Teachers air beef with district on radio

Wednesday, April 17, 2002 | 11:25 a.m.

Clark County teachers have taken their contract dispute with school district administrators to the airwaves, using radio spots to try to rally the public behind their bid for better pay and benefits.

The Clark County Education Association, which represents about 12,000 of the school district's 14,000 teachers, is locked in arbitration with school district officials over the terms of the next contract.

The 30-second radio spots, which began airing earlier this month on seven Las Vegas Valley stations, claim that the school district is losing teachers at a rate of nearly three each day. The school board's office phone number is given, and listeners are urged to call and complain.

"Public schools belong to you, and you have the power to stop the exodus of good teachers from our school system," the voice-over says.

The school district's annual turnover rate is about 6 percent, George Ann Rice, associate superintendent for human resources, said.

"Frankly, I wouldn't call that an exodus," Rice said Tuesday. "In fact, given the size of our faculty, I think we're doing fairly well."

The union's claim, while accurate, does not reflect the teachers' reasons for leaving, she said.

Since the school year began in August 2001, 427 teachers have left the district, Rice said. Of those teachers, 89 retired, five went on disability, six failed the licensing exams, 14 were fired and four died.

The remaining 309 teachers resigned, listing various reasons on their exit paperwork, Rice said. Two teachers reported plans to return to graduate school, 23 took medical leave, 129 said they were relocating, 17 said they were leaving the profession, 67 took personal leave and 60 gave no reason, Rice said. Just 11 teachers listed dissatisfaction with the school district as their reason for leaving, Rice said.

The school district has hired 1,900 new teachers this year and needs about 700 more before the start of the new school year in August, Rice said. The district, which has 266 schools, opens between 12 and 14 new campuses each year.

The school district would have better luck hiring if it could tell prospective employees that a new contract was in hand, Mary Ella Holloway, president of the teachers' union, said.

The uncertainty discourages teachers from other states from relocating, Holloway said. The radio spots were a necessary move in light of district officials' refusal to negotiate.

"We're willing to talk if they're willing to settle," Holloway said.

Since the radio spots began airing, the school board office has received about a dozen calls, said Joyce Haldeman, executive director of community and government relations for the district. At least two of the callers said they were offended by the spots and criticized the union's tactics, Haldeman said.

"It's really sad when they cannibalize each other to sensationalize an issue," Haldeman said. "These kinds of tactics are never effective, and usually backfire."

Clark County's teachers have not had a salary increase in four years, Holloway said. The district is also trying to eliminate the teacher's health fund, Holloway said.

Nevada teachers rank 22nd in the country for teacher pay with an average salary of $40,443, according to a recent survey by the National Education Association.

The teachers' union's demands are unreasonable in light of the district's ongoing fiscal crisis, School Board member Susan Brager-Wellman said.

"We've cut $74 million out of our budget because we've had to, not because we wanted to," Brager-Wellman said. "The solution isn't blaming the school board, it's the teachers and the district going together at the next legislative session and demanding what our students deserve."

Only 11 states nationwide fund education at a lower rate than Nevada, Brager-Wellman said.