What's the cost of 5 hours?

According to a copy of the proposal, the union demanded the following conditions: the permanent removal of five floating after-school meetings, permanent removal of the need to provide a reason for personal days, and the permanent requirement that no after-school meetings be scheduled two weeks prior to the issuing of report cards.

From the Milford Daily News article on the School Committee meeting 4/14/09.


The citizens of Franklin will find out, hopefully soon, what the cost of 5 hours of meetings are. Is it worth 1 million dollars? Or is it worth more?

The teachers union in a vote to accept the 2.5 percent wage freeze for the 2009-2010 school year attached three minor conditions to the proposal.

To remove from their contract, five floating after school meetings. There already are three mandatory meetings each month for the teachers at each school. Is there really a need for these five floating meetings? I hope not.

To remove the requirement for providing a reason for taking two "personal" days. There are only two, you use them or loose them. They are already defined "personal". Does the School Dept really need to know the personal reason? I think that is too much of a controlling issue.

To add a requirement not to schedule after-school meetings in the two weeks prior to report cards. This seems reasonable. The time before report cards should be focused on preparing the accurate information for students and parents/guardians on the progress made during the marking period.

Why this was not discussed during the meeting, I can understand given the nature of the conversation that did take place between Chandler Creedon and the School Committee. They were talking about the same topic, using different words, not really answering each others questions. For me, there is a communication issue there. I hope it gets resolved quickly.