Unpaid teacher perks raise ire in Española

Unpaid teacher perks raise ire in Española
District says it lacks cash to pay incentives for last year of federal program to boost students' scores

[PLEASE NOTE: Four or five current and past employees were interviewed, though only one was quoted. We urge all who wish for a positive resolution of this issue to contribute to balancing the power of district administrators by strengthening our ability to represent school employee interests through adding your membership to those of the majority of your colleagues. To Join Now ($50 rebates end October 31, 2011): see your Association Representative, or www.nea-nm.org ]


Robert Nott | The New Mexican
Posted: Thursday, October 20, 2011 - 10/18/11
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Española Valley School District teachers are threatening a lawsuit over incentive pay they say they are still owed from the last school year.

Starting in 2006-07, teachers, principals and educational assistants in Española received up to $3,000 a year if they could show improved academic performance by their students.

The money came from the Teacher Incentive Fund, a $600 million federal grant program designed to foster innovative approaches to reforming teacher pay. The fund supports performance-based teacher and principal compensation to attract top talent to public schools.

In New Mexico, the grants are administered to both Española and Taos school districts by the Rio Rancho-based Northern New Mexico Network, a cooperative of nearly 30 rural school districts in the state.

During the program's first four years in Española, teachers who qualified for the incentive pay received between $1,000 and $3,000 a year, according to several Española teachers and Charles Goodmacher, the National Education Association liaison for Española. The total federal payout to New Mexico was more than $7.2 million, according to a U.S. Department of Education spokesperson.

Under the grant guidelines, in the program's fifth year — 2010-11 — the district was supposed to pay 75 percent of the cost of the program, or about $880,000.

But the district does not have the money, school board President Jose "Coco" Archuleta said.

"It's hard," said Archuleta, who joined the board in 2009. "The teachers did make a commitment. They followed the path to what they believed would get them some incentive, and now there's no funding for it."

It is unclear at this point whether it's the district that has let the teachers down or whether the Northern New Mexico Network, which administered the grants, is responsible.

Española teacher Damon McGinn wonders if the network is at fault for failing to comply with all the federal requirements.

For one thing, the network was supposed to send circuit-rider educators to monitor Española's teachers in the classroom. It did this in the second through fourth years, and then dropped the practice in year five.

McGinn was not a fan of the approach. "You can't come in my classroom for five minutes and really gauge anything," he said. "It came down to checklists. ... It was not very rigorous."

In August, the network's executive director, Carlos Atencio, informed Española Valley Public Schools Superintendent Evelyn Maruska that the network could not reimburse the district for this year's incentive pay because the Department of Education did not approve of certain elements within the grant.

A letter dated Aug. 5 from the Department of Education to Atencio said the network was not authorized to discontinue on-site visits. It also took issue with the network and district's plan to count mandated salary increases under the state's three-tier pay system toward the district's 75 percent matching-fund contribution.

The letter noted that the network did not have permission to remove the requirement for site visits, even if it was facing funding challenges. According to the Department of Education, the network has a balance of about $1.5 million to fund those visits.

"We fail to see how your project lacked sufficient TIF funds to conduct the required multiple observations of teachers as specified in the approved TIF application," wrote Sylvia E. Lyles of the department's Office of Academic Improvement and Teacher Quality.

Speaking by phone, Atencio said finances were not the main reason for suspending the on-site visits. He said that as the program progressed, the Department of Education put more emphasis on tying the incentive pay to an increase in student test scores and less on skills, knowledge and professional development, which is one reason the network suspended the visits.

Atencio said the remaining $1.5 million was earmarked for professional development and other uses. He said the network acted in good faith and will return about $1 million to the Department of Education.

McGinn thinks the fault lies with the network and suggests the teachers union push the district to sue the nonprofit.

"I think Northern New Mexico Network owes us that money because they allowed two unacceptable parameters that they, being the facilitator of the grant, should have understood," he said.

Goodmacher said, "My belief is that the district and Northern both share responsibility for not executing the program correctly."

Complicating matters is the fact that three different superintendents have served the district since the grant began, leading to what Atencio calls "a gap in continuity."

Maruska did not return a call seeking comment.

Northern New Mexico Network distributed the federal money to both the Española and Taos school districts. Atencio said Taos is in the same boat as Española in that it cannot meet the 75 percent matching grant in the fifth year.

Efforts to reach a representative of Taos Municipal Schools with knowledge of the grant were unsuccessful.

A study by Mathematica Policy Research is under way to evaluate the Teacher Incentive Fund program.

Contact Robert Nott at 986-3021 or rnott@sfnewmexican.com.