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Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2006 > January > 02 > Entry
Teachers unions and rules, rules, rules
Imagine if you had to consult a two-inch thick manual and get all your co-workers to agree before you could make any major decision in your job.
That’s exactly what’s happening at one Arizona high school, and the principal wants things to change.
At Phoenix Union High School (perfect name for the place, by the way), the principal says teachers are so powerful he can’t do his job effectively. But teachers say the rules in the 20-year-old employee handbook simply protect them from unreasonable demands and were won fair and square at the bargaining table.
Some of the rules are ridiculously specific. Teachers refused to attend a 3 p.m. meeting because the handbook says all meetings must be held at 2 p.m. Others are quite common. The rules allow any teacher to choose an open assignment based on seniority. But the process is so cumbersome, the principal says he misses out on the chance to hire good candidates in scarce specialties like science and math.
This is a touchy subject in education. Teachers’ unions sometimes are quite powerful and in general organized teachers in many parts of the country have gained concessions through the years with smart, tough bargaining.
And in some ways, school boards have themselves to blame. Any negotiation is a two-way street and the boards who were sitting across the table had to agree to everything the teachers won. In my experience covering education, I’ve seen a lot of weak-willed school board cave in to a lot of teacher demands. Often times, the school boards are just not as skilled at negotiating tactics and politics. That’s not the union’s fault.
But put yourself in the shoes of a principal like this one in Arizona, who can’t even call a 3 p.m. meeting or hire a promising science teacher that he knows he’ll need next year. It’s clear that some of the rules are no longer workable and may actually be harming the school’s ability to provide good quality instruction.
So what can be done? Here’s my suggestion. School board should to back to the negotiating table and bargain hard. Go after the most cumbersome rules and get rid of them. Give the teachers back something else they want that hurts less. If necessary, play politics. Take your case to the community. Read the craziest rules out loud. In short, grow a backbone.
Too often school board negotiate all their power away and then want to cry that the unions have been unfair. Then they ask for the rules to be changed, begging legislatures to give them new powers or to create loopholes in the law.
In some cases, legislative intervention can help nudge the process along. Look at Dayton, who forged a good working partnership with its unions to address the problem of reconstituted schools. That probably never would have happened if the federal No Child Left Behind law hadn’t forced the issue by giving the school board the power to reassign everyone at a low performing school.
But in that case, Dayton did the smart thing. They didn’t beat the union over the head with the new law. They instead used it as leverage to get the conversation going about how to reconstitute a school and ended up cutting a deal that requires both administration and union input on the new assignments.
Ultimately, that’s the way I think these problems will be solved, when both sides can get together across a table and work them out. But some argue that it can’t be done that way. What do you think is the best way to deal with these problems?
Permalink | Comments (6) | Categories: Urban School Issues
Comments
By Ryan
January 12, 2006 8:20 PM | Link to this
You can have professional unions when you guarantee teachersthat they’ll always be treated as professional teachers. Until then, antagonism will be the norm. You can go to the public with ridiculous contract clauses, but fully expect the union to publish the names of the administrators who signed that contract. Stupidity truly can cut both ways.By Mary
January 4, 2006 6:38 AM | Link to this
Thanks, Terri, for being a rare teacher and for bringing up the fact that most salaried professionals do not get overtime. It is amazing to me with all the time off that the teaching profession gets, and that most professionals just dream about and would take a pay cut for, that they would quibble about a three o’clock meeting. As salaried professionals, teachers apparently also expect “extended pay” for the school year. In our schol district I have noticed some get as much as $400 a day for say one or two weeks of extra work into the summer. This is on top of $72,000 or more salaries and generous health care benefits. What a racket!By Terri
January 3, 2006 2:44 PM | Link to this
A couple of comments. First, most salaried professionals don’t get paid for overtime. Extra meetings, etc. are just par for the course. Second, I’m not familar with Arizona law but in Ohio districts have a deadline to meet in order to fire/reassign teachers and teachers have a deadline to meet in order to resign/retire/ask for a reassignment. Past those deadlines all bets are off. Third, I agree semantics matter and the teachers union should view themselves and should be viewed by others as a professional association with bargaining rights. And, just for full disclosure - I am a teacher in the Dayton Education Association.By shane
January 3, 2006 8:50 AM | Link to this
Contracts and rules are put in place to protect both the teacher’s and the school board. Both sides should follow the rules and not be chastised for doing so. If a principal calls a special meeting outside of the teacher’s contracted work day, teacher’s should be compensated for their time, as any other professional would.By Mary
January 2, 2006 8:54 PM | Link to this
Scott, I think some of your narrative shows some naivite regarding the “independence” of school boards and unions. I think many school board candidates and elected members and unions are in cahoots with one another with union endorsements and marketing to the naive voting public as to what is really going on in our schools. Have you read the new book by a New York newspaper reporter: “Cheating our kids - how politics and greed have ruined our schools”. It apparently addresses some of the union issues as well as other groups like the PTA. Generally, I think the news media, including the Dayton Daily News, relies too heavily on the status quo leadership and unions for its source of education information and perspective. Maybe your blog site helps compensate. The principal in Arizona is rare. Too many administrators seem to be beholden to their own pay and benefits and career development which derive from pay and benefits and career development generated by the teachers’ unions. It is all pretty much an incestuous, status quo symbiotic system. Your reporters pretty much rely on school employees and develop a relationship with them, rather than with parents, students (except for some athletes through sports reporting) and taxpayers.By Randy Hartwig
January 2, 2006 11:45 AM | Link to this
This is not a union problem but rather it is a relationship problem. Lack of leadership and vision on both sides is preventing an amicable solution to the problem. Negotiations between the union and the school board should have been able to resolve this issue before it became a public issue. The union needs to stop being a labor union and transform itself into a professional association. Then the association needs to act like the professional educators they are. In turn, the school board needs to recognize the valuable human resources their teachers represent and treat them as such. Going to the community with differences in order to force a solution is an option of last resort, one used by desperate people or despots. Such action will result in hard feelings and a day of reckoning will come.