OKC school district leaders may delay enacting new code of conduct, union leader says
Union leader Ed Allen, in an email to 2,700 Oklahoma City teachers, said Oklahoma City Public Schools Superintendent Rob Neu is reconsidering a proposal to have teachers create intervention plans for disruptive students and will delay using a new code of conduct.
Oklahoma City Public Schools Superintendent Rob Neu is rethinking the role teachers would play in proposed interventions for disruptive students and will delay implementing a new code of conduct, district teachers were told Friday.
Union leader Ed Allen, in an email to 2,700 teachers, said the delay is "a result of our intense opposition."
"Superintendent (Rob) Neu has agreed that much work remains to be done in order to address our concerns, particularly in regards to the proposal creating 'student support team interventions,' " Allen wrote. "The superintendent has stated to me that these types of interventions cannot be (a) teacher responsibility.
"This is a huge acknowledgement that developing and implementing services for disruptive students will require a tremendous amount of time, time that classroom teachers do not have."
District spokesman Mark Myers declined comment and Neu could not be reached.
Allen and Neu have been at odds over what to do with disruptive students since Neu said he wanted to revise the code to reduce the number and length of suspensions, particularly among minorities.
District officials have said the proposed interventions would result in less behavior issues, an improved school environment and fewer out-of-school suspensions while not "putting any more on (teachers) than what they are currently exposed to."
Allen has been critical of a second level of proposed interventions in which teachers would be asked to work with student support teams to help identify problems students face outside the classroom, provide counseling or recommend other services, according to a draft of the proposed discipline plan obtained by The Oklahoman.
Teachers would end up "bearing the burden of chronic misbehavior," he told school board members July 1.
Allen, who met twice with Neu in recent days, said the superintendent has assured him that teachers "won't have to implement all the work, won't have to sit down and do peer mediation, develop intervention and after-school suspension plans."
"That's for the district or the support team to take care of," Allen said. "Every one of OKC school district leaders may delay enacting new code of conduct, union leader says | News OK: