includes the Superintendent Dr. Javier Montañez, a senior PPSD official and a representative of the RI Department of Education (RIDE). The lead negotiator for PPSD is attorney Charles Ruggerio, of Henneous, Carroll, Lombardo, LLC.
Neither side would describe their proposals in detail, although PTU President Calabro did provide a broad view of her members’ goals and the negotiating process during a one-hour interview. The Union is seeking “respect, recognition, a role in decision-making and better pay,” for its members, Calabro says.
PPSD declined an interview and did not respond to written questions.
Current School Board member and candidate for the new elected School Board seat from Region 4 (Wards 8,9,19) Night Jean Muhingabo, is frustrated. He says PPSD hasn’t provided any kind of report to the current School Board. For now, though the Board has little official power under the RIDE takeover, it has used its platform to amplify community voices and raise critical questions. “These are decisions they make without including members of the community. To me, that’s not fair to students or to teachers.”
Seniority rules criticized
Many critics of public schools say the traditional contract’s seniority-based protections against the termination of poorly performing teachers, the conditions it sets on teacher selection and assignment and other mandates on school operations makes it an insurmountable barrier to improvements in schools.
Teachers and their union say Providence now has fewer seniority protections than most other districts and that those still in effect are essential to attracting and retaining highly qualified teachers. They counter that the stubborn focus on seniority above all else is a smokescreen for anti-union bias and a way to avoid coming to grips with the real barriers to improvement, most of which are connected to the amount of money taxpayers are prepared to invest in schools.
One Providence school principal agreed that previous seniority concessions have made it far easier to select the best candidate for open teaching positions, but also says that getting incompetent or even misbehaving senior teachers out of the building is still almost impossible under the contractual process. And, though educational experts agree that teacher quality is the biggest factor in determining student outcomes, there is no agreement on a fair, accurate and effective method for assessing teacher quality.
In any event, PTU is unlikely to give up more seniority protections without some extraordinary incentive in return. The PPSD budget still calls for more spending than the revenue provided by the city and state for the coming school year. In fact, with no extra money to allocate to teachers, the negotiators may be challenged even to achieve the Union’s modest minimum goal, described by Providence Teachers Union President Maribeth Calabro as “not making decisions that cause teachers to leave the district.”
Just keeping teachers is a challenge
There is no doubt that keeping teachers on staff is a daunting challenge facing PPSD this year. Last fall, teacher resignations and difficulties in teacher recruitment meant that some classrooms had no permanent assigned teacher and students were “sprinkled” among other classes, sometimes not even in their own grade. Last spring, PPSD laid off another 50 teachers for budgetary reasons. Now classrooms are being filled to, and sometimes beyond, the 26-student maximum allowed in the contract. (Temporary “overage” is allowed under certain circumstances.)
The teachers have been told not to even hope for more pay. Instead, they have asked for guaranteed access to paper and pencils in the contract. Simple but critical instructional materials like these have been scarce for two years, with requests and requisitions going unfilled for months at a time, they say. Teachers have been digging into their own pockets just to provide students with these basics.
And teachers are still feeling the impacts that COVID had on student learning and behavior. Providence teachers say their job is just harder to do now, which has contributed to a wave of early retirements. And, as job stresses ratchet up in Providence, a less challenging environment, even at lower pay, becomes more attractive, and many. Providence teachers are leaving for suburban districts. Calabro cites a particular need for incentives for teachers certified in special education. “There are just more student needs after COVID. We have to pay to meet them, “she says.
Teachers want input into decision-making
Many teachers feel disempowered and disrespected by decisions made by PPSD and RIDE, which assumed ultimate control of PPSD in 2019. They say that under RIDE’s management, PPSD has become arbitrary and highly dictatorial in its decisions affecting teachers and school building administrators. More than 500 teachers, a quarter of the workforce, turned out at a demonstration in February to protest their treatment at the hands of RIDE.
Teachers have cited sudden changes in principals, secretive decisions on school closures and a series of poorly rolled out curriculum changes as examples of central office edicts that have had devastating impact on their school communities.
Two teachers, who would only speak anonymously out of fear of retaliation.described how once-effective school-based “professional learning communities,” that provided weekly training as well as in-class coaching and support, were effectively dismantled when subject specialists in each building were reassigned and replaced by visiting consultants. They see the change as both a step backward for their students and as a clear sign that PPSD and RIDE do not respect teachers as professionals and don’t trust them to do their jobs.
PPSD students photo courtesy of the Providence Teachers Union
“Teacher working conditions are student working conditions,” says Calabro She says the waste of teacher time is their biggest day-to-day annoyance. “Teacher time is finite, and it’s wasted. They want to be self-directed with collegial planning in their buildings – that would be a morale boost.”
Some teachers would like to see more school autonomy, where teachers would work with principals at the school level to analyze student needs and outcomes and make budgetary, training, staffing and curriculum choices to address them. The existing contract calls for “Institutional Learning Teams (ILT)” in each school, which provide a degree of teacher input on learning strategies. However, teachers say, principals often ignore or undermine the ILT.
There’s No Trust
Any kind of collaborative self-management requires flexibility based on trust that is sorely lacking between teachers and administrators after five years under RIDE’s control. With limited money and limited trust, the new contract may turn out to be similar to the old one, minus some temporary provisions for an extended school day only possible due to the now-expired infusion of federal ESSER funding.
Everyone agrees on one thing: PPSD schools need to change. While the teachers’ contract could be the basis for true changes, It doesn’t appear that the “transformational” contract that public school critics, reformers and some teachers have long hoped for will happen this time around.
Jonathan Howard is Co-founder of Cause & Effect, Inc., a consulting company that provides strategic planning facilitation, fund development planning and board strengthening to mission-driven organizations. He is a long- time resident of Providence.
