Colleagues:

April 10, 2010 update

The legislature passed these bills. We can only stop them now if Gov. Charlie Crist vetoes them. When you sign the petition ADD REMARKS ASKING FOR THE GOV. CRIST TO VETO. They have the ball at our goal. YOU CAN HELP OUR DEFENSE.

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The Governor received Senate Bill 6 today at 12:19 p.m.  That means he has
until close of business on Friday, April 15th to veto the bill, sign it into
law or let it become law without his signature.
Please urge ALL FACULTY, colleagues, family and friends to contact the
Governor and ask him to veto this misguided piece of legislation.  His
contact information again is:
Governor Charlie Crist
Plaza Level 05
The Capitol
400 S. Monroe St.
Tallahassee, FL  32399-0001
[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
Phone - 850-488-4441 or 850-488-7146
FAX 850-487-0801
Campaign phone 850-907-1218

Please be sure and thank the members of the Florida House of Representatives
who voted NO on this bill but also continue to contact the legislators who
voted YES and express your displeasure.  It is important that they continue
to hear from us about this vote.  Ask them to explain why they voted for
this bill even though thousands of teachers, parents, and school board
members urged them not to.

Even if the Governor veto¹s this bill, it is certain to be back next
year!  Enough is enough.  We must begin holding our elected officials
accountable for these bad votes.
All Democrats in the Florida House of Representatives and the following
Republicans voted NO on SB 6 and deserve our thanks
:
Rep. Faye Culp, R- Tampa.
Rep. Ed Homan, R-Tampa.
Rep. Marcelo Llorente, R-Miami.
Rep. Peter Nehr, R-Tarpon Springs.
Rep. Pat Patterson, R-Deland.
Rep. J.C. Planas, R-Miami.
Rep. Julio Robaina, R-Miami.
Rep. Ron Schultz, R-Homosassa.
Rep. Charles Van Zant, R-Palatka.
Rep. Juan Zapata, R-Miami.
Rep. Mike Weinstein, R-Orange Park

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ORIGINAL PETITION

I am asking UNF faculty to take two steps - just say no to SB 6 and FRS changes.

Background
The economic recession began in December 2007, accelerated through the financial crisis in September 2008 and by January 2009, left 11.9 million people unemployed. This now causes administrators and legislators to turn their focus on academic tenure. UFF at UNF now believes that a national full-fledged attack on tenure is underway. There is as well an attack on our retirement system.  First, legislative leaders are moving rapidly to pass a bill, HB 1319 (Grady), that, for some, could cut your Florida Retirement System pension in half. By changing rules about how pensions are calculated, they can cut your average yearly pension from $30,000 to $15,000, for example. Tell your legislators to vote against HB 1319. (See below for details.) Second, legislators are also preparing to destroy tenure (continuing contracts) for K-12 teachers when they vote on Senate bill 6. This bill abolishes continuing contracts for teachers (earned after a probationary period), places them on annual contracts, and makes both reappointment and pay raises contingent on test scores of students.  School boards will actually be punished in funding if they pay teachers more for earning advanced degrees rather than rewarding teachers for test scores of students. Tell your legislators to vote against SB 6.

The long term economic effect of SB 6 will be to eliminate graduate programs in education when funding is taken away for advanced degrees, and make it impossible to adequately fund undergraduate education degrees by imposing unfunded mandates (expensive reporting mechanisms) to check on test scores of graduates. In other words, it is an attack on the funding and potential enrollment in public universities and colleges at the same time that it is an attack on teacher tenure and professional achievement. (See below for details.)  It severely jeopardizes recruitment of both faculty and teachers when legislators strip away professional compensation and restrict the academic freedom of educators by abolishing tenure.  Moreover, if legislators abolish tenure for K-12 now and get away with it without resistance, we can expect higher education will be next -- losing tenure and finding ourselves subjected to the latest testing scheme to decide if we have the professional standing to continue.

UFF at UNF position
The first wave of attack is an attack on tenure in the K-12 public schools.  While this first wave does not harm university faculty directly it is the canary in the mineshaft. For it will kill off tenure at the K-12 level and provides the "lessons learned" for the attack on university tenure.  In short, it is what will happen to you in future waves of attack. As you saw above the Florida legislature wishes to replace K-12 tenure with a system of continuing series annual contracts. The second wave of the attack is on science. In the State of Texas the legislators last week attacked Darwin’s theory of Evolution. Since January, Texans have passed more than 100 amendments to the 120-page curriculum standard affecting history, sociology and economics courses from elementary to high school. “We are adding balance,” said the leader of the conservative faction on the board. “History has already been skewed. Academia is skewed too far to the left.”These efforts have the support of the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority and the National Rifle Association.

UFF at UNF believes that the third wave of the attack will attack university tenure - focusing on university faculty.  As is well known many of the new state colleges in Florida will have no or very limited tenure. Indeed, FGCU has a very limited tenured faculty. UFF at UNF believes that this will become standard operating procedure in the third wave of attack on tenure. This, we fear will followed up with calls for charter colleges - outside the concept of public education and absent UNIONS. The fourth wave of the attack, will reduce retirement benefits for faculty following the lines HB 1319.

I am reminded of the poem of Martin Niemöller, a German pastor and theologian born in Lippstadt, Germany, in 1892. He is author of a famous poem, "First they came...”

"They came first for the Communists, and I did not speak up because I wasn't a  Communist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak up because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came  for the trade unionists, and I did not speak up because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for me and by that time there was no one else to speak up."

As president of UFF at UNF, I believe that the time to speak up is NOW - at the first wave of attack on K-12 tenure. We must not wait until there is no one else to speak up.  I ask all UNF faculty to sign this petition. Read the important links. Please use the comment space to speak "truth to power with rigor." Second, I ask that you make called on your mobile phones to legislators. UFF will have phone call luncheons on MWF at the UFF office in Building 4. 

We need to demonstrate our unity in protecting tenure and retirement. I thank you for your continuing leadership. We will update then as more information becomes known. Also remember the Pat Dix of FEA will be our dinner speaker at the UFF Dinner on March 26 at University Center. She sent this note today. " FEA talked with our Counsel about this and he explained that the FRS benefit is indeed a “property right”  (i.e., unlawful for legislator to renege).  However, he believes that “DROP” benefit does NOT enjoy that same property right protection.  We are still checking into the nuances of all the changes the bills propose.  Will get back to you with further information on specifics as they become available. 

Henry B. Thomas

PS: Be sure to read the links.