What time is Duran's announcement today?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why did they switch 3-5 to concurrent? That still doesn't make sense to me. Was it solely to appease parents complaining about switching teachers?

We were told there were not enough teachers to make the other way work given hybrid demand.

[Anonymous]

Not a shortage of teachers. A shortage of assistants to monitor the other half of the class if using the k-2 model. Every class has one teacher so there’s not a teacher shortage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel like people don't understand what an accommodation is under the ADA. It doesn't mean you get to work remotely forever. One accommodation is to put plexiglass up. The one used in schools is masks and distance. Just because you are high risk doesn't guarantee work from home. People should really read the regs and guidance that has come out before they make these assumptions.

You are correct. However APS did not tell anyone applying that they were using ADA. They still listed the CARES/CDC guidelines but then used ADA to assess the applications.

I understand your frustration. The HR guy (I'm blanking on his name) explained this to the SB a few meetings ago- basically they were initially planning to use CARES/CDC guidelines, but then realized they would also have to consider it under the ADA since that was the legal rqmt, so rather than making it a 3 step process (apply under CARES, get denied, apply under ADA, get denied, appeal) they streamlined it to just apply under the ADA.

I suspect the real reason, however is something along these lines.
Teaching and Learning is in way over its head- and cannot figure out how to manage this. They are constantly changing the model, which correspondingly changes the staffing needs. So initially it was going to be hybrid classes and virtual classes. Virtual classes would have a virtual teacher, hybrid classes would have an in person teacher. Under that model- there is a significant need for virtual teachers, and so it made sense to be liberal with granting virtual teaching requests. Then they start pushing out 'concurrent'. Initially it is just going to be concurrent for a few specialized high school classes, then it becomes all of high school, then all of middle school, and now going down to third grade. This of course takes place over many many months. Well no sane person really thinks that having a remote teacher, with a largely in person class, is in any sense an appropriate teaching model. So now APS really doesn't want to grant any requests to teach virtually b/c (other than k-2) it has largely done away with its 'virtual' positions. Theoretically, there could be a teacher who currently teaches 4th grade for example, but is fully qualified to teach 1st grade- so they should at least consider the request and see if they should move to teaching 1st grade virtually. There is also a fair amount of doublespeak happening at syphax, which makes it hard to trust anything that is said.

This is a great explanation that really explains everything coming out of teaching and learning this year. They really screwed themselves and everyone with the lack of planning and constant model shifting. Also, this is a product of APS taking a “survey” approach to deciding who gets in person instruction. Should have started with who needs it and staffed that way. This is what DC did.

Thank you, PPs for the excellent explanations. I feel for teachers but my son with an IEP that is short of a full one on one aide isn’t getting the accommodations he is supposed to get BY LAW either. Enough is enough.

I think that was part of the reason they moved to concurrent for 3-5 too. They had planned on using assistants to monitor the classes but if they did that SPED students lost hours. That’s a legal requirement they can’t just brush off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Part of the problem here is that so many teachers are submitting total bs accommodation requests that it puts APS in a position of having to take a hard line on all requests. If the people submitting requests based on close relatives with risk factors were limited only to people who actually live with people with critical health needs, it would be a lot easier for APS to be lenient in granting those requests even though they don’t strictly have to. When you have people making requests to teach virtually because their dad has a heart condition but dad lives an hour away and the teacher isn’t responsible for any direct care, that’s a garbage pretense to try to get an accommodation that has no grounds other than the teacher would rather keep working from home. APS can’t feasibly drill down into all of these requests and figure out what valid and what’s a pretense, so instead they deny all of them.

This.

and also just hearing a story that someone was denied that sounds bad isn't really enough to know what happened. Did the person submit the request properly? Did they have actual medical evidence?

I do know that one person who had a transplant was denied, but she was also given a virtual accommodation at the school level by her principal. It doesn’t stop the complaining though.