Members of United Teachers Los Angeles have approved a new contract with the Los Angeles school district that includes a 2 percent raise retroactive to July 1 of last year. The vote brings an end to negotiations that have gone on for more than a year and a half.
Fifty-four percent of the ballots cast were in favor of the terms of the contract, which covers the three-year period from July 1, 2003, to the end of June 2006.
The 26,428 ballots cast represent a voter turnout of about 61 percent of the members of UTLA, which is an affiliate of both the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers. The board of education for the school district also approved the agreement at its April 26 meeting.
The contract changes the way academic coaches are selected for schools; reduces faculty meetings by three, to no more than 30 in a school year and no more than four per month; and eliminates “learning walks” in which administrators or their appointees routinely visited classrooms to see whether teachers were clearly and consistently communicating academic expectations to students.