Union Takes Stand Against Unreasonable Clause in Teacher Contract

“Employee’s salary includes consideration for all assigned duties, responsibilities, and tasks, regardless of the actual number of days (including weekends and days designated as “holiday” on the District duty schedule) that the Employee works during the contract period.”

The Federation’s position is that the document fails to meet basic legal requirements of a contract, that educators are have no way to know how much they will be expected to work in the upcoming year or how much they will be paid, even after they lose the unilateral right to resign (the unilateral right for every teacher to resign occurs 45 days prior to the start of school), usually around the second week of July. Based on this contract, an educator could in effect be required to work anywhere from 187 to theoretically 360 days and that an amendment to the days worked could actually create a situation where the district would fail to meet state minimum salary requirements.

A previous legal precedent has already been set.

Texas AFT General Counsel Martha Owen Cites North East ISD v. Kelley, the Commissioner of Education and the Texas Education Agency

 

Kelley was contesting North East ISD’s attempt to enforce a ten month contract by forcing him to work an extra day and the District’s ability to modify the number of workdays an educator was required to work beyond the 187 days originally published in the District’s calendar.

 

The Hearing Officer noted that both the District and the Federation acknowledged that the Kelley case could have an effect on the disposition of this grievance.

 

On December 9, 2010, the Third Court of Appeals in a 2-1 decision, held that “the North East ISD’s work and salary schedules were incorporated by reference into the educator contract and that the contract required the educator to work only those number of days as designated by the calendar during the contract period.”