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1) KIPP Teachers Move to Decertify
Union. The timing was exquisite.
One year ago this week, Alexander Russo
of This Week in Education asked Mark Simon of the Tom Mooney
Institute for Teacher and Union Leadership,
"This time next year, will the KIPP network of charter
schools be unionized?"
Simon replied, "Yes. If you want
teachers to stick around and build a career in teaching -- which I think is
good for schools and good for communities -- and you're asking them to work
really hard, as KIPP does, then it's only a matter of time before a union
makes sense."
Russo's question was prompted by the
United Federation of Teachers' success in organizing three of the four
KIPP schools in New York City. Unfortunately for UFT, in March 2009
teachers at two of the three schools voted unanimously to get rid of the
union.
Now, one year after Simon's bold
prediction,
teachers at the third KIPP New York school also petitioned the state to
decertify the union. Naturally, this has set off
caterwauling from UFT, which only believes in "teacher voice" when it
shouts words approved at union headquarters.
Speaking of which...
2) Virginia Education Association Has
a Curious Cure for Malaise. The Virginia Education
Association held its convention last weekend. The delegates approved a
series of measures, such as reaffirming VEA's "opposition to private charter
schools, merit pay and other compensation systems based on student test
scores, wholesale firing of teachers, and/or threats to due process," and
supporting "NEA efforts to change the harmful elements of President Obama's
and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's Blueprint for the Reauthorization
of the Elementary Secondary Education Act (ESEA)."
But the organization had some internal
troubles to handle as well. In
her keynote speech, VEA President Kitty Boitnott referred to them:
"As though working in a hostile
political environment weren't bad enough, we have also suffered in other
ways this year. In spite of being referred to in the news as 'the powerful
VEA lobby,' the VEA has lost members in significant numbers this year due to
a whole host of reasons that I don't need to dwell on here, but along with
the external challenges of having few friends in high places, we have also
been suffering from an internal malaise of sorts in many of our very own
local affiliates. We need to take note and take note fast of the fact that
if we don't stop the hemorrhaging and stop it NOW, we will no longer be the
'powerful VEA lobby.' Power comes with numbers and with unity and with
activism, and we need to build our numbers--and our unity and our
activism--immediately. We need to accept that lately we haven't done a very
good job of communicating our effectiveness to our members and potential
members, and we need to make it clear to our non-member colleagues that we
need them to join with us NOW. They need to help us in our fight NOW.
Waiting for another year may be too late."
And what could be a better way of
encouraging members to throw off their malaise and become active in their
union than by...
disenfranchising them?
The current practice is to allow all
members to vote for the organization's statewide officers (president and
vice president), but "participation in recent years has been very low."
Beginning in 2011, those officers will be elected by the delegates at the
annual convention. The change was approved by... the delegates at the annual
convention.
So get out there, VEA members, and show
your undying support for the people who took away your vote! They'll only
laugh at you a little.
3) Last Week's Intercepts.
EIA's blog,
Intercepts, covered these topics from April 20-26:
* The
Era of Claiming Big Anything Is Over Is Over. Game over.
*
A Seat at the Table. And some footstools.
*
Getting the Message. Losing feels better when you declare victory
anyway.
*
Teacher Un-Des Moines Her Own Protest. The three ares.
4)
Quote of the Week.
"We don't lobby as a special interest; we lobby in the common interest." -
Carl Korn, spokesman for the New York State United Teachers. (April 26
New York Post) |
