Complete Colorado reported yesterday that the Jefferson County Education Association (JCEA) has filed suit against the Jeffco Board of Education for allegedly approving a temporary compensation plan for new teachers, those with master’s degrees, and those applying for hard-to-fill positions. In case you didn’t fully digest that, JCEA is suing the Jeffco School Board for giving teachers pay raises. Apparently, this move (to actually get teachers hired for the 2015-2016 school year) runs afoul of Proposition 104, which requires union negotiations to be done in public.
Hang on, we’re catching our breath from laughing. So, now the teachers union is for Proposition 104? When it spent $44,000 opposing it last year? Teachers, you may want to get your money back because blowing $44,000 on an issue the union was against before it was for it is an obscene waste of money.
Even funnier – it was a unanimous vote by the Jeffco Board, meaning that this vote also belongs to union pets Lesley Dahlkemper and Jill Fellman.
The Jeffco teachers union has seen steadily decreasing membership numbers over the past few years. So, a pay increase (again) offered by the horrible board majority to teachers not yet indoctrinated to the hate and venom spewed by the Jeffco teachers union threatens its very existence. And Jeffco teacher Don Cameron, who is probably not going to be terribly popular after teachers read what he had to say about pay, confirmed these suspicions via Complete:
“Cameron said the board needed to stop focusing on compensation and start focusing on class size, workload, benefits, working conditions, autonomy and creating a holistic and good working relationship with teachers. He implied that current teachers would not work collaboratively with new hires.”
Mr. Cameron appears to teach science, not econ, so we’ll cut him some slack here. There is only one reason that people work – it’s to get paid. That’s how the system works. Goods and/or services (like teaching) are exchanged for payment. While the items he outlined certainly are important, why on earth would any teacher suggest the board stop focusing on compensation for teachers? This is especially important as last year was the first year teachers received a raise in years.
A couple of weeks ago Colorado Education Association president Kerrie Dallman suggested that all teachers do the same job and should be paid the same. We questioned who the union was representing if not teachers (who we assume would like to be paid more)? We have to ask the question again. If the teachers union is suing to block the board of education from giving teachers raises, exactly who is this teachers union representing?