A state Supreme Court judge has given the Amityville school district 800,000 reasons why it cannot disregard a collective bargaining agreement and assign teachers extra work without pay.

In a decision upholding an arbitrator's 2006 ruling, the judge in Suffolk County ruled from the bench in November that the district must pay $800,000 in back wages to Amityville sixth-grade teachers who were assigned an extra academic period starting in 2003.

"This is money they earned for teaching an additional class," said Amityville Teachers Association President Carolyn Dodd.

In what Dodd called a complete "disregard for the collective bargaining process," the district in 2003 assigned 21 sixth-grade teachers an additional academic period to teach, replacing a non-instructional "team time" period that students typically used to get caught up on work.

Not the first time

Remarkably, the school district had tried the same thing in 1995, and ATA grieved the practice and settled it successfully.

This time, getting the teachers paid for their extra work was a long and often frustrating process, Dodd said.

The teachers worked the extra period for four years as the grievance process played out, and the district only this year dropped the extra period from teachers' schedules.

The ATA was assisted in the legal battle by NYSUT Labor Relations Specialist Jonathan Rubin and the statewide union's Office of General Counsel.

The case is similar to a recent settlement between the Rochester Teachers Association, led by Adam Urbanski, and the city schools, in which 700 teachers were over-assigned during a 13-year period.

Dodd said she was most proud of the solidarity and professionalism shown by her members and the affected sixth-grade teachers throughout the drawn-out legal process.

The 21 teachers had the full support of ATA's nearly 300 members, and they provided quality instruction during the extra period, without pay, while the legal proceedings continued.

While the district could appeal the ruling, Dodd is hoping two consecutive defeats will send a strong message.

"How many more taxpayer dollars are they going to spend on this?" she asked.

— Kevin Hart