Cooperstown Faculty Association Calls for Board Intervention in District Disputes

By ERIC SANTOMAURO-STENZEL
COOPERSTOWN

At the Cooperstown Central School District board meeting on Wednesday, April 22, the Cooperstown Faculty Association, the union representing regular full-time, part-time, probationary, and tenured teachers, wanted to make a statement.

When union co-president and decades-long teacher Rebecca Burk-Sciallo rose to speak during public comment, over a dozen other faculty wearing black shirts with orange text reading “Cooperstown Faculty Association” rose beside her. The move reflects a continued escalation arc, where for months now CFA members have taken to public comment to express concerns about district practices.

“We want to begin by acknowledging the Board of Education and the work you do to support our students, staff and the future of CCS,” Burk-Sciallo said. “Over the past year, the CFA has consistently communicated openly and transparently serious concerns regarding leadership and follow through at the district level. The data reflects this.”

She pointed to 18 labor grievances filed with the district since the start of the school year, half of which advanced past informal and formal stages to the third stage, Board of Education review. In a later interview, Burk-Sciallo said most of those cases have been rectified.

“These are not isolated incidents. They are the direct results of repeated failures to follow contractual obligations and established procedures,” Burk-Sciallo said.

The speech, which addressed wide ranging concerns from the responsiveness of the district when concerns are brought forward to long-delayed faculty evaluations, concluded that “the relationship between district leadership and the Faculty Association has become untenable.” On behalf of her union colleagues, Burk-Sciallo asked “urgently for the Board of Education to intervene when the chain of command fails.”

In an interview, School Board President Pete Iorizzo said that he respects “the fact that they spoke very candidly. And clearly their concerns are very serious.” He said it is the board’s job “to treat them as such.”

Iorizzo added that the board does not respond to public comments in the moment so as to “try to be thoughtful in our judgment and respectful of the process and make sure we’re asking the right questions.”

Asked about the call for board intervention, he said that processes for dealing with personnel matters occur in executive session and that until the board has enough time and another meeting to “fully digest” the comments, “it would probably be inappropriate for me to speculate on what the actual next action item would be.”

Reached for comment, Superintendent Sarah Spross responded to CFA concerns by saying that, “The District continues to work with the Faculty Association, to provide consistent and timely communication.

“We agree that teacher evaluations play a critical role in supporting both educator growth and student success. When done thoughtfully, they provide meaningful feedback, recognize strengths, and identify areas for professional development. We will continue to work collaboratively with the teachers on refining the [Standards-based Educator Evaluation and Professional Support] plan to assure that the plan is a supportive process that empowers teachers to refine their practice and better meet the needs of the students.”

CFA co-presidents Burk-Sciallo and Anne Reiss, another district teacher, told AllOtsego in an interview that the issues have been ongoing for years and calling for board intervention is the result of exhausted options. They also felt CFA had a “healthy relationship” with the board.

A common theme across the grievances, Burk-Sciallo said, is district officials not understanding the existing union contract.

“We have made it clear that we would appreciate if there was training on being familiar with the contract. But consistently, it seems that decisions are made and choices are made without perhaps referring to the contract or even talking to union leadership,” Burk-Sciallo said.

The union also points to several issues with teacher evaluations. For around two years, teachers and administrators were collaborating on developing a plan for teacher evaluations to submit to the state following changes to state requirements. In the interim, CFA reps said, the district ought to have proceeded with the old system.

“I think our frustration lies in the fact that in the past few years, our evaluations under [Annual Professional Performance Review] were not done correctly, looking at growth, instead they were evaluated looking at achievement” of students, Burk-Sciallo said. She and Reiss said they were unaware of negative consequences for teachers stemming from the discrepancy, but their concern was avoiding the potential for them to occur.

Earlier in the academic year, teachers voted to approve an initial evaluation plan to send to the state for review. While acting upon feedback they then received, some teachers decreased their involvement in the process, citing workload. When they later returned after further work from the district, Burk-Sciallo said, “The plan that we had left was very much a different plan. And so that was not the plan that our members had voted on.”

She said the district and teachers are now “very close” to a final plan. “But we need to make sure that this evaluation system is fair for teachers” and that it helps the teaching of students.

The tension has risen alongside a creeping contract expiration date of June 30. The current CFA contract went into effect on July 1, 2023. Both Iorizzo and CFA representatives declined to comment on the status of contract negotiations.

However, Reiss said, after learning from prior contracts, “when we find out that there are issues with some of the things in the contract, those are the things that we bring forth to negotiate on the next contract.”