L.A. School District Threatens to Dock Pay of Teachers if They Boycott Activities

Less than a week after the union representing its 32,000 teachers rejected a three-year contract offer, the Los Angeles Unified School District on Monday threatened to dock the pay of teachers who participate in certain boycott activities proposed by union leaders.

The district’s position, explained in a letter to teachers from Supt. Leonard Britton, brought a stern response from the union president, who said the district is attempting to intimidate teachers during contract talks.

In the letter, Britton warned teachers that if they refuse to submit completed attendance records, give parent conferences or administer standardized tests--which are among several activities the union has asked teachers to boycott until the contract dispute is settled--they could be violating the state Education Code and endangering state funding of district programs.

“I must advise you that the Board of Education and I regard such behavior as a partial strike,” Britton said in the letter. “As such, any employee who chooses to participate in this partial strike during the basic on-site working day will not be paid for the time he or she is on strike.”

The union is asking teachers not to participate in unpaid, after-school activities, such as attending faculty meetings or holding parent conferences, to withhold their lesson plans from their principals and to refrain from giving and handling a districtwide standardized test.

Teacher Actions Sought

Junior and senior high school teachers were asked to withhold five-week student progress reports from principals but to continue to provide copies to students and parents. Elementary school teachers were asked to leave out certain computations they normally include on monthly attendance reports.

After its rejection last week of a district offer to raise teacher salaries by 16.9% over three years, the union also asked teachers to boycott recess and lunch supervision--extra duties for which teachers are not paid--as well as faculty meetings scheduled during the school day. It plans to hold informational picketing at all campuses on Monday before classes begin.

“Our instructions to teachers are to teach their full complement of classes, complete all the paper work that students and parents would normally get and provide that to the student and parent,” union President Wayne Johnson said Monday. “What we are telling teachers not to do is cooperate with the district. . . . Obviously, this (letter) is prima facie evidence that (the boycott) is having an effect on them.”

In his letter, Britton suggests that teachers’ refusal to give the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills, a standardized exam given annually to all students, could result in some low-achieving students not being tested. This, in turn, could mean a loss of special state and federal money earmarked for remedial programs because such test are used to identify students who need special tutoring.

Most schools in the district were scheduled to begin giving the exam next Monday, but a district official said the test has been postponed for at least a week because of uncertainty over teachers’ cooperation.

Johnson said the boycott activities are neither interfering with instruction nor depriving the district of any state money.

“The district won’t lose one penny in revenue for anything,” he said.

The union leader said district officials have threatened to dock teachers’ pay because they are upset with the union’s rejection of the district offer. Under the district proposal, beginning and maximum pay would have risen to $24,755 and $46,879 respectively this year and would have increased in 1991 to $27,397 and $54,437. The union is asking for a 12% raise this year, which would bring minimum pay to $26,253 and top pay to $48,517.