Oct 20, 2021 | Blog
When we fight, we win!! And that is just what Education Support Professionals (ESPs) from around Colorado did at the bargaining table this year! From substantial increases in hourly pay rates to adding security guards and preschool staff to bargaining units, ESPs flexed their collective muscle to achieve these gains.
Boulder Valley Paraeducators Association negotiated a $15 minimum hourly rate, a 16.9% increase over the previous minimum, along with additional safety protocols and a district commitment to begin hiring resource paraeducators for the first time in 10 years.
ESPs in Westminster continue to be paid the highest in the state, with a 2-year financial settlement that grants steps plus 3% each year, meaning that bus drivers and special needs paraeducators will top out at over $33 an hour. ESP and certified staff benefit from the wall-to-wall structure of the Westminster Education Association.
Pueblo County Education Association, a wall-to-wall local that includes ESPs, completely restructured their ESP salary schedule. “All ESP received a very good increase and are getting paid extra for their educational hours and degrees,” said Donna Raught, Spanish Peaks UniServ director. Their new base pay is based on the positions they hold and allows them to move on the schedule with steps and longevity.
Pueblo Education Support Professionals Association, the Pueblo School District 60 local that represents clerical and early childhood educators, was able to bargain security guards into their Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). All employees are getting a 5.2% increase this year and a 4.8% increase for the 2022-2023 school year. There are 14 security guards and 13 have already joined PESPA.
The Association of Custodial and Maintenance Employees – Pueblo D60 bargained a step equal to 2.75% and a 3% COLA for a 5.75% increase for 2021-2022; and for 2022-2023 they will be getting a step and the equivalent of a 4.8% increase.
Pueblo Paraprofessional Education Association also bargained a step equal to 2.5% and a 3% COLA for the 2021-2022 school year.
The Trinidad Education Association that represents ESP staff are still in negotiation with the district, but they have agreed on compensation, Raught reports. The ESP are getting a new schedule that has a great base pay for each category of employee along with a step increase, Raught said. Their increases range from $700 on up to $5000, depending on the position. They also are getting longevity bonuses for years of service. ESPs were able to fight to keep their agreement and union when the board of education challenged the agreement. The employees organized and had support from the community and other labor unions to keep their agreements.
The Jeffco Education Support Professionals Association (JESPA) welcomed a new school year with no employee making less than $15/hour, preschool workers enjoying union protection under the Collective Bargaining Agreement, and increased access to information about their rights as workers.
JESPA won a $15 minimum wage for all bargaining unit employees, an increase of $2.50/hour for the starting wage for the lowest paid workers (parapros, food service), with all other job categories increasing all cells by $0.75/hour. Combined with winning two steps, the lowest paid JESPA workers will see $3.70 more per hour, which is a 30% increase to their hourly wages.
The new Preschool Article for the JESPA CBA includes contract language related to classroom supplies, professional development specific to preschool, pay for required PD, better communication to all ESP job titles from the Early Learning Office, and a collaborative committee made up of preschool teachers from JESPA and JCEA with administration. The agreement includes compensation of a new schedule starting at $15 per hour, 2 step increases and COLA of $0.75 per hour.
ESPs in the East Grand County Education Association won a 16% pay increase for ESPs, with increases ranging from $2.20/hour to as much as $4.85/hour. The lowest minimum hourly rate is now $15.60/hour.
As we begin a new school year, ESPs continue to power up and forge ahead at the bargaining table and beyond, supporting students, staff, schools and public education!
Jennifer Latham is a paraeducator and member of the Durango ESPA and the CEA.
Oct 20, 2021 | Blog
The Colorado Education Association’s Growth, Leadership, & Union Engagement (GLUE) program is a year-round, three phase program that teaches rank and file members and emerging leaders foundational organizing skills. When members utilize organizing skills in order to solve issues in their school district and state, they will win better public schools and create a stronger CEA in which members see themselves as the union. The program focuses on training, practice, coaching, and check-in’s with CEA Zone Organizers. GLUE participants engage in one-on-one conversations with members and potential members about specific issues that affect their school, students, and districts in order to achieve a win that builds the union and its members.
This year, CEA hosted 19 members from five locals across the state for phase one of the GLUE program Jun. 14 – Aug. 13. Phase one of the program focused on foundational organizing skills in order to build power and strength for their local union, such as solidifying one-on-one conversational skills, how to identify leaders, how to identify issues, and new member recruitment. Local staff and leaders helped their members in the program acquire potential member and new hire lists, worked with local teams on planning, and provided membership materials in order for member organizers in Ed Summer to successfully recruit new members and host successful new employee events.
The ongoing pandemic once again required us to use a combination of virtual and in-person training in order to keep our members safe. While virtual training helped make training easier to access for members across the metro area, it also made it difficult to build relationships with the members in the program. Training sessions were held twice a week, allowing members time to practice new skills in between sessions. This allowed us to go into more depth and cover more content since we broke a week of training into smaller parts. Additionally it created more frequent and regular times from members across locals to come together, building more relationships across local unions.
GLUE members were on committees in their locals to help or lead the organizing effort for their local union’s new employee events and they spent the summer phone banking other members and potential members. Due to the ease of accessibility, members were able to phone bank on their own schedule, regardless of if they were at home or traveling. Phone banking has been proven to be one of the easiest tools to do member outreach, especially during the summer, allowing members to make and receive calls regardless of their schedule.
Finally, GLUE members were able to engage with more of their colleagues across the state through CEA’s Professional Practice Program Speaker Series. Members attended “Creating a Place to Thrive: The BIPOC Experience” hosted by Denver Classroom Teachers Association members Kevin Adams and Gerardo Munoz from “Too Dope Teachers and a Mic” podcast.
Christine Wiggins is a Director of Organizing and Capacity Building in CEA’s Center for Organizing.
Oct 20, 2021 | Blog
When I applied to work in Jeffco School District’s Preschool, I intended to immerse myself in the classroom to see if I would enjoy teaching. I never would have envisioned that within my second year, I would be fighting to join the union. There wasn’t really one thing that made me feel like I wanted representation, instead the reason behind my motivation was more due to an ongoing build-up of unacceptable working conditions for both myself and the kids in my classroom. It was the lack of direction, organization and communication from the Early Learning Office; our inadequate class budgets and the expectation for teachers to pay for supplies out of our own pockets; my kids eating off copy paper on the dirty floor during the height of COVID-19; and after being ignored by the Early Learning Office for months, being told indirectly that I would be called on to sub in any classroom around the district during the most dangerous point of the pandemic.
The disrespect, isolation, and suppression that I felt, along with watching my students endure conditions that could’ve been avoided, pushed me to reach out to the teachers’ union. I knew that they did not represent classified staff, but I pled with them to let me in anyway. While I waited for a response and debated quitting my job, I sent out an email over the district’s preschool distribution list, hoping to find anyone else in preschool who felt as fed up and frustrated as I did. The responses that I received shocked me. There were preschool educators all over the district who shared their stories with me. Many of these stories felt familiar, but many of them were much worse than my experience. I started by fighting for myself and my students, but by this point I was fighting for the preschool educators across the district.
Alizay Furtado, an organizer from the Jefferson County Education Support Professionals Association (JESPA), reached out and told me that they wanted to create a new chapter for preschool, but first a majority of support from our work group was needed. JESPA staff and I canvassed schools and through that process, I came to meet six of the strongest women I’ve ever known: Nikki Wilson, Tonya Toller, Morgan Canjar, Sarah Smith, Carrol Barreras, and Kathleen Mess. Each represented countless other educators who felt unheard, bullied, scared, fed up, and angry at the state of their work environments. Together we created an unstoppable organizing team of delegates that we jokingly named “The Pre-K 7”. With JESPA’s help, we stuffed envelopes, met with preschool teachers, and made phone calls seeking others who wanted to join our fight. Within a few months we had enough signed union cards to present majority support to our new superintendent.
Getting recognized was a much more complicated task than any of us had imagined and to top it off, we only had a few weeks left in the school year to get it done. We were met with one roadblock after another, but each time we encountered resistance, Alizay and our delegate team would power through by marching, rallying, and teaming up with Coloradans for the Common Good who helped us connect to educators, parents, community leaders, and school board members. The most common thing we heard from preschool educators was that they felt unheard and neglected by the district so you can imagine how powerful it felt to find out that our supporters were flooding voicemails and sending hundreds of emails to district officials demanding that they recognize preschool educators. In the end, we were forced into an election that was held over the last days of the school year. Within the first six hours of the election, we gained majority support of our work group and by the end of the election, we had a supermajority. On Jun. 6, the Jefferson County Public Schools school board voted to recognize preschool educators.
Sitting on the brink of watching preschool educators written into the JESPA contract, I find myself feeling hopeful. The fight for fair working conditions and good learning environments for our students is never-ending and my biggest hope is that more educators and support staff join a fight of their own. Of course, the more people that join the union, the stronger we become, but I hope every person that feels devalued working in a school district starts to speak up. I can’t fully explain the transformation I have experienced by standing up and saying enough is enough, but I can say that I no longer feel unheard. I have found an entire community of influential people who care about improving the school district for both the employees and the students. I would love for more people to experience this reality. As far as preschool goes, those educators can achieve anything they put their minds to and I have no doubt that with the power of our union, they will continue to move mountains for years to come.
Hannah Mauro is an Early Childhood Instructional Partner in Jefferson County and proud member of JESPA.
Feb 20, 2021 | Blog
Billion dollar gaps in public education funding. Postponing standardized testing for this year. Accountability. Private school vouchers. COVID-19 safety. These are just a few of the challenges educators are facing right now. The 2021 Legislative Session is back in full swing and there’s never been a better time for CEA members to collectively rise up to advocate for the schools students and educators deserve. One way members can do that is by participating in back home lobbying; engaging with their legislators and letting them know they should be listening to the true experts in public education: the professionals in the classroom. Back home lobbying also helps build deep and authentic relationships between local elected officials and constituents. Legislators need to know about the issues that matter most to students, parents, educators and communities.
Lobbying is a way to share personal stories and solutions with elected officials to increase their understanding about a specific issue educators care about. Engaging elected officials through meetings, writing letters, making phone calls, attending and hosting events, ensures educator voice is heard to support students, communities and the education profession. Lobbying is a way for educators, students, parents, and community members to share personal stories and to advocate for a particular bill or issue on behalf of public education.
There are many things members can do to lobby elected official including including meeting one-on-one with them or with a group (keeping social distancing in mind, of course), hosting or participating a virtual town hall event, engaging with them on social media, and writing an op-ed or letter to the editor to the local paper to shine light on the public education issues that matter most. Contact your local association to find out their plan for lobbying local elected officials this legislative session.
You are difference makers and lobbying elected officials couldn’t be easier. The only requirements are to be knowledgeable and passionate about public education and the issues that affect you, your students and your classroom, bus, cafeteria, etc. Elected officials are normal people and they want to hear from you. Always remember the legislator’s job is to represent you.
Oct 19, 2020 | Press
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 19, 2020
Colorado Education Association Holds Virtual Get Out the Vote Rally Ahead of 2020 Election
CEA’s 39,000 members reaffirm their commitment to pro-public education agenda
DENVER – The Colorado Education Association (CEA) held a virtual Get Out the Vote (GOTV) rally on Friday, Oct. 16, to call on members to vote in the upcoming 2020 election. The CEA also reaffirmed their commitment to electing pro-public education candidates and voting for pro-public education ballot measures and local mill levy and bond races.
“This really is the most important election of our lifetime,” said Amie Baca-Oehlert, high school counselor and president of the Colorado Education Association.“The future of public education hinges on this election. Every race, from president all the way down the ballot, is important in shaping the future of public education for years to come and securing desperately needed COVID-19 relief now.”
“We will not consent or concede to anything‚Ķanything that threatens our democratic rights,” said Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association.“This is the work that we have been called to do together.”
Among the featured speakers were Baca-Oehlert, Pringle, CEA Vice President Kevin Vick, Weld Central Education Association member and CEA Fund Vice-Chair Jerad Sutton, Aurora Education Association member Byran Lindstrom, Aspen Education Association member Marnie White, District Twelve Education Association President Dave Lockley, Cherry Creek Education Association member Robin Balogh, Jefferson County Education Association Jon Cefikin, Pueblo County Education Association President Amy Spock, Johnstown-Milliken Education Association Co-Presidents Patsy Burenheide and Valerie Stumpf, Colorado Board of Education candidates Lisa Escarcega (CD-1), Mayling Simpson (CD-3), and Karla Esser (CD-7), Rep. Jason Crow (CD-6), US House of Representatives candidate Diane Mitsch-Bush (CD-3), Colorado State Senate candidates District Twelve Education Association member Paula Dickerson (HD-25) and Chris Kolker (SD-27), and Colorado State House Candidate Lindsey Daugherty (HD-29).
CEA leaders and members spoke about and introduced the candidates and ballot measures that public education advocates are supporting this election season. Baca-Oehlert also provided attendees a glimpse of the potential consequences if CEA’s recommended candidates, ballot initiatives and local elections aren’t successful on election night.
“This school year in Colorado we’re facing a record $1.18 billion deficit in public education funding, on top of the more than $9 billion withheld from students and educators over the last decade,” added Baca-Oehlert.“We need everyone to vote and make their voices heard.”
About the Colorado Education Association
The Colorado Education Association is a membership-based organization that represents 39,000 Colorado educators. The CEA promise to our students and communities is that the members of the Association will lead the way in guaranteeing every student access to the best public education. By working collectively with all education stakeholders, we will provide the best public education for every student and assure Colorado’s standing as an excellent state in which to learn, live, work, and raise a family.
###
