Proposals target teachers, schools

By Rob Howard
Associate Editor

Oklahoma teachers have been fighting legislation that would gut their income, their retirement security, their benefits and employee rights and funding for their schools. Teacher pay in Oklahoma is 48^th or 49^th lowest in the nation, depending on which set of statistics you use.

Probably the worst of these bills is SB 1187, authored by Sen. Clark Jolley (R-Edmond). The bill would let school districts submit “a request to the State Board of Education for an exemption from all statutory requirements and State Board of Education rules from which charter schools are exempt, as provided for in the Oklahoma Charter Schools Act.

It was bad enough that Jolley’s bill as originally written would eliminate the need to evaluate teachers, take away due process rights for dismissed education support employees and remove the obligation of school districts to negotiate with school employee unions.

But any piece of legislation can be made worse if you really try hard enough. When the Senate Committee on Education took up the bill, they amended it to eliminate all the requirements governing schools. The amended bill, passed on to the Senate floor by a vote of 9-4, would allow districts to do the following:

1. Eliminate the teacher's minimum salary schedule.
2. Eliminate the requirement for school districts to participate in the Oklahoma Teacher's Retirement System (OTRS).
3. Eliminate school district provided health insurance.
4. Eliminate criminal background checks on school employees.
5. Eliminate teacher evaluation and due process protections.
6. Eliminate payroll deduction.
7. Eliminate due process protections for support staff.
8. Eliminate all certification requirements for all school district positions.
9. Eliminate negotiations between a school district and employees.
10. Eliminate student curriculum requirements.
11. Eliminate required continuing education for local board of education members.

Elaboration may be unnecessary, but here goes – a district could hire an unqualified person to teach, with no limits on curriculum, for as little as they could pay, with no benefits, no background check, and fire them at will.

Senators Brecheen, Halligan, Jolley, Quinn, Shaw, Smalley, Stanislawski, Thompson and Ford, all Republicans, voted Aye on the bill. Senators Dossett, Garrison, Paddack, all Democrats and Sharp, a Republican voted No.

Ironically, Sen. Jolley’s website bio says, “In the State Senate, Clark has also been a leader in the fight to stop Obamacare, promote positive changes in our education system, enact meaningful tort reform and implement true workers compensation reforms.

It would be a disaster if this bill became law. And terrible enough if it were the only attack on teachers and education. But it’s not; there are plenty of others and it’s not just the legislature in on the game.

State Treasurer Ken Miller has proposed moving the teacher retirement system from a “Defined Benefit” system, to a “Defined Contribution” plan. Under the current defined benefit system, teachers get a monthly retirement check based on their pay and years of service. The check comes every month for the rest of their life.

Under a defined contribution plan, the state makes an annual contribution to each teachers retirement account. It would be more like a 401(k) plan. When the teacher retires, all they get is the money in that account. It could be more, or less than the total contributed, depending on the performance of the plan’s investments. And when the money is gone, the monthly checks stop. Similar plans have driven retirees into poverty as the securities markets go up and down.

Back in the legislature, multiple bills support the issuance of vouchers for private school and approved home school-related expenses. Oklahoma State School Board Association (OSSBA) Executive Director Shawn Hime wrote that, “Upon full implementation in 14 years, the estimated annual impact to common education is $250 million. For school districts, this amounts to $363 less funding per student.”

$250 million less a year for public education.

When you say private schools, many of us think that includes religious schools, but the state constitution prohibits the use “of public monies or property for sectarian or religious purposes.” There are at least four proposals in the legislature to remove this restriction from the constitution.

SB 1392 would remove funding for school districts from the Motor Vehicle Fund. Most of us probably didn’t know it, but schools currently receive 36 percent of this fund. The percentage would decrease each year until zeroed out in 2017.

Another favorite of legislators is to attempt to force consolidation of school districts on the assumption it would reduce administrative costs because it would be “more efficient.” Some research on the issue by Augenblick, Palaich and Associates shows that “there is no single number [of students] that will guarantee districts to operate at their most efficient level economically or educationally.”

There were at least 71 bills dealing with education proposed in the legislature this year. Some of them may be good. But for the most part, it appears that some legislators simply want to destroy education in Oklahoma.

For more on this topic, see The Gayly’s February front-page story, “Would you be a teacher for a soul sucking $8.66 an hour?” It is available online at http://www.gayly.com/would-you-be-teacher-soul-sucking-866-hour.

The Gayly – February 25, @ 12:05 p.m.