Association leaders to meet with Legislators Tuesday

Our UniServ leadership will be meeting with our Weber County Legislators Tuesday night to present some ideas on public ed funding and protecting our state retirement system from changes. Stay tuned. rick

Have a nice Turkey Day Break

Hope you enjoy the break to eat and visit with family. We will trekking northward to the cold country of Aberdeen, Idaho for good food and family time. Last week I had an early Thanksgiving Dinner (Shrimp at Red Lobster in St. George) with kids and grandkids. Nothing better than seeing the kids growing up and raising beautiful babies. Rest up, eat a lot, watch a lot of football, and enjoy the family.

Rick

Future Educators Meet at WSU

Over 150 students from as far away as Provo, are meeting today at Weber State University for breakout sessions and competitions with the Future Education Association as the sponsor. Students from Weber Ed 1010 FEA Chapter (Joan Iverson, advisor), OHS FEA Chapter (Suzy Davis, advisor) , and BLHS FEA Chapter (Mindy Knowles and Tammy Johansen-Brown, advisors) are attending. The students will gain some insight into the teaching career, while their advisors receive training also. I helped judge "Impromptu Speeches" in the competitions that were held.

Stephanie Heath, WSU College of Ed, organized the day. WSU also has a FEA chapter on campus.

Rick

Future Educators Meet at

Jordan School District Looks at more Budget Cuts

Jordan District is looking at a possible $29 million shortfall and is announcing possible budget cuts for the 2010-11 budget.

The following ideas are on the table:

• a permanent 2% pay cut for all employees
• a three day furlough
• bumping up class sizes by four students
• the elimination of programs and services

None of the districts will know their funding until after the Legislative sesssion. Lawmakers have told districts to expect anywhere from a 3 to 7 % cut next year.

Rick

Legislature Committee Looks at extending Provisional Years

A legislative committee passed a bill that would extend provisional years from three to five. We oppose this extension because it will cost more in mentoring and administrators will have to extend the evaluations out two more years. Administrators can determine whether a teacher can make it after a couple of years of evaluations.

Blog Contest

For November and December I would like you to email me (rick@ogdenweber.org) and let me know if you like the Link Newsletter sent to you by email and posted on the website (www.ogdenweber.org) or would you rather receive a paper copy. Your email entry will go into our drawing for gift cards at the January AR meetings.

Thanks Rick

Lawmaker warns of budget shortfall-Deseret News

"Things look pretty bleak," says Sen. Lyle Hillyard in today's Bob Bernick article.(http://www.deseretnews.com/)

New tax-revenue numbers will be released, along with Gov. Herbert's budget, in December.
Legislators had planned on a $850 million deficit, but it could be worse.

Districts and State Increase Teacher Codes of Conduct

Read Amy Stewart's front page story, "Are Students Safe from Predators?" at www.deseretnews.com

Both Weber and Ogden Districts are looking at beefing up the "Code of Conduct", while implementing the state's new "self-reporting" rules and background checks and fingerprinting for relicensure.

Don't be surprised if the the legislature also tackles this issue.

One instance of inappropriate behavior with students is too many, but the percentage of cases compared to the thousands of teachers and student relationships that are not inappropriate is small. Teachers are held to a high standard of trust. Any breach of that trust will reach the headlines of the newspapers and lead on the nightly news.

One new story gives the newspapers the opportunity to revisit all other past stories and gives the impression of some sort of trend. It is our hope that all teachers will continue to maintain professional relationships with their students.

Rick

More Retirement Woes...Continued

Today's Deseret News has an article by Lisa Riley Roche detailing the Interim committee on retirement's meeting yesterday. Read it at http://www.deseretnews.com/

The committee offered no recommendations, but heard four hours of testimony. They were told that the retirement system would run out of money in 30 years if the government's contribution did not increase. The good news came from the system's director, Robert Newman, who reported that the fund had earned an extra $1 Billion this year. Our Ogden Senator, Jon Greiner, raised the most concerns about the audit. He countered that it is only "one half of one percent" of employees who retire in place. (receiving their retirement, salary, and 401 K)

Read the entire article.

Rick

Legislative Audit Blasts "double-dipping" of retirees

The legislative audit of the rehiring of retirees has been released and you can read about it at http://www.deseretnews.com/ . Public Education leads with 2,121 rehirees who receive their state retirement, plus a payment to their 401 (k) program instead of payment to the URS. House Speaker Dave Clark said, "There needs to be and should be some changes." Sen. Liljenquist (Davis County), chair of the committee dealing with retirement said, "We knew it was a problem. We didn't know how deep."

Look for the next session to make some changes.

Rick

WEA Winners of the Blog Contest

Congrats to Shanna Campbell at North Ogden Jr. High, Michael Smith at Rocky Mt. Jr. High, and Bryan Hatch at Two Rivers High for winning $25.00 Smith's gift cards...to help with turkey day.
Stay tuned for December's contest. Rick

UEA Awards

Go to www.utea.org to see the nomination forms for the "Golden Apple Award" for volunteers at your school. Also look for the nomination forms for the "Great Public Schools Celebration".

State Supt. Larry Shumway Proposes Budget

Read Amy Stewart's article at www.deseretnews.com "Ed Board calls for holding line on 2010 Budget" in todays edition.
The state board is proposing a 2.5 Billion dollar budget (same as last year) which doesn't pay for the possible 11,000 to 12,000 new students we will be seeing next year. That equates to a 2% decrease. That, of course, "means fewer teachers, larger classes, and lower benefits and salaries", Larry Shumway said.

Rick Have a nice weekend.

The Perfect Storm: More students, less cash

Read two articles in the Salt Lake Tribune today dealing with public ed budgets:

• Lisa Schenker writes about the increase in students and lower budgets www.sltrib.com
• Another article talks about the lack of tax revenues (down 22%)

It is a perfect storm of low revenues, no stimulus, more students, lack of support to raise taxes, lack of leadership in the state legislature to make the tough choices. (oh, they want to make districts, actually teachers's salaries, pay more of their retirement).

Our per pupil expenditure will continue to drop while the expectations for teachers, higher test scores, increase. Debra Roberts, chair of the State Board of Ed, understates the problem, "It is going to be tough year..."

Rick

Mary Jessop and Chris Heslop Winners of Gift Cards

Mary Jessop, Washington High, and Chris Heslop, Ogden High, were winners of the blog contest in Ogden this month.

The Ogden School Board is looking at the possibiltiy of opening one of the closed elementary schools because of overcrowding at the district's elementary schools. Taylor and Lynn are two that could open, causing boundary changes in several other schools. All but one of the elementary schools have portables. Meetings are being held in the areas affected by the possible moves.

Rick

Pete Jahsman-Utah 3-A Swim Coach of the Year

Pete Jahsman, OHS swim coach, was awarded the 3-A Utah Swim Coach of the year award last Wednesday at the Ogden School Board meeting. Pete led the boys team to state championship last year.