The Cincinnati Board of Education and the Cincinnati Federation of Teachers have reached an “agreement in principle” on a new three-year contract.
The agreement came three hours before a scheduled one-day strike and marked the end of four months of heated negotiations over salary, benefits, and a variety of educational-improvement issues. (See Education Week, Feb. 20, 1985.)
In addition to granting teachers a 17-percent wage increase over three years, the board of education agreed to: limit class size; allow teachers to appeal a principal’s decision to change a student’s grade; and pilot a two-year project on teacher-performance evaluations, similiar to one now being used in Toledo.
The federation represents approximately 3,000 teachers in the 50,000-student district.
The Freshie Company, which provides school meals for the School District of Philadelphia, might have overcharged the district by $2.9 million between 1981 and 1984, a school official has charged.
Frederick B. Wookey Jr., the district’s deputy superintendent for administrative services, made the statement in a deposition based on the preliminary findings of an internal school-district audit that has not been made public, according to J. William Jones, a district spokesman.
Repeated calls last week to the food-services company for comment drew no response.
The audit was ordered by Constance E. Clayton, superintendent of schools, after a controversy arose6when Freshie was awarded the dis-trict’s food-service contract over the low bidder, ARA Services Inc. (See Education Week, May 23, 1984.)
The education committee of the Idaho House of Representatives has agreed to take no action for at least one year to repeal a 1983 law that requires high-school students to have a C average in English and mathematics in order to graduate, according to Clint Hoopes, the former chairman of the state board. (See Education Week, May 9, 1984.)
The committee agreed to the proposal at the request of the state board, said Mr. Hoopes, who stepped down last month from the board after 10 years of service. The requirements will affect this year’s 9th graders, who will be the graduating class of 1988.
“A high-school diploma doesn’t mean anything if students do not have skills in these areas,” Mr. Hoopes said.
Kansas City, Mo., school officials have complied with a federal district judge’s order and filed a new desegregation plan that does not call for the merger of the predominantly black city district with 11 largely white suburban districts.
The school officials, however, presented U.S. District Judge Russell Clark on Feb. 19 with a document outlining the new plan’s shortcomings and advocating the merger proposal.
On Jan. 10, the district presented a plan to Judge Clark calling for the city school system’s consolidation with the suburban districts. The judge rejected the plan 10 days later, saying that it went far beyond his September 1984 ruling that state and city school officials were responsible for segregation in the district. (See Education Week, Jan 30, 1985.)
