Record Numbers of QEOs Imposed on Teachers

An unprecedented number of school boards have taken the action of imposing a Qualified Economic Offer contract on their teachers this year. At the middle of September, at least 21 QEOs have been imposed for the two-year contract period that began July 1, 2001.

“The QEO is a slap in the face to teachers who are dedicating their lives to the children of this state and have made Wisconsin schools great schools,” said WEAC President Stan Johnson. “It is an outrage that school boards would stoop so low as to unilaterally abandon the collective bargaining process and utilize this demeaning law to impose lousy contracts on their teachers. It is an insult.”

Under the QEO law, a school board can impose a contract on teachers as long as the contract includes a total salary and benefit increase of 3.8%. With sharply rising insurance costs – typically exceeding 30% this year – that 3.8%, and more, goes to cover benefit costs. Teachers in many communities are being forced to take actual dollar pay cuts to compensate for the health care premium increases. As a result of the QEO law and school district revenue controls, more than 200 teacher contracts remain unsettled 15 months into the contract period.

Teachers are trying to work out solutions to these problems at the bargaining table, Johnson said. They are looking for ways to maintain quality health care programs and provide fair salary increases so that schools can retain and attract the best people to the teaching profession. At the same time, the collective bargaining process opens up opportunities for positive discussion and solutions to school improvement and professional development issues, all of which contribute to a positive school environment and an improved learning climate for children.

“When a school board imposes a QEO on its teaching staff, it is demoralizing,” Johnson said. “Teachers are cut out of the process and demeaned. It affects morale, and leads to a very poor learning environment.”

Districts that have imposed QEO contracts on their teachers so far include: Blair-Taylor, Cuba City, Fontana, Gale-Ettrick-Trempealeau, Genoa City, Glendale J.1., Glidden, La Farge, Maple Dale, Oshkosh, Pecatonica, Prairie du Chien, Reek Elementary, Seneca, Sharon, Stoughton, Sturgeon Bay, Walworth UHS, Washington Island, Westfield and Williams Bay.

Many other districts have threatened to impose a QEO. (If your local is the victim of a QEO and is not on this list, please contact Linda Coogan at cooganl@weac.org or at 1-800-362-8034, ext. 214.)

The decline in honest collective bargaining that has resulted from the QEO law has led to labor tensions in many communities throughout the state. Teachers are picketing, rallying, engaging in job actions (usually by limiting work duties to only those specifically required by the contract), and appealing to their communities and policymakers through letters, e-mails and letters to the editor. The QEO law has also created an atmosphere of distrust, confusion and uncertainty, Johnson said.

In Milwaukee, the school board took preliminary action in August to impose a QEO when it told the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission that the district and Milwaukee Teachers’ Education Association were at an impasse in negotiations. MTEA leaders strongly disagreed, and no QEO had been imposed as of mid-September.

In Manitowoc, where the board has been threatening to impose a QEO, a pro-teacher and education support professional rally last spring drew 1,200 people. Hundreds more packed into a school board meeting in September.

In Stoughton, QEO’d teachers are angry that they were given an $80 to $100 per step salary decrease, and the board recently reported a $1.6 million budget surplus.

Burlington teachers, faced with the threat of a QEO, rallied and marched through the downtown area just before the start of the school year.

In Waupaca and Clintonville, the school boards have said they are imposing the QEO, but as of this writing failed to follow the procedures required to actually do so. The Clintonville Education Association has made it clear to the board that teachers want to continue to bargain.

CEA President Bob Arkens appeared before the board in September with this statement, which reflects the concerns of teachers in many communities:

“I feel compelled to note that teachers in the Clintonville Public Schools have not had a cost-of-living wage increase since the 1994-95 school year. If the board chooses to pursue a Qualified Economic Offer, Clintonville teachers will be nearly 8% behind what they made in 1994, in equivalent dollars. This tremendous wage loss is nearly impossible to make up, and such a loss in real wages is hurting our district's ability to attract and maintain its tradition of a quality, long-term staff.

“In the past four years approximately 55 teachers have, for various reasons, left Clintonville. Many of those were teachers we trained for one to three years. ... In addition, we have had a number of veteran staff leave us as well. Most who leave and have remained in teaching have found salaries in their new district far superior to what they had in Clintonville.

“This is a tragic loss to the students we teach.”

List of unsettled locals

Posted September 25, 2002