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When a Contract Isn't a Contract

Steve Goode

April 06, 2010

Wednesday morning the State Board of Education will take up the issue of the current Collective Bargaining Agreement between the Hartford Board of Education and the teachers and administrators unions. At issue is a request by Superintendent Steven Adamowski to the state to open up that contract and make some changes to seniority language. Basically Adamowski wants the state to change seniority from district-wide to building-wide.

Adamowski contends that the current seniority system, which allows for a teacher that is targeted for a lay off to bump a less experienced teacher in another building, is detrimental to student learning because many of them attend schools with a specialized curriculum and a teacher coming into that school may not be properly trained in that curriculum.

Of course the union is well within its right to cry foul and they have. They say they bargained in good faith and expect the contract to be honored.

Valid arguments on both sides of the issue to be sure.

A three member committee of the state school board took up the issue recently and as could be expected there was no consensus on what action to recommend to the full board. One for the proposal, one against and one undecided, so they decided to recommend that the full board hear it but made no recommendation for action one way or the other.

The betting here is that the full board will recommend that Adamowski and the unions sit down and try to settle this without state - in the union's case most likely court - intervention.

But anyone who has been paying any attention at all to the death spiral of the relationship between those kids wouldn't bet a nickel on that happening any time soon.