Seniority vs. specialty: Colfax teachers protest proposed layoff policy change

Two months before the Colfax school district faces a deadline on teacher layoffs, the school board Monday received a letter from the teachers union which objects to the district’s proposed approach to layoffs.

The teachers urged the board to stick with the present practice of making staff cuts on the basis of seniority.

Cary Cammack, president of the Colfax Education Association, delivered the letter to the school board. It was signed by 39 of the district’s 42 teachers.

The letter said the teachers reject what it calls the district’s “regressive proposals” outlined in the district draft of a new contract with the CEA.

“Many of the proposals we are viewing as take-aways,” Cammack told the board Monday night.

Contract negotiations were scheduled to continue Wednesday with a mediation session slated between representatives of the board and the CEA.

According to the contract proposed by the district, teachers could be laid off according to subject category first and seniority second.

The district’s proposed contract would allow it to target teacher lay-offs based on the subjects they teach rather than how long they have taught in Colfax.

A statement written by Supt. Morgan on behalf of the board, contends “The current agreement gives no consideration to state and federal laws which mandate districts provide teachers who are ‘highly qualified’ in the core subject areas.”

Morgan gave an example of the situation the district’s proposal would eliminate.

“A possible scenario would be that a teacher with a higher ‘seniority rank’ who has taught exclusively in the high school P.E. department would be given first employment opportunity for re-hire to fill a fifth grade math position over a teacher who has less seniority, but has taught fifth grade math and is certified as ‘highly qualified’ with a math endorsement.”

Under the district’s current contract with the union, layoffs in the Colfax school district have been made according to seniority.

“We feel it’s a fair system and it’s a good system. If things aren’t broken, why try to fix something?” Cammack said in a later interview with the Gazette.

Cammack said teachers want to keep their current contract because teachers have worked years to build tenure and earn seniority.

Colfax teachers were scheduled to hold a rally Wednesday outside the Best Western Hotel in Colfax before mediation talks between the CEA’s union representative and the school district’s hired negotiator. The CEA is part of the Washington Education Association, the state teachers union. A WEA associate will represent their side of the mediation.

Cammack pointed out to the board Monday all but three of the teachers now employed by the district signed the letter.

Board members met in executive session for 15 minutes after receiving the CEA letter to discuss their approach in the upcoming bargaining sessiin.

The deadline for the district to inform staff members of Reduction in Force layoffs is May 15.