BOE presses Inos on teacher rep designation

The Public School System is pressing Gov. Eloy S. Inos to appoint a teacher representative to the Board of Education via executive order.

According to letters and documents submitted to the governor, there has been no teacher representative on the board since January of 2008 when Ambrose Bennett’s term expired.

The two letters have so far not gotten any official response from Inos, according to BOE chair Herman Guerrero at a board meeting Tuesday.

“I don’t know where the governor stands on the issue,” Guerrero said in an interview that same day.

In the first letter, dated May 2 this year, Guerrero cited the “ongoing struggle to motivate the Legislature to act in a coherent matter.”

He said that PSS has consulted its attorneys on the legality of the appointment via executive order.

“Because the [CNMI] Constitution gives you the power to appoint any person you deem fit for the job, the criteria constituting that appointment is solely an executive function,” Guerrero told the governor.

He said that PSS previously proposed a bill that called for schoolwide election by fellow teachers, but the Senate pushed a substitute bill instead that did not track the language promoted by PSS or as introduced by then-Senate Education Committee chair Sen. Jovita Taimano (Ind-Rota).

“It has not yielded any fruit,” Guerrero said, on the three-year work with the Legislature.

A follow-up letter, sent three months later on Aug. 6, reiterated PSS’ desire to have the governor appoint the teacher rep through executive order.

Guerrero again cited the Constitution, which states “The selection process of a public school teacher representative by law.”

When asked for comments, acting press secretary Ivan Blanco said the governor supports the position of a teacher representative and can be expected to sign the executive order.

‘Critical’

In an interview, Guerrero described the constitutionally mandated teacher representative as an avenue for teacher input, and that even though the rep is a non-voting member he or she can still participate and debate on issues.

“It’s important to get input from our teachers, it’s an additional avenue for them to do, rather than going through the [BOE] members, going through the commissioner,” he said.

He described teacher input as a critical part of the process in improving and strengthening public schools.

“The Constitution calls for a selection process to be done pursuant to law. Unfortunately the Legislature has not done so,” he said.

‘STOY as Teacher Rep’

Article 15 Section 1(c) of the CNMI Constitution was amended in 2009 to have the process of establishing a selection process for teacher representative be the responsibility of the Legislature.

The Senate bill introduced by Taimanao—dated March 25 of last year—said “the Legislature finds based on a survey the CNMI teachers overwhelming[ly] support that the teacher representative should be the CNMI teacher of the year.”

The survey conducted by PSS Teachers Advisory Panel presented options of a selection process. One was that the president of a teacher organization would be selected as teacher rep, another was selection through a “general election” among teachers, another was the teacher representative being the CNMI state teacher of the year, a similar one was a “panel” of STOY nominees created for governor’s appointment, and the last was a “council of teachers” made up of representatives from each island or schools selecting their own representative on the board.

Out of the 14 schools that participated in the poll—several did not submit votes—13 schools voted for either the STOY or the STOY candidate pool option.

As reported last year, the Legislature instead recommended that teachers hold an election to decide on their representative.

The board rejected this recommendation.

“Based on the results of the survey, PSS teachers want to have the…teacher representative appointed to the position. Because this bill does not reflect the will of teachers, PSS cannot support it at this time,” stated a joint letter that PSS and the BOE submitted to the House education panel last year.