Placentia Teachers Launch Their Slowdown Protest in Salary Impasse

Alan Miller, the band leader at Esperanza High School in Anaheim, says he typically has worked about 20 hours a week beyond his official schedule without any financial compensation.

But not anymore.

“Now, I am leaving at the end of the day until further notice,” he said Thursday.

Shirley Storll, a math teacher at the school, said she “feels very guilty” because she was to give a test today and did not stay after school Thursday to help students who needed extra attention. “That bothers me,” she conceded.

Graphics art teacher Andrew Ward said he loves his job but wishes he earned as much as baby sitters who get paid $2 an hour for each child they watch. “I would love to get that,” Ward declared.

The three are among the 752 teachers in the Placentia Unified School District who began a work slowdown Thursday to protest an impasse in contract negotiations.

As a result of the protest, the teachers have decided not to take papers home to grade or perform unpaid extra duties such as supervising school clubs. The work that they usually do at home, they said, will have to be handled during the day as long as the slowdown protest lasts.

Chuck Magnuson, a health education teacher and representative of the teachers’ union at the school, said the slowdown is an attempt to demonstrate to the community that a teacher’s job is not over at the end of the school day.

“We are still going to correct papers,” he said, “but we are going to correct them in school. And that means we may be a day or so late in giving the papers back. We may cut back on the amount of homework we give out because there may not be enough time in class to do everything.”

In the stalled contract negotiations, the teachers’ union, the Placentia Unified Education Assn., has been seeking an 8% pay increase this year. The Placentia Unified School District’s last offer was for a 5% boost. Both sides declared an impasse in January, and a mediator will be brought in.

Wendell Bainter, president of the teachers’ union, said Thursday that it was too early to assess the work slowdown. “Some of the teachers are just getting the word today (Thursday),” he said. “We are telling teachers to leave their schools as soon as they are prepared for the next day, which is what our contract calls for.”

But Timothy VanEck, an assistant superintendent, said that if the teachers think the district has any more money to offer, “they are very seriously misinformed. We have opened our books to them. There are no funds available.”

Most of the teachers at Esperanza praised their school’s administration but insisted that the district has the money to meet their pay demands.

Pay in the district now ranges from $20,050 for a beginning teacher to slightly more than $38,000 for the most senior, experienced teacher. VanEck said the average teacher’s pay is $32,500, not including benefits.

Most of the students support their teachers, said Michelle Templeton, 16, campus editor of the school newspaper.

“I hate to see it come down to this slowdown,” she said. “It is affecting the students. But most support the teachers.”

Nearly 300 students signed a petition expressing their support of the teachers, Templeton said.

Joe Lamantia, 15, said the students are worried that the teachers might strike. “Nobody wants to go to school in the summer,” he added.