General Membership Meeting: JFT will hold a General Membership Tuesday, March 21st at 6 PM at the Plumbers and Steamfitters Building 3515 N. Interstate 10 Service Rd W, Metairie 70002. Cynthia Posey, Political and Legislative Director, will present her 2023 Legislative Update. The Regular Legislative Session begins on April 10th and ends on June 8th. It is a fiscal session. Teacher and support staff pay raises will be part of the 2023 session. LFT and JFT will be asking for members to participate through click and sends and possibly a day of action at the Capitol. Please keep an eye out for urgent action alerts from LFT and participate whenever you can! Nominations for president will also take place at the General Membership Meeting. Ms. Kesler Camese-Jones retired in December 2022. Nominations will occur for the remainder of her term, which runs through May 2024. MORE

Last year, Louisiana passed a $1,500 raise for teachers and $750 for school support staff. It was an historic raise by Louisiana standards, but still significantly lower than increases passed in neighboring states. At the same time, LDOE passed a bill that forces teachers to pay a fee for a duplicate background check and the Office of Group Benefits increased premium costs, again. LFT is already working to pass another pay increase. One that will actually make a difference in the lives of our teachers and school employees, but we want to hear from you! Low pay is not the only thing driving teachers and school employees away from our classrooms, but it is an important factor. We want to hear about your experience. How have recent increases to insurance costs impacted your take home pay? How has inflation and increased costs of living impacted your ability to stay in this job? MORE

This week, the Minimum Foundation Program (MFP) Task Force met to consider the 2023-2024 funding formula for Louisiana public schools. This task force makes a recommendation to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) about how to moderate the formula to provide for raises and/or school funding. Next week, BESE will consider this recommendation and determine how large of a raise to include in their MFP proposal before sending it to the legislature for approval. Learn more about what happened and how we can work together to push BESE to increase your raise. MORE

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The Jefferson Parish School Board recently implemented a Biometrics finger-swipe sign-in/sign-out process for employees to monitor employee attendance. Several JFT members have asked whether this is legal and have raised questions concerning privacy rights and possible data breaches. Only four states that have passed laws governing use of biometrics in employment: Illinois, Texas and Washington. One additional state (New Hampshire) has passed a law governing biometrics used by their Department of Motor Vehicles. Louisiana has passed a law but it only applies to biometric data gathered from students, not employees. MORE

Kesler Camese-Jones retired on December 9, 2022. In accordance with Article VII, Section F of the JFT Constitution, the position of President will be declared vacant and an election will be held to fill the position of President for the remainder of Kesler’s term, which expires in June of 2024. Sandra Hauer (Executive Vice-President) will become Acting President. MORE