SPED Organizing Leads to District Caseload Proposal, Supt. Forum Postponed

Our collective organizing to address the understaffing of Special Education is working, thanks to you and the pressure educators and parents have put on the District. In response to our organizing, the District has made a new proposal to SDEA to negotiate over the caseloads of Resource Specialists and Mild-Moderate Ed. Specialists. What the district is proposing is nowhere near what we need to address the SpEd understaffing issues our members and students are dealing with; however, it is an opening to possible real improvements.

To that end, we are rescheduling the forum with Supt. Marten that was scheduled for February 28^th and will instead use that time to discuss the District’s proposal and get input from you (and parents) on a response that will result in real improvements for Special Education educators and students.

The forum with Supt. Marten will be re-scheduled for late March, to allow for negotiations to take place. It is still critical that Supt. Marten face parents and teachers, but she now has a chance to show her commitment to Special Education by directing her staff to negotiate real improvements in Special Education staffing.

If you invited parents to attend the Supt. Marten Forum you can let them know about the meeting change and that they are welcome to attend and discuss the district’s proposal.

The District’s request to negotiate (link to proposal) includes a plan to have:

• One caseload number for both Resource Specialists and Mild-Moderate Ed. Specialists.
• A caseload cap for the new positions and compensation for caseload overages.
• Monitoring systems to ensure caseload adherence.

Make no mistake, the initial proposal from the District is not good enough! However, it is a response to our organizing and an opportunity to address caseload language in our contract now. We must keep the pressure up on the District leadership to make them realize adequate change will only come from adequate staffing.

In addition to the repurposed meeting this upcoming Thursday, there will also be additional opportunities for impacted SDEA members to give their input on the District’s proposal. These additional meetings will be held on Tuesday, March 5 and Thursday, March 7.

Sign up here to attend one of the SDEA Special Education Union Meetings to be held at the SDEA Building located at 10393 San Diego Mission Road, Suite 100 San Diego, CA 92108:

a.       Thur. February 28, 2019 – 4:00-5:30pm (open to parents)

b.       Tues. March 5, 2019 – 3:30-4:30pm

c.       Thur. March 7, 2019 – 4:15-5:15pm