CITY SCHOOLS OPPOSE RETIREMENT SUIT

The Cape Girardeau School District is taking legal action opposing its inclusion in a class-action lawsuit contesting the state's public- schools retirement system.

The board passed a resolution against the lawsuit Tuesday, directing its attorney to file a motion in court asking that the school district be removed as a plaintiff in the lawsuit.

Business manager Larry Dew said if the plaintiffs are successful participants in the retirement system would lose at least $50 a month in retirement benefits.

Dew said he believes the board's vote Tuesday is the first such action against the lawsuit by a school district in the state.

The lawsuit was filed by eight Missouri school districts in 1988, led by the Savannah School District in northwest Missouri. The Savannah school system has 2,200 students.

The suit challenges the system's practice of collecting retirement benefits as a percentage of fringe benefits, such as health insurance. It contends that retirement benefits should be figured as a percentage of salary only. It asks that districts and teachers be refunded for contributions based on fringe benefits made as far back as 1983.

The outcome of the Savannah School District suit will affect all Missouri school districts and teachers who pay into the mandatory Public School Retirement System. The system is a form of social security for teachers, in which 50 percent of the benefits are paid in by the employee and 50 percent by the employer.

A judge will hear arguments in the lawsuit in September.

Doris Ford, a representative of the Cape Girardeau Community Teachers Association, said school districts and teachers were involved in the lawsuit "without our knowledge."

"We do not want this. This is a suit that we oppose," she said. "It affects retirees and those of us still teaching to the tune of half a billion dollars," said Ford.

"It would take better than $50 a month from retirement payments. For most teachers it would take more."

James Englehart, director of secondary and elementary education, estimated the lawsuit would cost him more than $100 a month after retirement.

The board also heard a report about the new Reading Recovery program from Marlene Miller, a professor at Southeast Missouri State University and a trainer in the Reading Recovery program.

Training for Reading Recovery teachers begins today. Reading Recovery is an intensive method to help first-graders learn to read.

Miller has just returned from a year of study of Reading Recovery at Ohio State University. Cape Girardeau public schools funded half of her tuition for the program.

This first year, 12 teachers will be trained in Reading Recovery at Southeast. Six are from Cape Girardeau schools; others are from Chaffee, New Madrid, Anna, Ill., Hermann, Montgomery City, and the Ferguson-Florissant district.

First-grade students are selected for Reading Recovery from the lowest 20 percent of each class in reading. Teachers work with the children one-on-one for 30 minutes each day, Miller explained.

"We don't teach skills. We are teaching children strategies what to do if they don't know what they are reading," she said.

"The teachers will work very hard, but the great thing is you see success."

Students are in the program for 50 to 60 daily lessons. During that time, students "accelerate" to the middle reading ability in their class and then leave the Reading Recovery program.

Teachers are being trained this year, but they will also be working with students as part of their training.

Miller said students will be identified for the program as early as the second week of school.

Only 12 people in the United States are trained at the level of Miller in Reading Recovery. The program in Cape Girardeau is the first in the state.