MERIDIAN, Idaho – In 2011, Idaho lawmakers approved, and Gov. Butch Otter signed, a law limiting the power of teachers unions in the state’s public schools.

Among other things, the law limited union collective bargaining to salary and benefits. Teachers unions no longer had the ability to dictate policy, and suck the financial life out of schools, through cut-throat contract negotiations.

A year later state voters overturned the law at the ballot box, mostly due to a multi-million dollar campaign by the unions to convince the public that they care about the interests of students.

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Individual teachers certainly care about students, but union officials – who negotiate the contracts – are dedicated to securing all the perks they can, regardless of how it affects children or school districts.

Paid leave policies in teacher union contracts are perfect examples. They encourage absenteeism, which forces districts to pay a lot of money to employees for sitting at home, as well as substitute teachers. It also steals learning time away from students, who generally gain very little from time spent with subs.

In the West Ada school district, the union contract provides teachers and other covered employees with 10 paid sick days at the beginning of every school year. The work year for most teachers is about 190 days.

Employees can accumulate up to 280 unused sick days, and there is no apparent limit on the number they can use each year.

The contract also provides covered employees with two paid personal days for the first three years of employment, and three personal days starting with the fourth year.

Unused personal days can be banked, and employees covered by the contract can use up to six per year.

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The paid leave policies in the union contract obviously only apply to teachers and other employees who are members of the union, but they comprise the majority of employees in the district.

All the days off they are allowed to take add up to a major investment for the district.

In 2013-14, the approximately 3,000 employees in the West Ada district took a combined 27,578 sick and personal days off, which comes out to an average of about nine paid absences per employee.

The employees were paid a combined $3.4 million for sick days off and $1.6 million for personal days off. That comes out to $5 million spent in salary for employees when they were not working.

The West Ada district paid out $2.1 million for substitute teachers in 2013-14.

Is this the best possible use of that much district money? According to news reports, the West Ada district, like most in Idaho, is still recovering from massive cuts in state school aid during the recent recession.

For instance, the district still has not restored five professional development days for teachers that were eliminated as part of the budget-cutting process, according to a media report. Voters in the school district recently approved a $28 million property tax level to help the district with operational costs, due to the lack of revenue from the state, another news report said.

Yet the school district still pays out $5 million in a single academic year for employees who are not present and not working. There has to be a more economical way to give employees the days off they need when they are genuinely sick, without inviting a lot of frivolous absenteeism.

Another example is the Nampa school district, where the union contract provides 10 sick days and three personal days per year.

Unused sick days can accumulate from year-to-year and there doesn’t seem to be any limits on the number of days that can be taken during a school year.

Personal days can be carried over from year-to-year and a maximum of six can be used during a single school year.

In 2013-14, roughly 852 teachers and administrators in Nampa took a combined 4,151 paid sick and personal days. They were paid a combined $896,445 for those days off, and the district was forced to spend $367,480 on substitute teachers.