substitute teacher background

 Would you believe that the teacher in your child’s classroom may actually be earning 17 percent less than a teacher who stood in the same room twenty years earlier? Sadly, it is true. On this Teacher Appreciation Week, I cry out for respect, dignity, and yes, pay raises for TUSD’s substitute teachers, regardless of at which school they may work. From 2000 to 2010, on most days, subs could earn $121.05 per day in any TUSD school. Then in 2010, TUSD cut the rate to $100/day.  In 2015 H.T. Sanchez and his CFO Karla Soto told the Governing Board if they would just outsource us he would use the money he had been putting toward our retirement to raise our pay.  Then Sanchez promptly cut our pay to $92 per day AND took away our retirement as well. The 2015 vote to outsource us was supported by Adelita Grijalva, Kristel Foster, and Cam Juarez, three Democrats who I (as a Democrat) would have assumed would never have kicked low-wage teachers off retirement or cut their pay. (Meanwhile, that same month, Sanchez gave himself a shining evaluation, and the same three board members voted to give him a $30K retroactive increase (bonus) for the school year that just ended, plus a $50K increase for the next year. A school attorney canceled the retro-active increase as not allowable.) It took a multi-year lobbying campaign to get the decision to outsource us reversed. To her credit, Ms. Grijalva had the courage to change her vote after  listening to us, and studying financial reports that showed the farce of outsourcing.  Most subs were re-employed directly into TUSD in January, 2019. That meant those of us who were full-time had the opportunity for district-sponsored health care policies after a year of service, we were re-admitted to state retirement program, and at 25 schools our daily rate went from $100 per day to $135. Hallelujah! But the majority of jobs are at 61 other TUSD schools which still pay $100/day, $21 a day less than subs earned 20  YEARS AGO. Lower-paying schools include F-rated Magee Middle School and D-rated Gridley and Alice Vail Middle schools.    Long-term subs fill dozens of vacancies in the district. They take on full responsibilities of a classroom teacher for a fraction of the pay.  At the 61 lower-paying schools, they earn just $23,000 for a full year of service, only $464 more than a long-term sub of 20 years ago. (Today's subs receive significantly reduced retirement benefits compared to a long-term sub from 2000, so today's long-term subs at most TUSD schools are actually still being paid less than the long-term sub of 20 years ago.) Before presenting the 2019-2020 budget last year, Superintendent Gabriel Trujillo announced to the Governing Board there was increased compensation for “all.”  Later, he admitted in an email to me he didn’t mean us. So we launched a campaign for a mid-year rate increase at the 61 lower-paying schools. Leila Counts proposed $4 a day. Rachael Sedgwick suggested $10. But we didn’t win support from Grijalva and Bruce Burke, who were on the board for the devastating cuts of 2010, nor from Kristel Foster, the champion defender of outsourcing. Then, when school shut down, subs all found ourselves unemployed. Thankfully, I qualified for state unemployment. But to my dismay, colleagues who work full-time or almost full-time at the lower-paying schools were rejected for state unemployment because they didn’t earn enough money. Unlike other TUSD employees, we receive no paid personal days nor any paid holidays that could bring us nearer the cut-off. (Just recently, we found out subs rejected for state unemployment may receive special federal unemployment.) We stand by our teachers and do our best to fill in when they are sick or need to be out for training; we also fill in when a teacher dies, is pulled for alleged misconduct, or simply flees.  How ironic that TUSD—the district that waves the flag of social justice-- has such a sordid history toward its day laborers.
Dolores "Cory" de Vera has been a sub in TUSD since 2012.  Before that she was a news reporter in Missouri for 13 years.