From Council Member Tim Riggenbach to East Bluff Neighborhood Association Presidents:
THURSDAY MARCH 10th at Prince of Peace Church Councilman Tim Riggenbach invites you to hear the Peoria Public School District 150 Teacher’s Union under the leadership of Bobby Darling present their vision of the educational reforms and actions they are willing to make and promote. The discussion will include the hows and whys of teachers should be leading the reform efforts.
To Council Member Riggenbach from Bill Collier:
(Bill Collier, is Mayor Jim Ardis' "education liason")
Tim---
The Peoria Public Schools District 150 Teacher's Union, under the leadership of Bobby Darling, would like to visit with neighborhood organizations/associations to inform the residents in the various council districts of educational reform actions the teachers and their union are interested in making. The school board and district administration have various avenues to get their information out to the public--paid communication people, a web site, electronic newsletter and televised school board meetings. The Union has no such abilities to explain to the public how teachers could and maybe should lead the reform efforts.
I have agreed to help the Union with the setting up of meetings throughout the city and my first thought was to ask district council people to host such a meeting as a good first step. Your district is home to some very active neighborhood associations who like to be informed and this seems to be a great opportunity for them to interact with teacher leaders. The sharing of information can only help the district better know and react to resident concerns while at the same time interacting with those who send their kids to D150.
As you are one of the most active council members I thought I would ask you if you would be interested in hosting a one hour neighborhood meeting. You would select and secure the location and invite those you wish to invite. We would like to start out with 20-30 attendees and see how the sessions go before holding larger meetings. The dates selected for the first round are March 10, March 24, March 30 and March 31. These would be evening meetings. Once you select a date I will ask other council persons if they are interested and fill in the dates as commitments are made. We may be able to host additional meetings in April as time allows. (emphasis added is mine)
Let me know your thoughts and if you wish to host a meeting, select the date(s) that work for you and we will make that a commitment.
Bill Collier
645-8062
(Bill Collier, is Mayor Jim Ardis' "education liason")
Tim---
The Peoria Public Schools District 150 Teacher's Union, under the leadership of Bobby Darling, would like to visit with neighborhood organizations/associations to inform the residents in the various council districts of educational reform actions the teachers and their union are interested in making. The school board and district administration have various avenues to get their information out to the public--paid communication people, a web site, electronic newsletter and televised school board meetings. The Union has no such abilities to explain to the public how teachers could and maybe should lead the reform efforts.
I have agreed to help the Union with the setting up of meetings throughout the city and my first thought was to ask district council people to host such a meeting as a good first step. Your district is home to some very active neighborhood associations who like to be informed and this seems to be a great opportunity for them to interact with teacher leaders. The sharing of information can only help the district better know and react to resident concerns while at the same time interacting with those who send their kids to D150.
As you are one of the most active council members I thought I would ask you if you would be interested in hosting a one hour neighborhood meeting. You would select and secure the location and invite those you wish to invite. We would like to start out with 20-30 attendees and see how the sessions go before holding larger meetings. The dates selected for the first round are March 10, March 24, March 30 and March 31. These would be evening meetings. Once you select a date I will ask other council persons if they are interested and fill in the dates as commitments are made. We may be able to host additional meetings in April as time allows. (emphasis added is mine)
Let me know your thoughts and if you wish to host a meeting, select the date(s) that work for you and we will make that a commitment.
Bill Collier
645-8062
Related article: Peoria teachers union president talks education reform
13 comments:
Sharon: You probably didn't receive this "special invitation", but I am betting anybody who shows up can attend. Should be interesting.
Dennis in Peoria:
Will you be recording this meeting?
I won't be attending any meetings just yet--my new knee is doing very well, but not ready to go out in public yet. Do you happen to know what time and where this evening?
Location is Prince Peace - I don't know what time.
Why is Mr. Collier acting on behalf of the teachers union? Isn't his job to act in the best interest of the City in relation to Dist. 150?
In this letter he states:
"The school board and district administration have various avenues to get their information out to the public--paid communication people, a web site, electronic newsletter and televised school board meetings. The Union has no such abilities . . ."
And it is his job to assist in remedying this because WHY? Unions have their own resources for communicating their negotiation posturing.
Should be interesting learning what the Union is "willing" to do through this series of meetings.
All teachers have been notified about this meeting. I think it will be about reforms in evaluations for one thing.
From a very reliable source--4 or 5 fights at Richwoods today.
The meeting is at 7 p.m.
Emerge,
No, just now found out it; I've been in Springfield since Monday afternoon shooting a client video; got back today about 3 pm. Going to be home tonight with family. Maybe I can shoot another meeting if this one goes well
Are the fights at Richwoods something new? We only heard about fights at Peoria High before.
What are these fights attributable to?
Good question Frustrated:
I too found it interesting that Mr. Collier was even asked to help the Union, when the Union could have gone to district council people and set up meetings on their own.
And are town hall meetings something that should be endorsed by the City at this juncture? Not in my opinion.
At the end of the day, the teacher union is an EMPLOYEE union and the District the EMPLOYER. The negotiations are between the 2 parties - not the general public. The community had their chance to have input when they elected board members. Now the public will just have to have faith in those they voted for and the leadership of the Superintendent the Board hired.
Is Collier Ardis' right hand man? Emerge, I would have reported Richwoods fights if I had known about them--just hadn't heard about them. Of course, as I've said before my concern is not so much about the fights (in terms of what schools have them); my concern is how the fights are handled and whether or not the students receive the appropriate consequences.
I guess you'll have to wait to see what is discussed by the union tonight. I thought it was to inform people about the new evaluation process--I don't think that's being negotiated. In truth, I don't know much about it. So should the city listen to the teachers or to the administration and board or should they remain completely neutral? That's a sincere question. I don't know how I feel about any of this. It is my understanding that the union isn't supposed to negotiate in public--I think I recall some times when a school board member did a bit of that on blogs.
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