cheap charter solution eliminates

Cheap Charter Solution Eliminates Retiree Health Care

The new urban model for K-12 education in New Orleans has a new

strategy for attracting only the most desperate educators who can't

compete for teaching jobs in the suburban public systems that still

have benefits for their teachers: Along with no job security, the new

poor community solution offers no health benefits for retired

teachers. From the Times Picauyne:

For teacher Dennis Mischler the road to retirement will take an

unexpected, last-minute twist.

The 30-year veteran had planned to end his career at Lusher Charter

School, where he has taught fifth grade for the past five years.

But this school year Mischler faced an agonizing choice. He could

spend his last semester teaching at Lusher and forgo retirement

health benefits, or move to a non-charter school run directly by

the Orleans Parish school system, and retire with medical benefits.

When it became a charter school more than two years ago, Lusher's

teachers were placed on a leave of absence from the Orleans Parish

school system for three years. District officials said state

charter law required that teachers at schools converting from

traditional programs to charters be put on leave for the three-year

period. That means unless the teachers return from "leave," the

retiree health and life insurance benefits they worked toward in

the old system will be lost.

The unique predicament illustrates the unanticipated wrinkles that

can arise in a school system that transformed into a system of

mostly charter schools at unprecedented speed -- and must now try

to share a limited pool of money and teachers. It also shows the

challenges that charter schools can face in offering the services

and benefits that a central office -- and the collective buying

power of a large school system -- would have provided in the past.

If he stayed at Lusher, Mischler would still be eligible for the

basic retirement benefits through the state retirement system for

public school teachers. It's a share of the ancillary retirement

benefits, like medical and life insurance, that the Orleans Parish

school system provides, but nearly all charter schools do not.

. . . .

Like other employers, charter schools are in no way obligated to

offer retiree health care as a benefit. Huffstutler, 61, said the

Lusher teachers knew they were taking a three-year leave of absence

from the district when the school became a charter. But she's not

sure they all realized the ramifications for retirement benefits.

"At some point, the (school) board is going to say, 'We are not

going to hire someone back for a semester just so we can pay

insurance for them for the rest of their life,' " said Brian

Riedlinger, chief executive officer of the Algiers Charter Schools

Association, a cooperative that manages nine charter schools. "That

doesn't make sense."

. . . .

Some charter operators have studied ways to add more retirement

benefits, but cost remains a steep obstacle. Riedlinger said that,

for the Algiers Charter Schools Association, "the decision was made

early on that it would just destroy us" to offer retiree health

benefits. "We knew it was going to be a problem early on," he said.

. . .