Court Opinion

ID: 9731633
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 15:52:58.842915+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:20.141301
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE HARTMAN, dissenting: From the majority’s finding that the grievances in this case concerned employment issues rather than class staffing and assignment under section 4.5(a)(4) of the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act, 115 ILCS 5/4.5(a)(4) (West 1996), I must respectfully dissent for the reasons that follow. For its summer agenda of 1998, Barton Elementary School offered two programs: the Social Center Program, a recreation program intended to keep children occupied during the summer months, in which students receive one hour of tutoring and two hours of recreation each day; and the Bridge Program, in which students in grades three, six and eight, who have failed to advance to the next grade level, take classes in the summer in an attempt to catch up on the skills they are missing. It is important to recognize that no regular summer school program was offered at Barton in the summer of 1998. Summer Bridge Programs were offered not only at Barton, but also at other Chicago public schools. In fact, three Barton teachers taught in Bridge Programs at schools other than Barton in 1998. Six or seven Bridge Program positions were available at Barton for the summer of 1998. Evidence was adduced at the hearings that applications for employment at these programs were placed in every Barton teacher’s box, the union representative’s box and the engineer’s box prior to selection. More applications were received than positions available. There was evidence that no applications were received from any of the grievants prior to the completion of the selection process. The social center positions, however, initially were not completely filled at Barton. The record shows no applications by the grievants for these positions. Recruitment calls had to be made and two teachers were hired from outside Barton for those positions. If this case was about employment, “the ability to obtain additional work, and earn extra compensation, during the summer” (334 Ill. App. 3d at 945) and “an opportunity to earn an additional salary by working a second job” (334 Ill. App. 3d at 945), as found by the majority in its conclusion, there appears to have been openings at Barton for such employment in the summer of 1998, in the Bridge Program which the grievants failed to seek timely, and in the Social Center Program, which the grievants failed to seek at all. Clearly, the grievants here were not just seeking summer employment, but staff placement or assignment to a specific class, the Bridge Program, which was not within their prerogatives, nor was it arbitrable under section 4.5(a)(4). I would affirm.