MEMORANDUM

Memo To:   All Buffalo Teachers

From:         Philip Rumore, President, BTF

Date:          May 1, 2020

Subject:     Updates

THOUGHTS FOR TODAY 

• Simply be, rather than do, for a moment.
• Happiness is a inside job.
• One good thing about egoists:  They don’t talk about other people.
• How do they get deer to cross the road only at those yellow road signs?

SCHOOL CLOSINGS
When there is talk about Buffalo School closings, what is obviously meant is school buildings being closed for students and staff.

At this point, especially the conditions in Erie County, many believe it would be an unacceptable risk and danger to have students and staff return to school buildings before the scheduled end on June 26, 2020.

While Distance Learning has been extremely difficult and hard on teachers, students and parents, it would be wrong to expose anyone to the risk of catching the virus.

The Superintendent asked for our support of a letter he was sending to State officials calling on them to keep schools (buildings) closed until the end of the school year.  Attached (Click Here), please find a letter of support that I sent him.  Note I included that if conditions changed, the closure could be reconsidered.  Also attached is correspondence he sent to the BPTO.

If the link is not clickable, please copy and paste the following link in to your web browser. http://www.btfny.org/email/2020/5120_school_closing.pdf  

Hopefully, you agree with my letter of support.  If not, I apologize --  it seemed what is in the interest of all – teachers, students, parents, our community.
 
THE SCHOOL YEAR / OUR CONTRACT
As of this date, we will have worked four (4) days in excess of the 188-day maximum in our contract if we are to report until June 26, 2020.  This would, obviously, require that teachers receive their salary for the four (4) extra days. 

If the “school year”, last day for teachers to report, ends in compliance with our contract (ends earlier), there is no problem.  Be assured, if necessary, we will take appropriate action.

As previously stated, if the District seeks to extend the school year, it would need to modify our contract.  We would insist that any additional service or summer school be voluntary and be at an agreed upon salary.

Once again, any such agreement would have to be approved by the Executive Committee, Council of Delegates and most importantly you.

DISTANCE LEARNING CONCERNS

• We are still awaiting answers to questions you and we have forwarded to the Superintendent many of which relate to privacy concerns.

Copies of all correspondence to the Superintendent, Board and all teachers are on our website www.btfny.org. Click on “Latest News”, ”News & Alerts”.

Please advise me if any of the following are occurring: (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).

• Principals (Building Administrators) are requiring that they be included in your Schoolology lessons.

While we understand their interest, we consider it a new term and condition of employment that must be negotiated.

• Building administrators making unreasonable demands.  They don’t have 1/100th the amount of work and pressure that you have.  Some have realized that.  Too many don’t.

MARKS / GRADES
They distributed a document “Buffalo Public Schools – Instruction Guidance during Period of Extended Closure”.

Among the questions raised by teachers are those relating to pages 12-15 “Graduating Guidance for Teachers”.

We are unaware of teacher involvement in this section.  Please review and provide your positives as
well as your concerns (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).

We would have hoped that the District would have provided all teachers with an opportunity to provide input prior to publishing this document.  There are excellent parts; however, why not ask
for input from those doing the job?

Sorry, forget where we are.

RETIREMENT
The District had initially refused to accept retirement letters with June 26, 2020 or wording, if earlier.  Don’t ask!       

They have now agreed to accept them.  You need not re-submit them.

MEMORANDUM

Memo To:   All Buffalo Teachers

From:         Philip Rumore, President, BTF

Date:          May 11, 2020

Subject:     Virtual Graduation

The BTF Executive Committee has authorized our being a sponsor of the Virtual Graduations that will be aired on WUTV/WNYO starting in June/July. High Schools will be allowed to purchase one-half hour for $1500 or an hour for $3000.  The Executive Committee has authorized $15,000 for BTF to be a sponsor and authorized BTF to provide each participating High School with $500.00 toward their fee.
     
The source of funding for this comes from funding that will not be used to send representatives to the NYSUT and NEA Delegate Assemblies.  We believe the AFT Delegate Assembly will also be cancelled.  This should cover all costs.

Each school will develop its own video.  The station has committed to have its staff available to assist.

We assume that District Staff will be available to assist.  We have sent correspondence to the Superintendent seeking the District’s assistance and support and to see if they have any concerns.

Since other Districts will also probably want to participate, the earlier a school reserves a spot, the better will be their placement. The Virtual Graduations will air on WUTV or WNYO on Saturdays between 8:00 pm – 10:00 pm.

Attached is a sample of part of the participant document.  For more information or to reserve a “spot”, please contact:

Tamara Walter – WUTV/WNYO
Office – (716) 447-3221
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

We will provide more information as we receive it as well as any response from the District.

We want to help all of our students through these challenging times; however, we want to provide something that our High School graduates can have to remember.

Each student can make a copy of their video.  That’s not all they were looking forward to but it’s something we can do to, at least, fill part of what they missed.



PR:ls

Attachment: 1 (Click Here).  If the link is not clickable, copy and paste the following into your web browser. http://www.btfny.org/email/2020/high_school_grad.pdf

MEMORANDUM

Memo To:   Dr. Kriner Cash, Superintendent, BPS
                  Members, Buffalo Board of Education

From:         Philip Rumore, President, BTF

Date:          May 8, 2020

Subject:     Destruction of Teacher Morale

You and most City Hall Administrators, obviously, don’t know or care about the tremendous stress that teachers (and parents) are under.

Teachers are working all hours to reach out to and teach their students using platforms that are often overloaded (and which many have received little or no training), encountering great difficulty reaching students and parents via internet or phone, having their own children at home – to name a few.

Yet, those at City Hall who are not trying to work with 30 – 150 or more students under these circumstances continue to direct the already greatly stressed teachers to add additional layers of stress on them.

• Not only are teachers being asked to report the undefined “contacts” with students, this week they are being asked, on May 6, 2020, to go back to April 20, 2020 to report on May 8, 2020 said contacts.

Aside from the difficulty in determining if they are/were in contact with a student, there is no definition of “contact”.

Enclosed correspondence from Darren Brown and Principal Lynn Piccirillo – there are many similar ones. We note that Darren Brown thanks teachers for feedback. Please advise us of the names of the teachers who provided said feedback and why said document wasn’t provided to all teachers for input (“A”).

• Some administrators are writing teachers admonishing them for not meeting their (the administrators) demands for “contacts”.
• There is no explanation co-teachers who have the same class are to complete said “procedure”.
• We have been informed that the “system” was not operating on the first day of reporting.
• Some schools (#082) for example want teachers to provide “contact” information on both Schoology and this program. Some teachers, Special Ed/Speech, are already completing “contacts” on Medicaid forms.
• For a teacher who has 150-160 students, they would be making over 20 calls/day with parents receiving 5-6 different calls/day.
• A new Grading policy was implemented without teacher input or a request for teacher concerns.

o Total possible points varies for many of my students so the examples in the document are helpful but do not take into account all representations. For example, what about students who have been suspended or have exempt absences from class? Point totals for these students differ from others and will impact grades to a larger degree accordingly if denominators are locked in place.

o When I mark new assignments after 3/13 as exempt, the denominator for my point totals don’t change, nor do the actual scores of students. Will the denominators change on Saturday after the district does the final lock? Unless I missed it, I don’t see that being addressed in grading policy directions.

o Exempting, modifying, manipulating grades and values to reflect values predetermined by the district to be appropriate – Specifically page 5 states “Please be mindful, however, that while we want our students to be successful as we engage in remote learning, this Quarter 3 grading guidance should not yield increases of more than approximately 30-35%.

o Some language unclear.

o Just one of the confusing sections states “Continue to collect work and provide meaningful, affirmative feedback that students and families are experiencing. Use data from Quarters 1 and 2 to make targeted plans to support students at risk of not meeting grade level standards. Students who have had trouble connecting with the school during this period of extended closure should also be included.” How is this to be done, how do teachers determine the needs of students “who have had trouble connecting”?

LESSON PLANS

Enclosed please find just two (2) of what is being asked of teachers (there are more). One is from School #048@39, the other is from School #076. (“D”, “E”).

Indeed we have been informed that the principals at #037, #065 and #059 are asking Math and ELA teachers for a 12-minute video of each class!! This is in addition to everything else they are demanding. Since they are the same, we assume this came from City Hall (“B”, “C”).

What if a teacher is a “push in” teacher e.g., ENL with many different grades and levels.

These are but a small sample of the anger and concerns of teachers who, unlike those who promulgate these edicts, are on the front lines every day working tirelessly to educate their students under extremely difficult circumstances.

Almost every correspondence to teachers from City Hall (the District) praises the teachers, honors their work, long hours and commitment. However, to most teachers, in light of the above and previous correspondence to you, they are hypocritical, hollow and sham statements.

You, at City Hall, have no clue as to the tireless efforts they are putting forth or you wouldn’t continue to ignore them with edicts that have provided no input before being imposed on them.

Apparently, you don’t care. In addition, we have still not received a response to the correspondence sent to the District since March.

PR:ls

Enclosures: “A”, “B”, “C”,”D”, “E” (Click Here) If the link is not clickable, copy and paste the following into your web browser. http://www.btfny.org/email/2020/docs_5.8.2020.pdf

MEMORANDUM

Memo To:   All Buffalo Teachers

From:         Philip Rumore, President, BTF

Date:          July 14, 2020

Subject:     FYI - Just Released NYS Reopening Guidance

Please see the following links for NYS Reopening Guidance information.

http://www.btfny.org/email/2020/prek_to_grade_12_schools_master_guidence.pdf

http://www.nysed.gov/news/2020/state-education-department-presents-framework-guidance-reopen-new-york-state-schools

Thank you.