Let’s Put Kids Above Profits
I’d like to
share some reasons NOT to privatize food services:
1.
It can weaken the school-community link and
threaten the quality of education. How does this happen you may ask?
•
It puts dedicated workers out of a job. These
workers are often older and female and will have difficulty finding replacement
jobs
•
These workers are often the health care provider
in the household
•
These food service workers know the names of the
children who come through their cafeteria daily, they know their food
allergies, they know how the discipline in the school works and enforce it.
They provide good role models for the students.
•
For
example, our cafeteria workers always make the holidays a special treat with
decorations and give the children a special little token paid for with their
own money. I doubt this will happen with privatized workers.
•
Research shows that quality of services can be a
huge concern. In a study conducted by the Great Lakes Center for Education
and Research Practice the following concerns arose with private services:
·
In Richmond, Va., parents and students
complained about food quality after a private vendor took over. One lunch meal
consisted of “a pretzel, vegetable and fruit.”
·
In Western Oaks Middle School, located in
suburban Oklahoma City, a contractor left meals in food warmers over a winter
break, resulting in several students becoming ill.
·
In New Orleans, human feces were found in sinks
in the gym facility after the private contractor finished cleaning the area.
2.
Another huge concern is accountability:
•
If a problem arises it is difficult to hold a
private company to the same standards of public scrutiny as we are used to in
public education. If a parent has a concern what assurance do they have that it
will be addressed as similar concerns would be with the other school employees?
Who will be responsible for following up on such complaints? How long will the
process take? How can results be enforced when fault is found?
•
School systems that move toward privatization become
less open and accountable and become more closed and secretive. There are
different regulations for private business and public ones when it comes to
their finances.
3.
There is a high turnover associated with private
food service workers.
•
These private companies pay low wages, hire part
time workers who typically do not stay long in their jobs. This creates a
negative revolving door of personnel serving our children.
•
This merry-go-round of non-qualified employees
presents a problem, as to being sure they are properly trained and properly
screened.
•
Some examples of this are found in the Great
Lakes Center study.
•
In New
Jersey, an audit revealed that a custodial vendor failed to complete criminal
records checks on employees. The audit occurred after workers were caught
stealing laptops. The same company later fired 39 employees for drug use and
other problems.
•
In New York State, a school bus driver who
worked for a private company was arrested for possession of child pornography
•
High turnover leads to low morale, loss of institutional
knowledge, and lower overall service quality.
•
Moreover, this revolving door of school service
providers precludes establishing long-term, trusting relationships among school
staff, parents and students.
•
Private vendors have chronic difficulty in
retaining employees
•
The Great Lakes Center study quotes one school
food worker, as describing her relationship
to the students this way, “I'm mother, father, sister, brother, aunt, uncle,
counselor.... if you need me, I'm here. We can talk. I feel like it’s a village
and everybody has a part.”
4.
Sticker Shock often accompanies the contracting
of private services.
•
There are often cost overruns- larger invoices
than expected
•
Bids are often “Low balled’ to the school system
in order to secure the contract and in future years of service the costs are
marked up
Research
consistently shows that most often over time money is not saved by outsourcing
public education jobs.
More importantly
it shows that quality of service suffers, that accountability becomes less
transparent, and it has a negative impact on the community and those most in
need of jobs.
Why would
you even consider this, when research shows that the school board’s desired
effects of saving money most likely will not even occur and our children will
lose that food service worker who has been properly vetted, who can be held
accountable, who lives in the community, and is the friendly face, appropriate
role model, and person that greets our children every day in the cafeteria and
considers them family?
Speech to the VEA Retired at the VEA-R Convention
Greetings to my VEA Retired friends. I wish I could be here with you today, but I am on a field trip to the Pumpkin Patch with my Early Childhood Special Needs children. I am Sarah Patton, a candidate for VEA President and am seeking your support. I recently asked one of your members for his support. He readily answered, “I am happy to support you”. To which I replied, “Thank you! I value the support of VEA retired members”. He continued, “I not sure how much help we can be, as we only have a few votes to cast”. This was my response to him and to each of you. I can’t think of any group of members whose endorsement I would rather have. Your years of continued dedication and support of public education in Virginia, place you in a unique spot to judge what qualifications and characteristics are needed in a VEA President. You have witnessed first-hand multiple presidents. I believe I have what is needed to serve as president in these challenging times. I pledge to each of you when I am elected, I will be reaching out to you for your knowledge and guidance. I will solicit your input to be sure that the continued funding of VRS and other issues important to our retired members are addressed.
I believe we have the same vision for Virginia – Great public schools for every student in Virginia and great places for every educator to work. I will be listening to the many voices of our members to achieve this goal. Every member’s voice should be heard and every vote counts!
Have a wonderful conference! Thank you for your many years of support for public education and know that I value and appreciate each and every one of you. I look forward to seeing you as I campaign around the state.
Declaration of Candidacy given at the RA Monday, July 6, 2015
I am announcing that I am a candidate for VEA President and asking for your support.
My dad taught me to live by one of his favorite sayings, “Anything worth having is worth fighting for”. I believe that every child in Virginia deserves an equal and quality education. To achieve that goal we need to join together to fight for a strong and vibrant VEA. Anything that benefits us as educators benefits our students. I use the term educators to include ALL school employees.
Can one person or only a few achieve this goal? NO! It will take team work.
Are we deserving of a salary that compensates us fairly?
Do we deserve to be respected?
Do we deserve to be free from the pressures of toxic standardized tests and unfair evaluations?
If you answered yes to these questions, I invite you to join me in the fight to lift up our professional association, so that it is inclusive of all members, values the strength in our diversity, is respectful of all members, and where all voices are heard!
We can no longer sit back and just accept whatever comes our way. Let’s demand what we deserve-to be the most respected profession in Virginia, because we have the most important job in the world.
Thank you.
