May 3, 2021 - The School District of Manatee County and the Manatee Education Association have reached agreement through Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in lieu of any formal action over the recent adoption of modifications to the calendar for 2021-2022.  The MOU addresses the modifications to the October 8, 2021 Record Day and modifies the Collective Bargaining Agreement pertaining to Article XVII-Work Year-Section 1-Work Year. 

The MOU provides the following: 

1. Voluntary BEST Standards professional learning opportunities may be offered on half of the Record Day on October 8, 2021. It is the teacher’s sole choice to participate in this professional development, and no one shall be coerced or pressured to do so by any District or school administrator. No other meetings or professional learning will be scheduled on October 8th. 
2. The Student Growth Score within the Teacher Evaluation System for the 2020-2021 work year will only be used if the measure results in an advantage or benefit for the teacher. 
3. The Superintendent and MEA agree to distribute a joint communication regarding the voluntary professional development, its purpose, and the fact it is restricted to the Record Day on October 8, 2021. 

Pat Barber                                                                       Cynthia Saunders
MEA President                                                                Superintendent 

JFT General Membership Meeting

The last General Membership Meeting of this school year will take place on Tuesday, May 25, 2021 at 5PM via Zoom.

PLANNING TIME

Senate Bill 128 by Senator Katrina Jackson was approved by the Senate Education Committee this week. This legislation would guarantee all public-school teachers 45-minutes of unencumbered planning time each day.

While some districts do offer their teachers a planning period, it’s often interrupted with meetings or being pulled into another class. This year, more than most, teachers have lost out on valuable planning time. Not only is this necessary for lesson planning, printing materials and planning for the day, it is often the only time that teachers have to use the bathroom, drink water or eat during the entire school day.

PAY RAISES

This week, the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education held a Special Meeting to consider the MFP recommendation from the legislature, among other business. As you may remember, previously the legislature sent the MFP back to BESE to ask that they include more funding for teacher and school employee pay raises. At the meeting this week, BESE voted to amend their MFP proposal to match the recommendation from the Louisiana Legislature. BESE's MFP proposal now includes an $800 raise for certified 

On Tuesday the Revenue Estimating Conference will meet to re-consider revenue projections for...

Click here for this week's update

In this Issue:

1) Evaluation Rebuttals

2) Discretionary Fund Update

3) Non Tenured Update

4) NBOE Approved Vendors (Aflac, etc)

5) AFT Update

6) Escrow Update

And much more

This Nurse’s Week, we want to reflect on what the last year has been like for nurses and health professionals.

Congratulations to Doug Kingsbury, who, after three decades in lab medicine, is retiring June 1. We'll miss him greatly and of course we wish him the best.

Before saying goodbye, he agreed to a quick exit interview.

A recap of our 2021 business convention, the first to be held virtually, April 15.