My district office is so bad--and make no mistake about it, the rot starts at the top--that my best suggestion for how to fix things would be to nuke the entire *street* from orbit. Yes, I acknowledge that doing this would cause significant collateral damage, but on balance, ensuring the removal of the greatest possible number of district office administration would probably be worth the cost.
As you can see, I don't have feelings of admiration and/or respect for the denizens of the D.O. Yesterday, however, one of them impressed me, and impressed me to such a degree that I told other teachers the story today every chance I got. I don't want to be the guy who complains all the time.
By the end of school last June I had completed enough outside training that I can move over to a higher level on our salary schedule. The documentation was submitted over the summer and, when I returned to school last week, showed up on the computer. I thus needed to submit my paperwork to let our payroll department know that I now meet the requirements to be moved on the salary schedule, and did so this past Monday.
The catch, though, is that the person who would usually process this paperwork no longer works for our district. With no one sure whom I should send the paperwork to, I sent it to the head of our HR department. I enclosed a letter explaining why I sent her that paperwork and what it was for.
Again, that was Monday. On Tuesday I received a thorough email from our HR Director. It was a few paragraphs long.
First off, she confirmed that HR had received my paperwork.
Then she explained that August is a difficult time for our payroll department, as their primary concern is to ensure everyone gets a paycheck at the end of the month. Given all the new hires, etc., they are quite busy and will probably not be processing pay raises in August. Once the August payroll is complete, however, then they will start processing those of us who have changes in the order in which they received our paperwork. Even if my personal situation is not resolved in September (we have over 2000 teachers, in addition to all the other staff), it will be handled as quickly as they can do so and any pay due will be paid to me retroactively.
I appreciated her prompt, professional, and clear reply. Such a reply gives me confidence that at least one boss over at the district office knows what she's doing.
I've long said that any bureaucracy could elemenate entire layers and nobody would be the wiser. ON that same topic, a former collegue of mine found out last month that the district had shorted his salary for the last four years to the tune of $4000 or so a year. This was at a time when his family was struggling as he went through treatment for cancer. No apology note, no offer of interest, just a notation on his check stub.
ReplyDeleteIn my suburban district, the Science Department needed to replace our 50 year old Van de Graaff generator. When the asst. superintendent was in the building, he stopped by my room to let me know that the district owns several generators. I should let him know if I needed to borrow one. It took me a second to realize that he'd seen the Van de Graaff request and was offering to help.
ReplyDeleteCentral office does plenty of stupid stuff in general, but a few people actually aspire to do their jobs. I'm with you. When somebody comes through on an issue in a helpful and professional manner, I tell everyone. When it's an underling, I email the department manager. The world doesn't get better by just criticizing the crappy, you have to recognize and reward the good.