Demonstration Teacher Bargaining Fact Sheet September 2022

Last Tuesday September 13, Lab School families may have seen Demonstration Teachers at carpool with signs and wearing UC-AFT t-shirts. In case you missed it, Demonstration Teachers were passing out information about our contract negotiations with the Lab School administration. Demonstration Teachers have given the Lab School administration 19 proposals in addition to compensation. To date, the administration and UC Management is refusing to negotiate over any topics beyond compensation. Demonstration Teachers are committed to reaching agreement on a full contract that covers all topics related to our ability to serve ALL students and provide excellent instruction. Please take a few minutes to read the fact sheet and other information below. We will continue to provide information at carpool and post our flyers until we have a robust contract.

• Our current contract expired in January 2020.
• Demonstration Teachers are included in UC-AFT Bargaining Unit 18, which includes non-tenured faculty in the UC system.
• UCLA Lab School and UCLA management historically also negotiate a site specific “side letter” covering a wide range of topics that applies just to us, in addition to the Unit 18 contract.
• During the main Unit 18 contract negotiations with UC-AFT, Nadine Fishel (Chief Negotiator for UC Management) assured the bargaining team many times that UC PreK-12 schools would be able to negotiate robust side letters.
• It was Nadine Fishel’s preference and expectation that UC-AFT and UCLA Management would negotiate a full lab school side letter covering many topics upon the settlement of the Unit 18 Collective Bargaining Agreement.
• Geffen Academy (UCLA 6-12th grades) negotiated their “side letter” contract covering a wide range of topics (planning time, class size, workload, compensation, promotion, etc.) and ratified it in May 2022.
• Preuss School (UCSD 6-12th grades) negotiated their “side letter” contract covering a wide range of topics and ratified it in August 2020.
• Since February 11, 2022, Demonstration Teachers and UC-AFT formally proposed and requested bargaining dates five times and for five months the University failed to respond with dates or even a timeline for beginning negotiations.
• In June 2022, UCLA Management stated their position that the lab school teachers had waived their right to bargain over everything except compensation. They maintained they were not mandated to negotiate a wide range of topics.
• UCLA hired an outside lawyer. It is highly unusual for the University to pay an outside attorney to lead the negotiations. This was not done for negotiations with Geffen Academy or Preuss School UCSD.
• UCLA Management finally responded with dates for bargaining sessions mid-July 2022.
• Bargaining began August 10, 2022.
• Demonstration Teachers presented twenty proposals over 4 days of bargaining in August.
• UCLA Management responded with a single counter proposal that was just over a page long, addressing only compensation. Principal Lazo described the proposal as a “comprehensive salary proposal to acknowledge Demonstration Teachers’ work.” Demonstration Teachers disagree. The proposal is not comprehensive and does not honor our work in teaching and learning, research, and public engagement.
• On August 22, 2022, UCLA Lab School Administration published the 2022-2023 school calendar without negotiating it with lab school teachers.

You may read the entirety of the above MOUs and lab school teachers’ proposal at http://bit.ly/K12UCAFT.

We want to bring everyone up-to-date on our negotiations. We believe that teaching conditions are learning conditions. Teachers’ priorities will strengthen our constructivist and inquiry-based approach at the Lab School. Demonstration Teachers have called for the following:

• reduced class sizes to provide more individual instruction
• planning time in the instructional day for ongoing collaborative development of a robust and innovative curriculum
• compensation and a clear merit process to recruit and retain excellent teachers
• a nurse on campus
• supports for neurodiverse students
• a sufficient number of teaching assistants
• competitive compensation for quality substitute teachers

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