Clifford was one of the first people we met at Village School in West Windsor back in 1997 when we first moved to this area and Katie, just seven years old, entered as a second-grader in Mrs. Knuppel’s class. The years have rolled by, Mrs. Knuppel has since retired, and Katie is now a college sophomore, but Clifford? Kind, dependable Clifford?
Well, these days you’ll find him over at Town Center School in Plainsboro, where he is the night custodian. We stayed in touch with him there as well, since Will was there from kindergarten through third grade, and we knew we could always count on him for a cheery hello, even when he was called upon for some of the most unpleasant cleanup tasks that involve grade school children.
Clifford is just one of the district’s many employees who may be out of a job if the West Windsor-Plainsboro School District decides to go ahead with a plan to outsource its custodial and maintenance staff. There has been much heated and emotional discussion of this controversial issue, including at recent school board meetings, in the pages of this very newspaper (bravo, Mary Alden and Andrea Crossey, for your well-written editorials in the last issue) and even on lawns across our two communities in the form of colorful purple-inked signs that are hard to miss.
Teachers and parents have rallied behind the two unions that represent the endangered employees, speaking out vehemently against the plan that has been pitched as a way to save money in these hard economic times.
Though many strong, articulate voices have emerged already, I wanted to add my voice to the discussion, as both a taxpayer and a parent who has raised three children in this district. I am outraged by the idea of taking these jobs away from some of the hardest-working, most loyal employees in our schools.
In addition to people like Clifford, there are others like the beloved Jim Stives, still with the district, whom we also knew at Town Center when he was the Operations Foreman. Every winter and spring, when I showed up to rehearse with the chorus for their concerts, I could count on Jim to make sure that the risers were set up for the kids to perform and my piano was rolled out and in place.
One day he noticed that I had a problem with my sheet music falling off the ledge, and the next time I showed up, he had built me a new, longer ledge that held all of the music securely. He was always singing a song with his rich, deep baritone, and I’m convinced many of the kids were convinced that he was Santa himself, with his jolly laugh and kindly face.
Bob is another wonderful fellow whose job is in danger. He’s been at Millstone River School for 19 years. How many times has one of my kids forgotten something in the classroom, or had to run back in to school after hours, and we’ve been okay, knowing he’s there to make sure they’re safe. It’s the safety angle that many of the parents I know are concerned about when it comes to this issue.
Linda Dowling of Plainsboro, who has ninth and 11th graders at High School North, and a seventh grader at Community Middle School, says it’s scary to think that the staff she has known for years might be replaced by outsourced employees. “I’m not going to be saying to my kids you run in and I’ll wait in the car,” she tells me. “There’s a security knowing that you know the people who are in the school after hours when your kids have to be in the locker rooms, or even over spring break when the kids have practices and they have to be in the school when it’s not in session.”
Jim Applegate is also at Millstone River School, but he started at Community Middle School back when it first opened. “We custodians are the ones who opened that school, right there with Dr. Downs,” he recalls with pride evident on his face. “I remember it clearly. It was August 10, 1997, and school had to be open September 9 that year, and so we had a month to get the school up and ready.”
Our economy is in trouble, not just for the short-term, but for the foreseeable future, and part of the problem is outsourcing, giving away jobs that Americans are fully capable of performing, to people, many times in other countries, who are willing to work for less. While this may improve profits and present a rosy view of the bottom line in the short run, it is ultimately destructive, and we are seeing some of the results of that near-sighted approach right now.
I agree that belt-tightening and review of fiscal responsibilities is prudent and the right thing to do. But it is not right to reward people who have given years of service and dedication by throwing them out of their jobs. Is it that they are paid too much? Hardly! And if we are examining their paychecks, would it not be fair, then, to look at others (for now, who shall go unnamed) who have paychecks that are much higher and have recently received raises to boot?
I love metaphors so I’ll offer one here to illustrate the situation as I see it. It’s like we’re all in a lifeboat bobbing along the sea of economic trouble. Then someone says, “Hey, let’s toss out a few people and replace them with others who are willing to drink less water and eat less food. Who cares if they are helping to keep us afloat?” How about getting everyone in that lifeboat to consume a little bit less until you reach land, which should be in sight just around the corner?
These are the people who have been taking care of our children, our schools, and our district’s buildings and grounds. Shouldn’t we repay their kindness by taking care of them?
