DAE Holds First Public Meeting with Superintendent

On March 24th, the Durham Association of Educators (DAE) held their first public meeting with DPS Superintendent Dr. Anthony Lewis to discuss the possibility of instituting a ‘meet and confer’ policy, which the union has spent the last year pushing for. DAE requested to negotiate their demands for a meet-and-confer policy with Lewis, who refused to agree to DAE’s latest version of the policy, in which union leaders have claimed to have made significant compromises.

For 14 months, DAE has been fighting for a policy that would allow them to negotiate with their employers and have a seat at the decision-making table. Meet-and-confer policy is a legal alternative to collective bargaining, which is banned in North Carolina.

At 5:30pm, a crowd of DAE members and supporters, dressed in “red for ed,” gathered in front of the DPS Staff Development Center. At approximately 6:00pm, the rally moved inside the building to observe DAE’s newly-elected Meet-and-Confer Team negotiate with Lewis about the policy.

The meeting was scheduled for 6:00pm, and Lewis arrived at 6:20pm. The Meet-and-Confer Team – consisting of 11 members, 9 of whom were present due to 2 members having bus-driving responsibilities – began by asking Lewis if he was ready to support the DAE’s proposal for meet-and-confer.

In response, Lewis launched into a prepared speech, where he expressed his preference for a more modified version of the policy.

DAE proposed a compromised version of meet-and-confer to address Lewis’ concerns after his repeated rejection of the policy. DAE wants 8 exclusive meet-and-confer sessions with district administration a year, and a public comment section at the start of each meeting for any workers or community members to voice their concerns. Additionally, rather than allowing any organization with over 50% membership of all workers in a district to qualify for meet-and-confer (which DAE does), DAE proposed that organizations with 6% membership could gain a single meet-and-confer meeting a year, which could increase as their membership grows. 

The meet-and-confer policy Lewis wants would include the handpicking of individual non-union workers to represent the union at meetings, instead of workers that have been democratically elected by the union. He also proposed to have many different employee representative organizations (EROs) present at the meetings all at once, instead of one-on-one meetings with DAE.

In his speech, Lewis also implied his desire for DAE to adopt a more “student-focused” approach to change. However, fulfilling DAE’s demands, which are designed to improve DPS for everybody, would directly improve student wellbeing.

DAE’s demands include improving budget transparency, improving employee pay, and protecting immigrant students and families by instating a “no collaboration” policy with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Improving staff retention rates is another main goal.

Lewis left the meeting 20 minutes early, provoking verbal outcry from some attendees. One representative on the Meet-and-Confer Team later expressed frustration with Lewis’ disregard for their time, given that she, like many others, had to take off work from a second job to be at the meeting.

Sources:

"Durham Association of Educators' fight for recognition heats up," WUNC