On Thursday, February 22 School Personnel across the state of West Virginia in all 55 counties began a 2 day peaceful demonstration in hopes to get their voices heard in Charleston on issues that are important to them.
During this time a lot of miss information has come out as well as some people who are not willing to hear why we are on the front lines fighting.
That is me in the camo coat in the picture above. The picture was taken by the Moorefield Examiner for an article that they are going to put out next week about us. My sign says the following.
My Mom went on strike in 1990.
I am on strike in 2018.
Same Issues.....
28 years apart
Fix PEIA Give Us A Pay Raise
Support Your Local School Personnel.
Yes 28 years ago my Mom went on strike. She was the president of the Hardy County Education Association, HCEA. She lead teachers in an 11 day strike to get their voices heard. I am sure that my Mom, who taught school for 40 years would be proud of the stand that I am taking for what I believe in.
You may be wondering just what we are demonstrating about in the first place. There are many issues that we are seeking to address. Here is the highlights from an email that I sent to one of the Legislators near me.
First we need to make sure that we have certified teachers teaching in our classrooms all across West Virginia. It is critical that they be certified to teach the subject area or grade level that they are employed in. By not having certified teachers in the classroom students in our schools are not receiving a quality education.
We also need to keep seniority. It is not far to think of the possibility that if someone is going to be cut it is going to be a teacher or service personnel that has the most years of service in just to promote a new teacher in order to save money. It in the end will cost more money to have new younger less seniority teachers in the classroom. These teachers will have to be trained to do the job that the more senior teachers already know how to do. This will also mean more loss of time in the classroom with subs having to fill in.
We need to keep testing for service personnel. It is not right that they are planning to take this away. I had to take a test in order to become an aide. It is not far that they want to stop this. That would mean that anyone could come in and do the job of service personnel. I would hate to see what would happen if someone was doing a service personnel job without being tested. These test help the counties know if a person is competent to do the job that they are applying for.
We need to stop charter schools. Having Charter Schools will take away funds for public schools. That will mean that teachers will have to end up spending more money out of pocket than they do now to fund their classrooms. It would mean that some programs in the public schools will come to an end because the system just does not have the funding for them.
Right now School Personnel are ranked #48 in pay in the nation. We need a pay raise. We work long hours. We sacrifice time with our family to do for school. We go above and beyond for the students in our classrooms and schools. We furnish supplies for our classrooms with our own money. We make sure children have clothes, shoes, and much more so that students don't have to worry and can focus on learning. We come early and stay late. For example I am an aide who's hours are 7:30am-3:30pm. I am at school most days between 6:45 and 7:00am and don't leave till 4:00pm. I don't get payed for time before 7:30 and time after 3:30.
We need to fix PEIA. Right now the 4% raise for teachers and the 3% raise for service personnel is not enough. That raise will end up being taken to pay for my PEIA. PEIA says that we must see a provider in their network. That means someone in West Virginia. So if I need to see a specialist or have special test done I will need to go to someone or a hospital in state. Most often that means traveling about 3 hours to Morgantown for services. Normally I would go to Harrisonburg or Winchester, VA which are an hour away. If I chose to go out of state for care it will cost me more than it use to.
A severance tax on gas, oil, and coal would help with PEIA. It would make the cost out of pocket for me and many others in West Virginia lower.
Also PEIA affect retired state employees. Anyone who retirees before they are 65 years old are still getting the same PEIA as a full time employee. That means that state employees will have to work longer.
So you see it is not about money as some would say it is. It is about much more. It is about fixing issues that if not fixed will only continue to get worse.
Legislators in West Virginia need to wake up and realize that if they don't take us seriously that come November when we go to vote that they could and will be voted out for not supporting us. We know who has not supported us in our endeavor at this time.
What can you do to help? Well you can go to http://wvlegislature.gov/ and look up your local representatives. Then you can shoot them an email supporting us. Don't just stop at your local representatives. Email those in areas around you as well. The more emails you write the more support you are showing us. We appreciate it.
You have the facts. Now use them to help us get our voices heard. We appreciate all that you do for us. This is your way of giving back to us who do so much for your children during the school year.
Thank You!
