As rural schools struggle with teacher shortages, we need all capable hands on deck. Recent House bills signed into law helped retired teachers and other employees return to work without a reduction in pension benefits. But these laws don\u2019t apply to administrators.<\/p>\n
Tom Burris, interim superintendent at Montezuma-Cortez School District, is one of those administrators.<\/p>\n
Burris, a former RE-1 educator, had settled in nicely to retired life \u2013 hunting, fishing exploring and \u201cgoing out in the forests, doing all the fun things,\u201d he said. Then the district came calling. Burris wanted to be of service to this community he loves and was hired in March.<\/p>\n
Burris has a 140-140 contract. He could work 140 days one year, then 140 days into the next year. From his hiring, Burris counted 159 workdays through the end of the year. He couldn\u2019t be on the payroll for 19 days because of a snag with PERA, Colorado\u2019s Public Employees Retirement Association. If he goes over, the penalty is $288 per day. With a four-day school week, 19 workdays unpaid equals five weeks without leadership. Who would run the district? \u201cI can\u2019t let that happen,\u201d Burris said.<\/p>\n
While crafting the bills, Rep. Barbara McLachlan, D-Durango, and her colleagues honed in on the most dire shortages: teachers, school nurses, bus drivers, cafeteria workers and paraprofessionals. This covers almost everyone. Except administrators.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe shortage wasn\u2019t as acute for administrators, so they weren\u2019t included in talks between state representatives and PERA officials to return under the same plan,\u201d said McLachlan. The lawmakers\u2019 work is commendable. PERA can\u2019t budge without this legislative muscle. Still, we\u2019d like to see PERA compromise to include administrators in the same spirit of support for rural schools. Separately, New Mexico relaxed its Educational Retirement Board restrictions. We want Colorado\u2019s PERA to take notice.<\/p>\n
The state gets in its own way with PERA. Our educators \u2013 no matter their level of management \u2013 need to be paid or have time off. We encourage PERA to reconsider how its rules play out in the real world.<\/p>\n
McLachlan, a former teacher, said PERA often says it will lose money by letting employees back into districts. But school budget experts disagree \u2013 employees put in money, districts put in money. When pressed, PERA \u201cdidn\u2019t fight for that comment,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Burris added, \u201cI don\u2019t get the logic.\u201d<\/p>\n
He pays into the PERA system monthly, with \u201cno resulting affect to his retirement account.\u201d He won\u2019t see the money he\u2019s putting in now.<\/p>\n
The Montezuma-Cortez school board voted unanimously recently to extend Burris\u2019 contract through the 2022-23 school year. He is well-acquainted with Cortez schools, having served as assistant principal, then principal of Montezuma-Cortez Middle School, and later becoming the district\u2019s business manager and human resources director.<\/p>\n
Since then, he has served as superintendent for New Mexico\u2019s Roswell Independent School District and Truth or Consequences Municipal Schools.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe best years of my career were here,\u201d Burris told The Journal<\/em>. \u201cI would not have done this for any other district.\u201d<\/p>\n The last thing we want the state to do is penalize his choice. And he isn\u2019t alone in this situation.<\/p>\n Burris has focused on RE-1\u2019s strategic planning process, and aligning district policies and procedures. Rather than coming in with an agenda, Burris turned to staff members on where the district needed to improve. Two of the most pressing problems: discipline and attendance. Educational leaders deserve all the backing we can offer. And we can\u2019t let up.<\/p>\n We require bold, top-down leadership. School administrators coming out of retirement shouldn\u2019t have to pay out-of-pocket for their jobs. We need them too much.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" rural schools struggle with teacher shortages, we need all capable hands on deck. Recent House bills signed into law helped retired teachers and other employees return to work without a reduction in pension benefits. But these laws don\u2019t apply to administrators. Tom Burris, interim superintendent at Montezuma-Cortez School District, is one of those administrators. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-39135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39135\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39135"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=39135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}