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WILKES-BARRE — At Tuesday’s meeting, a visibly vexed John Padilla, one of 34 teachers being furloughed, accused the Wilkes-Barre Area School District of “creating positions” to help some employees remain on the payroll, and hinted some teachers seemed to know more about what was coming than others as the process unfolded.
Superintendent Bernard Prevuznak denied both charges, but did say the district revamped the athletic director system in a way that allows two retiring teachers to stay on for a stipend as ADs, the same jobs they filled while teaching.
That move is expected to save money, Prevuznak added, because the teaching positions the two left behind will not be filled.
Padilla is only in his second year teaching social studies at Meyers High School, according to state data. He has no other certifications. His lack of seniority and other certifications made him a likely candidate to get furloughed even if he didn’t teach in the programs the board cut: Art, industrial arts, library services and family and consumer sciences.
Teachers in those programs who had seniority and certifications in other fields could stay in the district by “bumping” those with lower seniority in another subject. Figuring out who went where is called “checker boarding.”
During the public comment section of Tuesday’s meeting, Padilla noted some teachers were able to take tests and get state certifications in different subjects before the furloughs were announced, “almost like they knew” ahead of time what was coming.
He also said, “Others who get paid a lot more than I do got a class created for them.”
On Wednesday, Prevuznak said he understood Padilla was upset, but “there was no job, to my knowledge, created so people could keep positions or keep employment within the district.”
Regarding teachers getting certifications that helped them avoid losing their jobs, Prevuznak said the union was informed any such certifications had to be completed by June 10.
“There were pending certifications out there,” Prevuznak said, and it was made clear they had to be resolved by June 10.
The union was involved in the process, Prevuznak added. “I will go on record. We sat down in the room purposely and we invited the union. There were representatives from the union, in fact there were officers, who sat in and watched the checker boarding based on seniority.”
The change with athletic directors at GAR and Coughlin was a separate matter, Prevuznak said. The teachers who have been filling the posts: Cliff Jones at Coughlin and Simon Peter at GAR, retired this year, but the district offered to keep them on as athletic directors for about $17,000 each.
Clifford was with the district 30 years and taught social studies, according to state data. Peter was with the district 27 years and taught health and physical education.
Prevuznak said both were told the work was temporary, until the two schools are consolidated into a new building at the Coughlin site under a plan approved by the school board.
