A survey of teachers done by the county teachers union's leader has raised the ire of Harford County Board of Education members and Superintendent Barbara Canavan.
Ryan Burbey, president of the Harford County Education Association, presented a poll completed by 641 union members which he said showed many of them feel unvalued and disrespected by the school system. The school system employs about 3,000 teachers.
School board members, however, called the survey scientifically questionable, and Canavan said it may have damaged relationships within the school system.
Jean Mantegna, assistant superintendent of human resources, also said soliciting school staff for the survey violated labor agreements the school system has with the teachers union.
"I'm sure there were good intentions with this survey, but there were a lot of people hurt by this, a lot of people," Canavan told Burbey following his presentation.
Acrimonious relationship
The outspoken union leader's relationship with school officials has been unusually acrimonious in recent months. In September, Burbey was banned from entering school buildings. He says he was accused cursing at an after-school program staff member at Emmorton Elementary School. He denies that happened.
After the school system denied a grievance filed by Harford County Education Association on Burbey's behalf, a complaint was filed with the Maryland Public School Labor Relations Board through the union's parent, the Maryland State Education Association. The case remains open, Kristy Anderson, general counsel for state education association, said Thursday.
The school ban for Burbey does not extend to school headquarters the A.A. Roberty Building in Bel Air, where Burbey spoke to school board members Monday night.
In the teachers union survey, about 90 percent of those responding said they do not feel valued and respected by the school system, 67 percent said they do not feel valued and respected by the community in Harford County and 74 percent said they are considering leaving the school system.
Upward of 40 percent also said their principal, assistant principal or instructional facilitator did not provide quality professional development, according to the survey.
More than 55 percent said their supervisors have treated them or their colleagues in an unprofessional manner, and 33 percent said they have felt bullied by a principal, assistant principal or facilitator, according to the survey.
Several issues cited
Mantegna told the board the survey has structural issues, explaining she knows respondents could complete the survey multiple times and she knows at least one person surveyed who is not a teacher.
Burbey said Tuesday his union membership includes about 60 percent of the school system's roughly 3,000 teachers. Based on that estimate, approximately 35 percent of the HCEA members took the survey. Burbey said he used the popular Internet application SurveyMonkey.com to elicit responses.
He told the board the results were not meant as an attack on them and he knows Canavan "has made herculean efforts" to help administrators foster quality professional development.
Burbey told the board that despite the survey's possible flaws, the high responses of dissatisfied employees "is a troubling, troubling number."
"It's reached a breaking point," he said.
Board president Nancy Reynolds, however, wondered why Burbey did not use a more scientific statistical tool and told him he could have obtained the information in a more objective manner.
Board member Thomas Fitzpatrick added that while a previous presentation by Mantegna, on teacher recruitment and retention, "was a very powerful tool" for the board, "this document is not quite as useful as that, for a number of reasons."
Fitzpatrick said many thought the Burbey survey was "a conclusion chasing in search of a premise."
Mantegna's report on teacher recruitment and retention, also released to the board Monday night, states that the rate of teacher retention fell to 89.2 percent, as Harford lost 101 teachers during the period, "with retirement being the top single reason cited for separation." The report covers the period from mid-October 2013 to mid-October 2014.
The report also notes that Harford received an average of nine applications for every teacher position filled; however, 46 offers were declined, "nearly double that from the previous year." Of that total, salary or prior acceptance of another offer were cited in 29 turndowns.
A similar report released in December 2013, that discussed the disparity in pay for Harford teachers compared their counterparts in other counties, placed overall teacher retention rate for HCPS at 93.1 percent from the 12 months ending Sept. 30, 2013.
'Adversarial, finger-pointing'
Board member Joseph Hau said Burbey's survey "seems designed to be adversarial," while board member Jim Thornton said the survey should have been more collaborative.
"This is not one of our highlights as a board this evening, this presentation," Thornton told Burbey. "It appears to me nothing is gained here except finger-pointing. I think it sets us back, frankly."
Canavan said her email "went on fire" after the survey and noted she and her leadership team visit every school, trying to have open dialogues with everyone.
"We are not interested in a dog-and-pony show," she told Burbey about her regular visits with the staff. "I am not a person that tolerates 'unsatisfactory,' and I have a hard time with 'satisfactory.'"
Canavan told Burbey she hopes to move on from the survey.
"From here on in, let's continue to try to work together as a community and a cohort to make things better for all of us," she told Burbey.
Burbey said Tuesday he was not surprised by the board's response and still believes even if a small portion of staff responded and even if people were able to do the survey multiple times, "I don't think it's a fringe group."
"I said over and over again it's not a scientific survey. It does lack internal controls," Burbey said. "The purpose of this was to call attention to issues we are having in the schools and to get the board of education to understand [that]."