Becky and Scott

The state of Hawaii is in a bit of a budget crises (who isn't these days?). They've been talking about salary cuts & furloughs (days of no work and no pay) for awhile now. Most state employees are already being furloughed two days a month or so.

The teacher's union has been under negotiations since this summer. They finally reached a tentative agreement that will be voted on tomorrow. If its ratified (and from what I hear its expected) it means 17 furlough days from now till the end of the year, which means about an 8% pay cut. They've already come up with the schedule and they're going to be on fridays starting with two next month. And the month of december? Nothing but 4 day work weeks. Supposed to save the union 5 million dollars every furlough day.

We as SLPs are not a part of the teacher's union here...we're a part of the hawaii government employees union. They have not completed negotiations with the DOE/BOE yet. So, who knows, but the likelihood of us getting furloughed is high.

I have my once a week kids on fridays -- not a lot of them, but enough to make me think about re-doing the schedule. That would mean I have to fit 50 kids in 3 1/2 days (they get out at 12:45 every wednesday). That means...pre-k class groups and higher numbers of kids in a group. Small groups are headed out the window for the most part anyways, but they'll be even higher. I don't know what we're going to do about service minutes as an IEP is a legally binding document.

In a way, the public schools are a business like any other. I know my kids are getting the short end of the stick. And there's nothing we can do about it. A few extra days off are nice I suppose, but its turning into quite a mess.