District Fights to Shortchange ECE Teachers on Their Pay

Union Takes Case Before an Arbitrator

In 2018, Emmanuel Francouis, a veteran SDEA member and Early Childhood Education teacher noticed a peculiar discrepancy in his pay. Despite being employed by SDUSD for over 30 years he was not receiving his longevity pay. That didn’t make sense, so he worked with his SDEA AR and Contract Specialist to determine if there was something wrong with his situation. What they discovered unearthed a systemic underpayment system by SDUSD for veteran ECE teachers and it kicked off an excessively litigious grievance between the union and SDUSD.

In the 2019 round of bargaining, the union won longevity pay for all regular SDEA unit members. However, for ECE teachers that longevity pay had been in the contract going back at least two decades. In 2016, the union won a change to the contract that allowed ECE teachers to get to the top of the salary schedule by year 17, thereby guaranteeing higher career earnings. This change also aligned the ECE pay with that of other SDEA members who also topped out at 17 steps.

When that change occurred, the District unilaterally decided the longevity pay that was in place for many decades for ECE teachers would cease to be paid in addition to the regular salary of ECE teachers.  Instead the district paid the longevity on Steps 16 and 17 of the ECE salary schedule. This seemingly benign change meant that a group of teachers who are the lowest paid SDEA members, and predominately made up of women of color, were now being shortchanged in some cases over $200 a month of pay that they were due from the District. That’s because the District is arguing that an unwritten practice somehow allows them to roll the longevity pay for this group, and this group only, into the regular steps of the contract. A practice that other higher compensated SDEA members do not have to live under.

After Mr. Francouis discovered this discrepancy he filed a grievance, and so began a 3-year grievance saga that was finally heard by an arbitrator last month. Although the grievance was initially filed in August of 2018, the District’s legal and labor relations offices, which have inexplicably grown despite the overall size of the District shrinking, took many steps to try to ensure that the grievance didn’t make it before a neutral arbitrator.

SDEA, working with a CTA attorney, was successful in getting the matter before an arbitrator last month. A decision on the case is expected in November; however, Mr. Francouis, the member who first discovered the contract violation, passed away in the intervening years since the grievance was started.