Harp Stands By Push For Para Raises

Under fire for pushing for raises for the school system’s paraprofessionals, Mayor Toni Harp again went to bat for workers whom she pointed out are mostly women and mostly women of color.

Harp took heat at Monday’s Board of Education meeting for having singled out raises for the 500 teacher aides — whose salaries start out at $18,000 a year, which she called ​“slave wages” — as one of her top school budget priorities for the coming fiscal year.

Harp responded that when she first ran for mayor, she met with the school district’s paraprofessionals at High School in the Community. She said when she arrived at that school she stepped into a room much like the L.W. Beecher Museum School of Arts & Sciences cafetorium, where the board was holding its meeting Monday.

“It was full of teachers and, you know, I didn’t see one black person in that room. But you know there must have been about 50 teachers, and I thought that was the paraprofessionals room,” she recalled. ​“But then I saw [paraprofessional union leader] Claudine [Wilkins-Chambers] waving at me on the other side of the door, so I had to walk through that room and went to another smaller room, and when I went into that room I saw people of color, women of color, largely. There might have been one person in that room who was not of color. Maybe two.

“They began to tell me about their struggles and about how much they earned. And as I thought about it, and I’ve got to tell you, my experience was of walking through that room seeing teachers one way, and walking into another room and seeing something that was all together different. So when I asked how much time they spend in the classroom, and they said ​‘Well, it’s the same amount of time,’ and some of them said, ​‘I have a bachelor’s degree and a couple of them said, ​‘I have a master’s degree,. I asked why they didn’t go get [teaching] certifications. Some of them had issues around that.”

The mayor, who also serves as board president, talked about this experience after she was criticized Monday night by elected board members Ed Joyner and Darnell Goldson for her call, first made on the WNHH radio ​“Dateline New Haven program,” to raise the starting annual pay of paraprofessionals from $18,000 to between $25,000 and $30,000. They criticized her for singling out the para raises in remarks taken as a directive to school officials rather than participating first in a broader discussion with fellow board members.

The salary increase for paraprofessionals emerged as one of six initiatives that were outlined by the school district’s top fiscal officer, Victor De La Paz, as justification for asking for an additional $7.5 million from the city in the coming year over the $180 million the city currently contributes to the education budget. The new fiscal year begins July 1.

Rather than approve De La Paz’s plan, board members voted Monday night to leave open until later how they would spend a $7.5 million increase, assuming the Board of Alders approves one. Board members voted to remove the priorities outlined in De La Paz’s plan, which included a $1.7 million raise for paraprofessionals, and to scrap a new funding model for producing ​“equity” among city schools so that members could have more input on spending priorities.

Harp told the school board that when she was recently asked about a push by local unions to get Yale University and Yale-New Haven Hospital to hire more New Haveners at living wages, paraprofessionals were uppermost in her mind. She said not only did she agree with the unions, but the city should make similar considerations in its hiring practices as groups are asking private employers to make in addressing income inequality in New Haven, particularly when it comes to what she called ​“underfunded positions.” Paraprofessionals were also the people she was thinking about as the city launched its Saturday academies.

Harp said for paraprofessionals making $18,000, the district is spending more on benefits than on salary.

“If I have offended any of my fellow board members because I used that as an example and somehow without my knowing it came into this package, I am sorry. I apologize,” Harp said. ​“These women who work with our children all day long. I also was offended when I read [comments made in a] newspaper article that said they’re nothing but highly paid babysitters. I was offended by that.”

Paras Speak Out

She wasn’t the only one offended. Longtime district paraprofessionals present at Monday’s meeting, like Claudine Wilkins-Chambers, were offended too.

“We have more than a high school education,” she said. ​“We have associate degrees, bachelor degrees and even master’s degrees. And those who don’t have to pass the Para Pro test in order to be a full-time para in New Haven.”

Wilkins-Chamber said she has agitated for more professional development and a better evaluation system but nothing has changed. She also said that far too often paraprofessionals are pulled in as substitute teachers for absent teachers.

“We’re not supposed to be teaching-teaching,” she told board members Monday night. ​“If the teacher isn’t there, the parents think they’re children are being taught by a certified teacher, and that’s what bothers me. They’re being taught by a paraprofessional who is doing a good job, but the state says you need to be licensed to teach.”

Another paraprofessional who attended the meeting added that when paraprofessionals are pulled to substitute teach for a class, they’re not legally doing their jobs, particularly in the case of being assigned to a student who has an individualized education plan (IEP).

“It’s against the law,” she said. ​“We need to be able to serve our students. When we can’t provide that continuity, it just disrupts it and you can see the lack of progress … because we’re not consistently with them and those students especially need consistency.”

Diane Monroe, a Head Start paraprofessional, said she is in a classroom every day.

“I am doing every single thing and even more than what a certified teacher is doing,” said Monroe, who is considered by the federal program to be a head teacher. ​“Lesson plans, assessments, IEPs, parent conferences — I am doing above and beyond, and I’m being paid as a para. I make little bit more than the regular paras, but I’m in the classroom every single day.”

“Cherry Picking”?

The criticism of Harp Monday night centered on the fact that she made the call for paraprofessional raises on the WNHH radio program (which was the basis for a subsequent news article in the Independent) in remarks that were taken as a directive. Harp is a member of the board.

Board members Joyner and Goldson raised the criticism.

Joyner said if he had his way, he’d pay paraprofessionals more, ​“but there are some clear standards about what we as board members can say outside of the board, about what we can do and what have you, and if we do it the right way, we’re better off.

“I’m also not going to let anyone make me look like I’m against paraprofessionals because I’m not,” Joyner said. ​“A lot of my family members, a lot of my friends are paraprofessionals, we have custodians and other employees, and teachers, and we need to try to make everybody count in the system. We all have to share the responsibility.”

Goldson said that he doesn’t think any board members oppose looking at school district salaries and finding ways to make them more competitive. But he argued that it has to be done in the context of the entire budget picture, not singling out paraprofessionals.

“We are not going to make this an us against them fight,” Goldson said. ​“We are all in this together, and I’m not going to sit here an argue about who is going to get the most crumbs that are going to fall off the table. If we’re going to give paraprofessionals a $1.7 million raise, then let’s get rid of 23 $125,000 [a year] paid administrators in this school system in the central office, if that’s what we want to do. But let’s not sit up here and try to one up another board member.”

Goldson said the the issue should be studied so that the board can make a serious case to taxpayers and the Board of Alders for raises and not simply cherry pick one group that it has determined is underpaid.

“That is not a fair argument to use with taxpayers and it’s not a fair argument to use with the Board of Alders,” Goldson said. ​“We can’t explain to them what that increase is for, but we can go in the newspapers and say we’re giving 40 percent raises. We have to find a way to do this in a fair equitable way for everyone for the teachers that are underpaid especially the starting teachers, for the custodians who were decimated a couple of years ago when they were privatized, for security who are in there protecting our students, our teachers and our administrators for every working body in those schools. The fact of the matter, for me, without teachers, without students, you don’t have a school system.”

Harp noted that janitors in the school system make more than paras do.

“Not to say that janitors shouldn’t make [what they make]. My parents were janitors. I’m glad that they make good money, but frankly so should our paras,” she said. ​“I’m not ashamed of that. I will not be voting for your budget, and I’m sorry if you’re offended by the fact that I used that as an example; It was not meant to direct policy, but if it did, I am not sorry about that because these women work hard.”

“I was not trying to tell the superintendent to put that in his budget,” Harp said. ​“It was an example of what I consider to be something that the city does, something that New Haven public schools does that ought to be corrected. I didn’t say, ​‘Put it in the budget.’ I’m not going to vote on it one way or another. I’m not ashamed to say that I am ashamed of how much we pay these people.”