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By now you should have received an email from Dr. Hite outlining the schedule click here to view the schedule for the furlough days for the 2010-11 school year. While PGCEA is still working to eliminate or minimize the impact of furlough days on our members, the Board of Education needed to release the calendar and related information to give employees time to adjust their schedules.

Ten month staff will notice that the original recommendation of five (5) days has been reduced to four (4) days with a corresponding reduction for those that were scheduled to receive a ten (10) day furlough. The reduction of one day was due in large part to the efforts of PGCEA to convince members of the County Council that funding the school budget at the Maintenance of Effort level was not enough and as such we were able to help secure $6 million more in funding to reduce one furlough day. While PGCEA is still working to eliminate or minimize the impact of furlough days on our members, the Board of Education needed to release the calendar and related information to give employees time to adjust their schedules.

Unit members who are having their positions reclassified from 12 and 11 months to 10 months will not be impacted by the furloughs. Under the original budget plan, those employees were going to see their pay reduced by the reclassification and were going to be furloughed, but PGCEA successfully fought back that proposal.

PGCEA was also able to ensure that the impact of the missed pay due to furlough days would be limited as possible and we were convinced the Board of Education to spread the reduction of salary out over the year as oppose to seeing and entire day’s worth of pay missing from four paychecks. You can see how the deductions will work by clicking here and selecting the “Furlough Estimator.” Here you can input your salary and see exactly how the furlough days will impact your pay.

There are several things your should remember about these days. Furlough days are unpaid days for which you are not required to report to work. No one should be told by their supervisor that they are required to report on a scheduled furlough day. If that occurs, contact PGCEA immediately. Anyone who decides to voluntarily report to their work sites on a scheduled furlough day should know that they are there on their own time, are free to arrive and leave as they see fit and are not required to follow any sort of program set forth by an administrator on that day.

Please check in with the PGCEA website often as we will post updates as necessary.

  The First Furlough Day

Please click here for information on the first Furlough Day, August 16th.