June10,2003

Human Resources

Negotiations

Despite our best efforts to bring you an agreement by the end of the regular school year, it did not happen. There is more work left to do to create a comprehensive package that meets the instructional goals and compensation constraints of the district. We expect to have a final agreement completed by the end of summer and before the start of school, and we anticipate setting up meeting with principals through the area quadrants to discuss the new agreement once it has been approved. See the attached memo for more information.

Student Services

Judi’s House Spanish Language Support Groups

Judi's House for grieving children and families is offering a six-week Spanish speaking support group on Thursdays, beginning in July. There is no charge to participate. Please call Tony Muniz at 720-941-0331, extension 1 for more information. Judi’s House is a place where grieving children ages 3 to 18 who have lost a parent, sibling, grandparent or friend meet to share their emotions as they move through the healing process. In support groups, children and teens meet with others their age every other week for one to two hours. Each group has no more than 15 children and is facilitated by trained volunteers and a master’s level professional with a specialty in grief support. Parents and caregivers meet in a volunteer-facilitated support group where they share their feelings and receive ideas for helping their children. Adults are not required to attend these groups but must remain at Judi’s House while their child is attending his or her own group.

PublicInformation

2003-2004 School Maps

To place orders of more than 20 copies of the updated school map, send your account number and total number of maps requested by Friday, June 27 to: . Or, call the Public Information Office at 303-764-3414. The estimated cost will be 50¢ per map. Delivery will be toward the end of July.

The 2003-2004 maps are being produced in a new size that will fit more conveniently into cars – similar to standard roadmaps. The map will include new schools, future school sites and boundary changes. Side one will show elementary school boundariesand school names, addresses and phone numbers.Side two will show middle and high school boundaries and school names, addresses and phone numbers. Charter schools and alternative schools are also shown.

School Fair

Reserve the date now!The next School Fair will be held Saturday, November 1, 2003 – well in advance of all magnet program and Choice deadlines for the 2004-2005 school year. The site is moving, too, from the PepsiCenter to the Merchandise Mart.More details to come.Please start planning now to showcase your school or program.

SuperSchool News

Thanks to those of you who indicated your interest in participating in “Super School News,” a Rocky Mountain PBS mini-television series written, illustrated and presented by fifth and sixth graders. We heard from more schools than there were opportunities available. DPS offered the opportunity to the first seven schools that applied but that had not been selected to participate in recent years. We will make sure schools receive the sign-up information again in spring 2004 when “Super School News” requests participation for the following year.

Marketing Tip of the Week

Take stock of your best PR moments of the past year. How you can make them happen more often next year?

DPS-DCTA Joint Task Force on Teacher Compensation

June Community Forum

The Joint Task Force on Teacher Compensation has canceled its June 13 Pay for Performance community forum. It will be rescheduled in August.

TUESDAYTELEGRAMARCHIVE(clickonthislink:)

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Negotiations News

District Core Bargaining Team

June 10, 2003

Negotiations will not be completed by the end of school

Despite our best efforts to bring you an agreement by the end of the regular school year, it did not happen.There is more work left to do to create a comprehensive package that meets instructional goals and compensation constraints of the District. The next scheduled meeting of the Core Negotiating teams is Tuesday, June 17.We remain optimistic that a “tentative agreement” can be reached between the negotiating teams this summer.The Board and the DCTA membership would have to approve and ratify any agreement when school returns in August.

It is anticipated that the district budget will be adopted on June 19.

While “Total Compensation” is a major issue during these negotiations, there has been a significant portion of the negotiations centered on educational initiatives and improving the working relationships between the Districts and our teachers. Projected changes to the Agreement include:

  • Removed CDM from the Agreement, changed its name to Collaborative Committee (CC), modified the scope of its duties and made it part of school board policy.We have given the teacher working conditions decisions it formerly controlled to a Professional Standards Committee (PSC) comprised of the AR, a minimum of three teachers, and the principal.It will make the professional decisions associated with issues of teacher load (lunch, schedules, allocations, # of periods, # of preparations, time taught, etc.).In the case of lunch and teacher load the decision-making process will culminate in a secret ballot vote of the faculty.The Principal will make the final decision in event of a tie or if the PSC can’t come to a consensus.The PSC basically oversees and controls certain aspects of Article 8 – Professional Standards.
  • Created a joint Instructional Issues Council (IIC) to confront problems like those associated with the roll out of the literacy program; math program; staff development efforts; teacher-leader program; cuts to social studies, arts, music, specialized services, etc.
  • Created more detailed guidelines for “partner-like” behavior to be used throughout the district
  • Rewrote the transfer process for clarification, to make it flow with the staffing process that occurs in the schools and make it consistent with CDM not being in the Agreement.The Personnel Subcommittee will now be called the Personnel Committee (PC) and is given more responsibilities
  • Created a four week “black out” period from mid June to mid July where no inservices or required training can be held whether initiated by a school or the district
  • Agreed to use the Teacher Education Fund for costs associated with preparation and testing to meet No Child Left Behind (NCLB) requirements
  • Rewrote the lesson plan language and made it more clear and consistent with the FAQ distributed last fall to principals and ARs on September 27
  • Changed the payout of the ELA-S stipend to July of the year instead of November and eliminated the requirement of continuous service to get the higher amount
  • Created a joint budget and compensation committee to work with the district on budget development for future years and confront the problems that helped to create the bleak situation this year
  • Created more options for the use of the payout of unused sick leave at retirement
  • Created a committee to prepare more options for calculating highest average salaries (HAS) when/if we merge with PERA

We expect to have a final agreement completed by the end of summer and before the start of school.We anticipate setting up meeting with Principals through the area quadrants to discuss the new agreement once it has been approved.