Association of Classified Employees Foothill – De Anza

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  • 2025.03.21 Update – Floating Leave Review, CalPERS Education, ACE Website Woes, AB 65 Pregnancy Leave Bill (14 Weeks Paid), Accessible Secrets

    ACE Members,

    Floating Leave Review
    After talking with members, here is a complied deep dive review:

    9.3 Floating Leave
    Each full-time permanent worker shall be granted up to a maximum of 40 hours of paid leave per year as a floating leave. Permanent part-time workers who work fewer than 40 hours per week are entitled to that proportion of floating leave hours granted full-time workers that is equal to the percent of a full-time contract. Eligibility for floating leave begins on the first of the calendar month following six complete months of employment.

    Floating leave may be used for planned absences for which other leaves (sick leave, personal necessity leave) are inappropriate, such as special family obligation (attending a family member’s graduation or marriage ceremony) or celebrating a birthday or special occasion. The worker may, but is not required to, inform the supervisor of the purpose or nature of the request.   

    Floating leave is not cumulative, will not accrue from year to year, and must be utilized during the college year (July 1 – June 30) or will be lost. Floating leave has no cash-value, and any unused floating leave hours shall not be converted to other leave credits upon separation from service. Floating leave must be scheduled in advance with the supervisor, and must have the approval of the supervisor as evidenced by the supervisor’s signature on the time sheet.

    Why was this change made?
    Our Agreement has always included Personal Necessity Leave (defined by Ed Code) as a subset of Sick Leave, but our separate Personal Leave led to confusion for Human Resources new hires (pre-2024).

    What changed?
    Here’s a table and explanation:

    Pre-2024Post-2024
    10.1 Sick Leave (10.1 Personal Necessity Leave)10.1 Sick Leave (10.10 Personal Necessity Leave)
    10.10 Personal Leave9.3 Floating Leave

    Per our Agreement there are two key things to understand about Floating Leave:

    1. It is a catch-all for anything which other leaves may not be appropriate for, and;
    2. You are not required to disclose what you are using it for.

    How do I request Floating Leave?
    The District is working on updating Banner and LiquidOffice, but the expectation is that our existing pool Personal Leave will be renamed to Floating Leave. Until then you can request to use Floating Leave by emailing your manager/supervisor/administrator a message saying, “I would like to use floating leave on [planned day]. Please respond if you approve my request.”

    What if they ask what I’m using Floating Leave for?
    The suggested response would be, “I am not required to provide information regarding the purpose or nature of the request.”

    Until Banner and LiquidOffice are updated, how do I show that I used Floating Leave?
    For now, use the Personal Leave drop down category in LiquidOffice. Add a note where LiquidOffice allows stating that Floating Leave was approved on the days you chose Personal Leave.
    (Yes, it’s admittedly confusing right now but it will be corrected.)

    What if I need to take Personal Necessity Leave?
    Personal Necessity Leave is available to permanent and probationary workers, and it is drawn from Sick Leave, so you would use the Sick Leave drop down category in LiquidOffice and add a note stating that the Sick Leave was used for circumstances (but not limited to) of personal necessity under 10.10:

    10.10.1 Emergencies or obligations related to the worker’s home or family members, including medical or dental appointments for the worker’s family members when the nature of the appointment requires the worker’s presence,

    10.10.2 Emergencies or obligations related to the worker, including appointments for the purpose of conducting personal legal affairs or financial transactions, receipt of a court order requiring absence from work, or observation of a major religious holiday of the worker’s faith.

    10.10.3 Extending bereavement leave for the employee’s immediate family; or

    10.10.4 Appearance in any court or before any administrative tribunal as a litigant, party, or witness under subpoena or any order made with jurisdiction.

    What if I have more questions or getting leaves approved?
    Reach out to a Steward.

    Below is a sample image of my LiquidOffice Time Card (LOTR) from October which includes the dropdown of available codes. I’d like to focus on 3 of them:

    • 180 Sick Leave – This is most commonly used for when you are sick and does not require pre-approval.
      • How to use it: “I’m staying home today, I’m sick” or “I have a medical appointment for preventative treatment or diagnosis”
      • See 10.1 (LINK)
    • 185 Personal Necessity Leave – This covers unavoidable emergencies and obligations related to your household (does not require pre-approval [unless it can be anticipated/scheduled]).
      • How to use it: “I have an unavoidable obligation that takes place during work hours. If you have questions, let schedule a conversation.”
      • See 10.10 (LINK)
    • 300 Floating Leave – This could be used for anything (requires pre-approval).
      • How to use it: “I would like to use floating leave on Friday. I’m not required to disclose the purpose or nature of this request.”
      • See 9.3 (LINK)

    CalPERS Member Education
    Want to know more about the pension plan? Member education events are available on the CalPERS website – https://www.calpers.ca.gov/education-center/member-education

    On the same page you can sign up for email alerts that will ping you monthly, which is also a good reminder to attend an event or check out a video on your topic of interest:

    CalPERS may not be the largest social media influencer, but they are on YouTube if you’d like to subscribe to their channel – https://www.youtube.com/CalPERS

    Create an account to view, manage, and create retirement estimates at https://mycalpers.ca.gov/ .

    We may be able to answer some questions at upcoming site meetings, but CalPERS is the ultimate source for details about his benefit.

    ACE Website WordPress Woes
    Our website is a valuable resource for union updates, contract information, forms, and information about our organization. Unfortunately, some components are not aging gracefully. This week a plug-in broke access to pages and had to be disabled. This is occurring more frequently, so it’s probably beyond time to redesign the site and remove those old plugins which cause compatibility issues. Despite my technical background and personal Geocities experience, it does become a bit of a challenge and there’s an awareness that it may be unmanageable for others to support in the future.

    Want to get involved in the fix? Do you have a WordPress background and desire to provide additional guidance? Contact @Scott Olsen

    AB 65 Pregnancy Leave Bill
    Attached is the CalSTRS analysis for a state bill up for discussion. I’ll highlight the important pieces which would affect us at the district:

    Specifically, this bill:

    • Requires public school employers and community college districts to provide up to 14 weeks of leave with full pay to certificated and classified employees who experience pregnancy, miscarriage, childbirth, termination of pregnancy or recovery from those conditions as determined by the employee and employee’s physician.

    • Provides a formula for calculating the amount of leave for part-time employees.

    • Permits the paid leave to begin before or continue after childbirth.

    • Prohibits a paid leave of absence for any of these reasons from being deducted from other leaves of absence available to the employee.

    • Requires employers to maintain group health coverage for an employee who takes this leave for the duration of the leave and at the same level and under the same conditions of coverage they would have been provided had they not taken the leave.

    • States that employers have an obligation to continue complying with bargaining agreements that provide greater disability or parental leave rights to employees than those provided by this bill.

    • Extends provisions that require, except as provided by the bill, employers to apply policies and practices for disability due to pregnancy or childbirth in the same manner as other temporary disabilities to classified employees.

    • Provides that there are no eligibility requirements for this leave, including, but not limited to, minimum hours worked or length of service, except for those laid out in the bill.

    This would be a substantial benefit beyond our current collective bargaining agreement to address inequity in the workplace. Sometimes we’re able to negotiate for added contract benefits and sometimes the law can provide those added benefits. Please contact your state representatives to provide your feedback on this proposed bill – https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials/

    Do you have a topic to contribute to these member email updates? Send them my way! I can credit you or you could be anonymous. Anything that directly affects our work environment is a great subject to raise.

    From yesterday’s message, we have a copy of “Secrets of a Successful Organizer” to provide to members who are visually impaired or would like an accessible version.

    In Service,

    Scott Olsen (he/him) | ACE President
    https://acefhda.org | scott.olsen@acefhda.org  
    650-949-7789 | M-F 8:00am-5:00pm

  • 2025.03.20 Update – President’s Message, DA VP Appointed, Staff Development Leave, Dues Forgiveness Apr & May, Call Back Time

    ACE Members,

    President’s Message
    We’re constantly paying attention to the volume of executive orders, actions, and legal counters, rapidly coming out of the federal government. We’re in an evolving landscape (to put it very mildly) which is making understanding how we’ll be affected difficult. Again, nothing is changing at the district right now – we have no budget shortfall, no change in our services, and no positions are changing.

    The chart (LINK) below from Labor Notes’s “Secret of a Successful Organizer” is something I often recall. We are holding the “interpretation box” to understand what’s going to happen when the dust settles. Threats to funding also put us in the “righteous anger box”, but what’s important as a plan to win is to channel that message toward decision makers who have leverage over the funds which are at risk or stress that creating alternative funding sources may be necessary. We can all agree (common ground) that losing federal funding for any reason is not going to help us serve our community while we are already under the student centered formula funding (SCFF) floor(F). Clearly communicating that message to state and federal representatives is important, so I hope you are taking the time to send a message to your representatives – https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials/ .

    (Reach out if you’d like a copy of the book – I have 10 copies remaining and we have the budget to purchase more.)

    ACE Vice President for De Anza Appointed
    Welcome @Marybell Arebalo to the ACE Executive Board! Marybell was appointed unanimously. On behalf of all members, thank you for serving in this important position for the remainder of the term Vins Chacko was originally elected for ending Dec 31st, 2025. Everyone has the right to participate and serve in the union and we’re grateful to those who step forward into these leadership roles.

    We’re working on granting access to the ace_da email list, so look forward to receiving about union hiring committee appointments from Marybell. Special Note; ACE reps play an important role in advocating for internal applicants to determine equivalency for meeting minimum qualifications for an interview. If you are on a committee and feel as though a member is improperly denied an interview, contact @Scott Olsen immediately.

    Staff Development Leave (SDL) Update
    The committee is going to meet on Monday to review applications. If you’ve submitted yours, you may want to “bump” it to the top of the human resources inbox. I’ll email the applicants who cc’d me on their submissions. Expect to see approvals on the April Board of Trustees agenda in the HR Report. This is normally on their March agenda, but this is the first time for our current (new) HR Vice Chancellor and (new) HR Associate Vice Chancellor are working through this contract section. Welcome Karen White to a permanent role in HR as AVC.

    Dues Forgiveness April & May
    The ACE line item for union dues will not appear on member paystubs for April and May per the approved ACE budget. It does not affect your membership, so always contact a steward or our attorney directly if you have a question about conditions of employment. As always, we can do this because we control our own money as an independent labor organization, Treasurer @Kathy Nguyen provides excellent financial management, and we’ve earned interest upon our strike fund + money set aside for potential legal/operational expenses.

    Whenever ACE does not need to charge for services, we don’t.

    Overtime – Call Back Time, Stand-By, and post-Clocked Out Compensation
    Have you worked overtime but had a gap between your regular schedule and that overtime? You may be due a minimum of 4 hours of overtime per the Agreement (LINK):

    • Occasionally a worker may be called back for work in the evening or on a weekend to accommodate a special need. In such cases, travel time to and from home will be counted as time worked. In order to make the disturbance of normal time off worthwhile, the pay for combined work and travel time shall be for a minimum of four hours. (13.2.4)

    Article 13 goes on to state:

    • Carrying a district-provided cell phone after normal working hours shall be entirely voluntary. Workers will not be disciplined for failure to respond to a call, email, or text message after they have clocked out for the day. (13.2.6)
    • No worker shall be required or requested to be available for handling potential emergency situations or available to answer questions by phone, text, or email after they have clocked out for the day, unless the supervisor has contacted the worker to authorize call-back time to accommodate a special need. (13.2.6.1)
    • Workers who are contacted by phone, or computer after they have clocked out for the day, but prior to 11:00 p.m., to answer questions or handle emergencies from home, shall be paid a minimum of fifteen (15) minutes overtime and shall be paid in quarter hour (15 minute) increments after the first fifteen (15) minutes. (13.2.6.2)
      • Workers who are contacted by phone or computer after 11:00 p.m. to answer questions or handle emergency situations from home shall be paid a minimum of two hours overtime.
      • Workers who are contacted by phone or computer for emergencies which begin prior to 11:00 p.m., but continue past 11:00 p.m., will be paid the two-hour minimum.

    You should not feel stress to respond to district business after hours and you cannot be disciplined for not responding. It is understood that we have regular work schedules and overtime should not become a burden:

    • Overtime shall be distributed among qualified workers in order that opportunities to earn extra pay will be equitably shared and in order that overtime work will not become the burden of a small percentage of qualified workers. Consideration when possible will be given to the personal obligations of workers which may conflict with overtime hours. (13.2.5)

    If you are regularly being assigned more work than is possible to complete during your regular work schedule, we can meet with your supervisor/manager to prioritize tasks. Short staffing is a college/district choice – we can work with you to document that there is too much work and not enough people to do it. Creating an agreement surrounding duty/task priorities also shields you from discipline from work that is determined to be low priority. Reach out to any steward to start this conversation. Problems rarely if ever resolve themselves without a member coming forward.

    This is also a common occurrence while working out of class. If you’re assuming the duties of another full-time position, you should not be expected to complete the duties of the position you were originally hired for. Again, schedule a meeting with a steward for more information.

    More to come…

    In Service,

    Scott Olsen (he/him) | ACE President
    https://acefhda.org | scott.olsen@acefhda.org  
    650-949-7789 | M-F 8:00am-5:00pm

  • 2025.03.03 Update – District Townhall (De Anza Today @ 1pm), De Anza VP Message, T-Shirt Survey Reminder

    ACE Members,

    President’s Message
    “We are entering dark times,” was stated by an administrator at the start of the most recent Chancellor’s Advisory Council meeting. On February 14th the US Department of Education Office for Civil Rights issued a letter (attached) which provides the department’s interpretation of current legal standards. According to District counsel, this is not law, this is a statement of priorities. At this time there are no budgetary changes, no changes in reporting structure, and no changes in positions. Today the Chancellor will be holding an in-person townhall meeting on the De Anza campus. I hope to hear your questions/concerns at 1pm, Campus Center conference rooms A & B. FHDA CCD is going to continue to provide the same services and instruction, but there will be updates to how we continue forward under federal management.  

    At this time I would highly recommend each of us reach out to our elected representatives – https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials/

    • How do you feel about added scrutiny/penalties being placed upon public education?
    • How do you feel about federal workers being laid off indiscriminately?
    • How do you feel about the cost of living?
    • How do you feel about the opportunity for current and future generations to succeed?

    Sending an email or leaving a voicemail is free. These are the decision makers who need to hear the impact of what’s going on in our community. Help them develop an informed response by regularly contributing your perspective.

    Future Townhalls are scheduled to be held at Foothill and virtually:
    Monday, March 17, 9:00-10:00 a.m.
    Foothill College, Room 8338

    Friday, March 21, 1:00-2:00 p.m.
    Virtual meeting – Zoom link to follow

    Please join. Our questions and concerns will help contribute to developing a response here at the district.

    De Anza VP’s Message
    Dear ACE members,

    With a mix of gratitude and bittersweet emotions, I have to let you know that I will be leaving the district to start a career ladder with Gavilan Community college CTE & Workforce Dean position.   I will miss you all, but I hope to collaborate with you in the future in a different capacity.  My last day with De Anza college will be on March 14, 2025.

    Thank you for the experiences, lessons, and friendships I have gained during my time here. I truly appreciate the support and camaraderie and will carry these fond memories with me.   I am not too far, so I hope to continue our friendship and collaboration.

    I hope one of you will volunteer to be the next ACE Vice President.  I am happy to answer any questions you may have.

    Thank you

    Vins Chacko

    Congratulations to Vins! We are all grateful for your years of service and leadership in the ACE Vice President for De Anza position.

    Seeking Members for De Anza VP Appointment
    Vins is available if you have any questions about stepping into this union leadership position. Please send a statement of interest to @Scott Olsen by Tuesday, March 11th :

    D. Duties of the Vice Presidents
    1) Upon approval of the Board, the vice presidents may be authorized to approve expenditures withdrawn on ACE funds in place of either the president or treasurer, and shall perform such other duties as assigned by the president or the executive board.
    2) The vice presidents shall serve on the College Council, PARC, College Budget committees and other District committees as assigned.
    3) The vice presidents shall hold and facilitate site meetings each month at their respective sites.
    4) The vice presidents shall assign ACE representatives to hiring committees for classified workers in Unit 1 for their respective areas.

    A. Responsibilities of Executive Board Members
    The Executive Board Member is directly responsible for:
    1) The operation of ACE.
    2) Assuring appropriate expenditure of funds.
    3) Proper and legal administration and implementation of the constitution.
    4) Any representation of ACE that has been authorized by the Board in order to bind ACE or agree to any issues subject to collective bargaining and EERA.

    Serving as an Executive Board Member requires subordination of personal interests to those that represent the highest good of the members. Board Members shall have no greater rights than any other member of ACE.

    Reach out to any current VP or Board Member for more information.

    ACE T-Shirt & Sweater Survey (Reminder)
    Our swag “stuff we all get” survey is (still) live via a Google Forms. ACE has a $3,000 annual budget for marketing and increasing union visibility. Stickers are a small step, but we’re also looking to offer T-shirts to those who are interested. We will need to advocate for workplace improvements at board meetings, city meetings, county meetings, state meetings, etc. and shirts help to show we are united as a group with a request. Often, we are mistaken for faculty members or outside community members, but something as simple as a shirt shows that we’re organized together and willing to show up in numbers to speak to a need/concern.

    I purchased my shirt from the Labor Notes store (LINK) and would love to see similar shirts with ACE logos around campus showing union pride and solidarity. ACE has a massive effect on our workplace, but our visibility does not reflect that. Let us know your thoughts and T-shirt size so that we can create an estimate.

    Thank you to @Janie Garcia Cordova, @Lindsay West, and @Sharon Garcia-Vega for advancing this.

    The items in this message are ongoing conversations. Please attend union site meetings and respond to future surveys to voice how we move forward collectively as a group.

    In Service,

    Scott Olsen (he/him) | ACE President
    https://acefhda.org | scott.olsen@acefhda.org  
    650-949-7789 | M-F 8:00am-5:00pm