Last night the RPS School Board voted to terminate the employment of REA President Neri Suarez.
Disappointingly, only two School Board members voted to oppose or pause this termination. Third District School Board rep and City Council candidate Kenya Gibson voted "no;" Shonda Harris-Muhammed (6th District) abstained.
Obviously education workers will be making all of this an election issue.
In advance of the termination vote, I sent the following written comment to some members of the School Board.
Since emailing these remarks, I have added to them and extended them.
***RPS has put the President of the REA up for termination. In response, the REA Board launched a petition asking that the School Board rescind this termination.
In response to the petition and the accompanying email that went out out to all REA members, Superintendent Kamras accused the REA Vice President of libel and demanded that she retract the email and petition issued by the REA Board. He also demanded that she publicly apologize.
The petition that so rattled our superintendent was drafted by REA Board members, approved by the REA Board, and reviewed by VEA attorneys. Nothing in this petition rises to the level of libel.
In just five days, the petition has been signed by over 300 community members, including university-level academics who are experts in education and labor relations.
They all agree - firing the union president for such slight reasons is union-busting.
This is an anti-labor move.
And it is completely shameful in Richmond, one of the incubators of the Southern labor rights movement.
Kamras seems to have objected most to the REA's use of the term “union-busting” in reference to the firing of the union president.
For context: the RPS School Board passed a free speech resolution in 2018. One intent of the resolution was to encourage workers to express and describe the conditions under which they and their students work. We can't fix what we can't name.
"Union-busting" is a descriptor of the atmosphere under which we are working. It is an opinion; therefore, it does not rise to the legal definition of libel or defamation.
Disagreeing with a description or an opinion does not magically transform words we do not like into defamatory statements.
But of course Mr. Kamras knows that. He launched that salvo as a warning shot. He absolutely knows that this petition was not libelous, but he also knows - and counts on - the repercussions such an accusation might generate.
If employees are not allowed to name, describe, or protest behaviors using negative descriptors without being bludgeoned with the implication of potential legal action, we really do not have the option to exercise the free speech guaranteed us by the RPS School Board's free speech resolution.
Free speech is not free speech if we are only allowed to praise.
Public figures especially should become accustomed to their employees and constituents describing their actions in a negative light. When the plaintiff is a public figure, or if the content of the statements are a matter of public interest and concern, the burden of proof is on the person who claims they are being defamed. In this case, that means that the Superintendent would have to prove that he is not, in fact, union-busting.
Let’s explore how that defense might go:
Granted: the Superintendent is a member of the REA, pays dues, has participated in rallies at the General Assembly in support of funding our schools, and has explicitly supported collective bargaining both verbally and in print.
However, the following is also true:
RPS hired an attorney with anti-union work in her CV: Stacy Haney served as a lobbyist for the Virginia School Board Association. VSBA is a non-profit that according to the Times-Dispatch, took “a legislative stance against public school teachers’ efforts to unionize.”
Why would RPS choose such an attorney if it were not interested in eroding the effectiveness of the union?
RPS principals have told teachers, “Don’t talk to the union.” When this has been brought up to RPS admin, the response has been no response. Not addressing this publicly and forcefully emboldens building-level administrators to harass and silence union members. All of this is expressly forbidden by the collective bargaining resolution. It is also demoralizing and drives good teachers out of our school system.
One of the Superintendent’s designees, in violation of the collective bargaining agreement, told REA leadership to instruct its members to stop conducting union business during the school day.
RPS designees told teachers during collective bargaining negotiations that "teacher retention was off the table." [I think the exact words were, "We see what you are trying to do with this pay scale; teacher retention is not on the table."] RPS's designees also insinuated that RPS does not reflexively value teacher experience. Unions work to improve working conditions so that experienced teachers will stay in a given school system. This is so important when we consider that schools like Woodville only had three [edit: four] certified classroom teachers in grades K-5 this past school year, and that some of the instructors did not have BAs. The union is trying to stabilize this workforce in order to give our students the qualified, experienced teachers they deserve. Yet during collective bargaining, RPS expressed refusal to even discuss ways to improve teacher retention. We were not even permitted to allude to teacher retention.
During the collective bargaining process RPS misled the REA teacher unit CB team about whether or not RPS planned to explore or pursue an extended year pilot. This is, definitionally, bargaining in bad-faith. (Imagine the pearl-clutching and ruffled feathers if REA had concealed important info).
RPS attempted to remove a month off of the CTE teachers’ contracts - after the collectively bargained contract was struck.
RPS is trying to move ASL interpreters off of the continuing contracts that they have had for decades. Continuing contracts are obligatory for worker retention, especially for retaining high quality workers. Our deaf and hard of hearing students deserve the best ASL interpreters, and we can only deliver that if the ASL interpreters have continuing contracts. Furthermore, my “Friend the Chair of School Board in the Northeast” adds that RPS is ignoring and flouting its own past practice.
RPS refused to negotiate with REA concerning changes in additional duties and compensation to teachers’ contracts in schools being moved to a 200-day calendar.
RPS’s response to the grievance around the 200-day calendar implementation was a terse, two or three sentence reply indicating that, in essence, they did not have to adhere to or participate in a meaningful relationship with the REA if they don't want to. Their reply amounted to ‘we will do what we want, when we want, how we want, to whomever we want.’
RPS declined to answer REA’s legitimate questions concerning the procedures for and results of staff voting for the 200-day calendar, even in the face of multiple serious, legitimate, and repeated concerns over fraud, manipulation, and coercion in at least three worksites. All of this merits an audit. RPS has literally declined to even answer questions about these votes. The RPS School Board voted to proceed with the pilots even as active grievances around the pilot were underway. How does this square with the expressed devotion to worker empowerment and collective bargaining?
RPS failed to include the raises negotiated during collective bargaining in contracts for custodians and office associates, demonstrating a lack of care or seriousness around the issue of compensation won during collective bargaining. As Mary Gresham, recently retired head of custodial services expressed at last night's school board meeting, this oversight (mishap?...missed deadline?) caused extreme distress and anguish to already underpaid workers.
RPS has refused to negotiate compensation in the form of bonuses. We are now learning that many bonuses have not been distributed correctly, fairly, equitably, with entire groups of workers getting shut out. I am one of those workers. I would never have known that I had experienced a loss of, potentially, thousands of dollars if I hadn’t heard about it “through the grapevine.” This kind of error could be avoided if RPS would choose to lean into the collective bargaining system and engage authentically with REA to avoid these sorts of catastrophes.
The list goes on, and on….
Yet Superintendent Kamras thinks that not one person might reasonably interpret any of these instances, or all of them, as a pattern tending towards the erosion of a union’s ability to advocate for its members, i.e. union-busting.
I need our community to repeat after me:
It’s not libel if it’s true.
It’s not defamatory if it’s true.
Why does any of this matter?
Why does it matter if a school superintendent accuses a member of union leadership of libel?
Because as someone with hiring and firing power, this attempt to silence a union leader with the cudgel of legal action is coercive.
It is threatening.
It is a transparent attempt to suppress union leadership from speaking the truth and from sharing that truth out to the community in order to bring light and community eyes to important issues.
All of this is forbidden conduct under the collective bargaining resolution. It is also in direct contradiction to the spirit of collective bargaining.
How this administration can claim it believes in or authentically supports collective bargaining is risible at best, gas-lighting at least, and is veering into hypocrisy.
Many school board candidates have expressed that there are trust issues in RPS.
How can we trust an administration that is forcing teachers who voted against extending the school year to submit to these life-altering changes, an administration that has fired the union president for no good reason, an administration that can’t even get our contracts right?
RPS administration needs to focus on its foundational mission - running this school system with some semblance of order and functionality, and retaining enough teachers and support staff to deliver high quality instruction to our students.
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