In the spring of 2006, Garcia visited Alex Green and Inglewood elementary schools and told them of fantastically large bonuses in store for them the next year if they could get test scores up. Details were lacking; in fact at first it was going to be an apparent gift without clear standards of who would be eligible for the awards. MNEA leaders pointed out the need for negotiating compensation. So within the Educational Agreement was placed a Memorandum of Understanding which required a joint committee to flesh out the details for a vote. MNEA representatives were browbeaten into a less than ideal proposal on the basis that "the anonymous donor" would not fund awards that really had a chance of success. So the vote was set for late September and early October--a vote which involved all MNEA members.
The MNEA leaders did not point out to the general membership that all teachers had received less than inflationary raises for the past three years. Despite what Bill Purcell claimed was record increases in the Metro school budget, teachers had been held to the minimum pay increases required by state law. Generally, merit pay proposals are designed to distract the community from the reality that all teachers need to be paid appropriately. While leaders suspected the hidden agenda, they did not do one thing to advance the idea with the teachers before the vote. Likewise, the schools involved were not criticized. This was a favor to the administration.
One principal, potentially able to get a $10,000 bonus, is widely known as one of the most brutalizing in all the elementary schools. Indeed, compared to the size of her faculties, she has recommended against the tenure of more teachers than any other. Many a young educator had her career ended by being sent to this principal's school. Any non-tenured teacher with these new higher stakes would be almost a sacrificial lamb to the greed and the glee with which she would crack the whip trying to get teachers to put more hours on the job and lose more sleep at night. Her school was one of the first, years ago, to abolish nap time for kindergarten and the little ones still fall asleep in the afternoon trying to labor over dry workbook pages. Visiting her school is like a trip into a Charles Dickens novel. You have to scan many a child's face before you can see a smile.
If the proposal had been adequately explained to the teachers, recognizing the difficulty of being even handed in promoting one side or the other, the vote would have been far more one-sided in the negative than it was with minimal publicity. Most teachers, not being directly involved, did not think about the issue. If, as the administration's publicity following the vote claimed, this was truly an pilot program for merit pay, more teachers would have paid attention. Merit pay on the state level did much harm to teachers' salaries, compared to inflation, from about 1985 to about 1992. Many community people prefer not to believe merit pay is a plan to suppress salaries, but teachers have to make a living, and their leaders cannot overlook past history.
The resulting low voter turnout was a surprise to all. If the vote had been positive, the administration would not have complained. After all, the votes ratifying the Educational Agreement are often quite low. But since Pedro Garcia did not get what he wanted, he decided to go for the cheap shots. Then he wanted to pillory the general MNEA membership as being unworthy to vote on a proposal which only involved two schools. Finally, he brought up his usual claim that MNEA does not really represent teachers.
One identifying tag on all the publicity of the week indicates that it was orchestrated from central office. Quotations during the week from Steve Glover, Kay Simmons, Marsha Warden, and Pam Garrett included the phrase that "MNEA leaders were hurting children"--apparently by not approving more money for teachers. Only five months earlier, or seven months into the future, the school board members will say the opposite. That is, that the teacher quest for income that covers losses caused by inflation will be "selfish" and "hurt children." Logic has no place here. It is a constant Public Relations refrain which comes from Garcia's Administration, that somehow what he and his California friends want, "helps children" but whatever the MNEA and the teachers propose "hurts" children.
If MNEA leaders are forced into another vote, teachers need to pay close attention to heretofore unmentioned items. Teachers salaries, overall have fallen behind inflation, compared to 2003 or compared to 1999. Why emphasize the salaries of a few at the expense of the many? Secondly, the theory is that by making "up to $6,000" available as a bonus, it will cause experienced and presumably "good" teachers to volunteer to go to Alex Green and Inglewood. But looking at what it would take, a 20 percent increase in test scores over the whole grade level, it is a bonus that is unrealistic to say the least. What teacher would leave a so-called good school to go to a school with the degree of problems and brutal administration that exists in these places? The point is somewhat moot, because transfers are not allowed this year anyway! So how does this more money for teachers translate into a benefit for students? Finally, the bonuses go for three years. But even if spectacular gains are possible on the front end (this year) they will be impossible to sustain. So there will be no bonuses beyond a few at the $2,000 rate. For this they think they will lure better teachers into these schools?
Thank goodness for union democracy. Let an informed vote take place again. The people of the town will see how the rank and file teachers feel. The result will likely be much more hostile to the California crowd than the diplomatic MNEA leaders.
The source of the elusive money turns out to be the Anne Potter Wilson Foundation. The money has not been donated to the Nashville Alliance for Public Education, it has only been offered. So the strings attached, creating bad publicity for the MNEA, is part of a plot to embarrass the local union and give the various Tennessean columnists ammunition to try to get teachers to "kick out MNEA." Much of the money for this foundation came from Justin Potter, nicknamed "Jet" Potter, a fanatical enemy of the United Mine Workers of America specifically and organized labor in general. He gave more money in 1960 to the challenger of our Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver than any other individual. Possibly it was Kefauver's reelection which caused Potter to have such anger that led to his death in 1961.
Calculating the best reasonable case scenario for the potential awards, teachers in the schools might see $200,000 for one year and lesser amounts in the next two years. So it is not a 1.2 million dollar gift that has been advertised. It is funny money which is less than half that amount. Plus the money is not even in the bank, and may never be.
Teachers were caught up in a pay-for-performance plan back in the mid-1990s. The teachers did their part. The money was never given. This looks like another example of great promises with little or no actual payments to the teachers involved.