The Toledo school board and the Toledo Federation of Teachers last week approved a fact-finding report resolving the outstanding issues that had prevented them from reaching an agreement on an extension to the current teaching contract.
The report, which examined the 21 contractual and budgetary issues dividing the two sides, in many instances upheld the union’s arguments against eliminating particular programs.
As a result of voters’ rejection of a school-tax levy last November, the district had attempted to cut $12 million during the current school year and next to balance its budget. (See Education Week, March 6, 1991.)
If voters approve an emergency tax levy in May, however, some of the budget-cutting pressure will ease.
The union had protested the district’s proposals to suspend temporarily or eliminate several of the jointly operated school-reform projects that have brought Toledo national acclaim.
It also sought assurance during the fact-finding process that the district was committed to retaining the shared-governance provisions not only in the extended contract, which will expire on Jan. 31, but in future agreements.
The district, which argued that the union was “suffering from paranoia on this issue,” according to the report, maintained that it had no intention of dropping the governance provisions.
In making his recommendations, Jerry A. Fullmer, the fact-finder, noted that the relatively short life of the proposed contract, combined with the “financial hiatus” between the failed levy vote and the new vote, argued for the creation of “a period of as much stability as can be achieved.”
Fact-Finder’s Proposals
He recommended that the district’s nationally known intern-intervention program, in which teachers evaluate and support one another, be continued this school year and next, regardless of the outcome of the May election.
The district had proposed eliminating the program for the rest of this year and, if the levy does not pass, for the following year.
Dal Lawrence, president of the T.F.T., said the report “is quite good from our standpoint.”
“It goes a long way to redress some of the inequities that had occurred in the board’s budget list,” he added.
The fact-finder also recommended that the district not cut, among other initiatives, the district’s driver’s-education program, a mathematics and science research project being conducted by Michigan State University, and a program to prepare children for the 1st grade.
In addition, Mr. Fullmer recommended that the district’s Writing to Read computer program remain in a laboratory setting instead of being moved into regular classrooms.
The union was not successful in seeking to reopen wage negotiations if the May levy passes, however, or in preserving some stipends for teachers who supervise athletic pro-grams and fill in for school principals.
Bus Service Threatened
Over all, the fact-finder recommended that the district spend $67,658 more this school year than it had proposed. The amount would have been larger had the friction with the teachers’ union not forced the district to postpone the cuts.
Mr. Fullmer also recommended that the district proceed with its plans to save $2.4 million by eliminating its athletic and extracurricular programs next year if the tax levy fails.
Without those programs, the report recommends that the district spend $572,830 more than it had proposed for the next school year—money it suggests could be borrowed from the district’s reserve fund.
Superintendent Crystal Ellis said he was ''not disappointed” that the report recommended preserving the school-reform programs, since they were “reluctantly placed on the cost-reductions list.”
The most critical issue now facing the district is passing the tax levy so that the transportation program does not have to be cut next year, he added.
If the levy fails, in addition to wiping out athletics, the district will be forced to stop busing all high-school students who are not handicapped and will have to cut back bus service offered to elementary pupils.
“I believe if we do not have transportation in place, we’ll have a lot of high-school students who won’t be able to afford bus fare and won’t come to school,” the superintendent said. “The dropout rates and attendance rates would be affected.”