Steering Committee - Comprehensive Classification Study

On October 4, 2023, The Fontana Unified School District Board of Education Approved entering into a contract with Eric Hall and Associates for a comprehensive study of the Classified Job Descriptions and a salary comparison with surrounding Districts. The contract was amended at the July 23, 2025 Fontana Unified School District Board Meeting to extend the contract through August 30, 2025 at no additional cost to the District. In the original description of the study, Eric Hall and Associates stated they would stay with the District for a year after implementation of the study for consulting purposes. 

Surveys for suggested changes to job descriptions went out to the Classified Staff and the Managment Staff in March of 2024. 

The first orientations with the Classified Staff were held at the JD Piazza Center in Early April 2024. There were also a TEAMS interactive meeting held. The goal of these orientation sessions was to, introduce the company conducting the study and share their background in the field. Provide and overview of what a Classification Study entails. Provide ab opportunity for questions/clarification. Clearly articulate what the Study will and will not do. Outline the data collection process and outline the scope of the study. 

All employee groups were encouraged to participate. 

In mid-April, 2025 the Steering Committee members were appointed. They were selected by the President Dawn Dooley for their knowledge with the knowledge they already had with the Reclassification Committee. Dawn Dooley, Richard Romo, Rose Tibbels, Jana Marvin and Matt Griffiths. 

The members of the Management Team are/were Doug Staine, Rita Bayne, Anthony Viramontes and Jackie Bentancourt.

The work of the Steering Committee not only happened in the room of the Committee, in order to be prepared and to make the most of our meeting time, we were each tasked with our own review of 10 - 15 job descriptions in between meetings on our own time. When we met, we compared notes and worked collaboratively. 

The first meeting of the Steering Committee was held on June 7, 2024. In this meeting we discussed the process EH & A was going to be taking for analyzing the information collected and developing the draft job descriptions to be reviewed by the Steering Committee. The Steering Committee is scheduled again to meet in August. 

July 26, 2024- The Steering Committee reviewed the first draft changes to job descriptions. Future dates were selected. 

August 16, 2025 - The Committee continued to review job descriptions. The next meeting is set for August 30, 2024. 

August 31, 2024 - The Committee has been steadfast and committed to the labor-intensive work that involves analyzing every aspect of the essential duties of each job description. 

September 13, 2024 - We continue to work diligently, we had another productive and collaborative meeting. At this point in the process, we have been able to navigate through and analyze a multiple of classifications in great detail. The level of work requires line by line review of each document. The team is committed to continue the work necessary. 

10/24/2024 - We have established a steady pace, we are pleased to announce we have completed another "job family". A "job family" is identified as job descriptions all in the same function of occupation, like Maintenance and Operations or Clerical/Secretarial for instance. 

At this point we were about halfway through the job description analyzing where we thought we would have been near completion. Our Steering Committee requires release time for their days on the Committee, as these days have been full days of release time and full days of job description evaluation we have incurred a lot of release time already. If this were the true Reclassification Committee the District would be paying for the release of our members, however, since this is categorized as a "Steering Committee" we need to reimburse the District for the lost time of the Committee Members. Dawn Dooley in discussion with the Committee approached Doug and Rita in a separate meeting stating this is very important work we are doing, and we cannot do the work without the members of the USW and Management as per our CBA under the Reclassification Article. Dawn was able to negotiate an MOU to help subsidize the cost of release time through the process. 

01/31/2025 - We continue the process to review job descriptions after the winter break. We are making progress. 

02/21/2025 - The completion of the review for the Job Descriptions is a significant milestone and the Committee is beyond excited to have completed this phase and proud of the collaborative work that was put into this labor intensive meticulous process. Since this is being written post hence, the Committe will be forced to go back to the table for a second look at the job descriptions because EH & A did not do a complete job revising each of the job descriptions. The Committee was partnered, one member of Management one member of USW to complete the task of going through each job description for a second time. 

 Initial Review of the changes to the revised job descriptions. it was in this meeting where we found that some changes were not made. It was in this meeting, because there was a significant discovery of missing information or information that was not taken out of job descriptions that we realized as a Committe we MUST revisit EACH job description LINE BY LINE for a SECOND TIME! This again was going to be very time consuming!

May 2, 2025 - Finally the second and final review is complete! ...... 

Graduation happens this takes priority over our Committee.  USW wanted to start the salary schedule negotiations, we are ready for the data, EH & A does not have the data prepared. 

June 26, 2025 - Initial report from EH & A regarding our Benefits Package, vacation, etc. Our Committee was unimpressed with this information as the Management study was just an apparent comparison of salary with no benefits taken into account as we found out through information request. USW wants the data for the job description comparisons, again EH & A does not have that data. 

July 9, 2025 - Doug Staine sends the data from EH & A defining the benchmark positions at median, below median and above median "families" of job titles. An email gets shared with the USW Committee. 

Committee members begin research to compare the data to see if the salary schedules they were comparing with were the most current that EH & A used. We were sharing amongst ourselves, some  of the data used was outdated. 

July 25, 2025 - USW Committee meets to strategize the data and how the "families" of below median salaries will affect the salary schedule. We work on our proposal. 

August 25, 2025 - Salary Schedule Negotiations first session. USW and FUSD discussed our proposal for changes to "families" of the salary schedule. The proposal seemed well received. FUSD recognizes there are employee shortages in many areas and this could be due to the base salary. 

September 12,2025 - Met with EH & A and the District because the USW told the District in our research, they did not use proper comparable meaning for an entry level position they were looking at a higher-level position just because the name was similar not because any part of the content of the job description was comparable. The Joint Committee insisted E H & A bring us back those job descriptions in question with the reasons for them choosing the comparisons with details and the data.

October 17, 2025 - Next neogotiations session