Its a Wonderful Strife

All workers should have the right to unionize. Even Ayn Rand believed so. The question is how that union is used. Is it used to protect them from arbitrary evaluations like student performance or is it used to demand salary increases the private sector would dream of? I assume you see the difference here.

much of what i've read about the strike is focusing on the former, not the later. I haven't followed this that closely, though

I think all workers have the right to unionize. I just question one's professionalism when they seek to unionize as opposed to succeed on their own merits.

Funny. The workers do everything they can to keep white collar workers out of the UAW-GM.

The best part about this strike is how they all claim it's "for the children." They always find these sanctimonious scumbag teachers to put on TV talking about how they're public servants doing it for the children. Yeah, well, I got news for you. If you were doing it for the kids, you'd take the pay the public was willing to pay you. If you don't like the terms then you're not really doing it for the children are you? Teacher's are about the only group who seem to be able to declare how much they're worth. They're the only who group who can tell the public that they're not paying them enough. The people don't understand what teachers go through, or what they really have to do behind the scenes. So unlike any other professional group, the grant themselves the power to unionize and extort money from the public. Teachers also like to talk about how if they could just use their methods, and they all have different methods mind you, that the world would be great and allllllll these kids would be functional adults. Yet, they don't seek to compete against one another. They don't seek to start their own private schools. They don't seek to take opportunities that could otherwise be available to them. They expose that they're not really doing it for the kids when they don't teach their kids with their special needs pro-bono. Nope - extort from the public for the kids. Produce shitty results. Then wonder why people harbor animosity against you. I don't know if there's another group of people within government that views the public as tax serfs than teachers.

It's like this. The public should get to set the terms. If the public doesn't like the results, then they can adjust to it. And if YOU, Mrs Fat (have you noticed how all these Chicago teachers are fat?) teacher, THEN DON'T TEACH! Or go teach in the private sector and show us all how you do it for the kids by taking a pay cut and teaching with the same zest you do now.

Also - Forty percent of Chicago public school teachers send their kids to private schools. Do you suppose they have some sort of inside information? Perhaps the 16% raise is demanded so that the those earning below the $78,000 median wage (before benefits) can also afford get their kids out of the public school system. Weird.

What have you been reading? Why not drop the demand for a pay raise then?

You know, it's a good thing I don't have to worry about arbitrary evaluations like my company's compressor performance and stuff.

pay raises are nice. But little of what I've read has focused on that as a sticking point between the union and the city administration. That's not to say it isn't. I haven't followed this exhaustively

i'm not entirely sure what you do, but I would imagine that your compressor's performance is much easier to definitively quantify. What someone learned, how much they learned, and why they learned it, is not.

So what's the take away on this? What's the driving trust? What's the point?

of what, the strike? My impression was that the biggest sticking point was the pushback against the testing.

that's not to say that there aren't other demands, just that this was the big one.

No, not the strike, your last post. That since testing isn't as finite as a compressor that the public has no right to demand performance standards? Doesn't that seem a little one sided? "We can output whatever the fuck we want, and you shouldn't be able to have any say in it." It's raw arrogance.

I mean, I think it's clear that over the years I've expressed that I don't agree with all testing and how we gauge a teachers ability, but the idea that you shouldn't be tested and can thus go on strike is pretty rude and insulting to those you profess to serve.

For reals yo, it would take 16% more than $78k for me to be a public school teacher in Chicago.

I think they are criticizing basing 40% of a teacher's performance evaluation on student standardized test scores, which is far above the national average and invests a lot in a still highly controversial metric of questionable utility.

I agree it is important to figure out ways to evaluate teachers. At my work we just had a big fight two years ago about how to go about doing this, and while some weaker teachers were resistant to the whole idea of assessment in general even the good ones were really divided over how to effectively measure that. There are serious flaws with almost any measure anyone could come up with. I would like really rigorous standards, but I'm not sure how to get them.

If only we had a more equitable society where everyone earned what CPS teachers make.

Maybe this is true, I don't know. The perception is that the unions protect the ridiculously overpaid administrators and bad teachers in addition to fighting for fair compensation for those making a difference and what's happening in Chicago is not going to change that.


On the teacher performance system in DC:
http://thinkprogress.org/yglesias/2011/10/19/348253/controversial-dc-education-reform-has-raised-teacher-salaries-substantially/

I thought this was relevant, as it compares school performance before and after unionization. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2012/09/chicago_teachers_strike_are_unionized_teachers_better_than_non_unionized_teachers_.html

You may be the best, most dedicated teacher in the world but unionizing puts you in a conflict of interest the moment you act like your strike is about the kids.

I would hate if my profession unionized. As a performing employee why would I ever want to be grouped in and have my pay performance in with losers?

If a single payor health system is deemed great, why wouldn't a single payor education system be the same. In other words, school vouchers.

Protecting administrators? Usually administrators are classified as management and not able to be part of a union.

what do you do tyler?

I agree that the 'for the kids' stuff may be a little disingenuous from some. However, the emphasis on teaching to a test fundamentally changes the nature of instruction, and probably for the worst. It takes away space for innovative teaching and turns most subjects into the rote repetition of facts that will be tested. And kids will be worse off because of that, and it may be worth keeping a few kids out of school for a week or two to resist that for kids in the future.

Vouchers are also likely to further decimate the quality of our public school system, by pulling the best kids out of it and minimizing the resources available for the students at the bottom. And public education is a collective public enterprise. The purpose of the system is not to educate your particular child (which is your goal as a parent). The goal is to provide the best possible broad based education for the maximum number of future workers/citizens as possible.

Vouchers are actually the opposite of a single payer health care system. They are more akin to what we have now (at least in the US), where the wealthiest/healthiest people can get cheaper and better products and leave older/poorer/sicker people in more expensive and less comprehensive plans. The healthy people need to offset the sick. In some ways education works the same way. A single payer healthcare system would be one that nationalized (or at least did this by state) and equalized the funding all districts got.

That's the perception, regardless of the truthieness of it.

I work as a project manager and business systems analyst. Primarily in charge of the financial systems for a large company. This can involve ensuring system integrity, implementing new business processes and software. I'm currently have a designation in project management (PMP) and have dropped my accounting designation (CGA, American equivalent would be CPA) as I hate accounting and no longer need it. I am working towards the business analyst designation (CBAP) and writing the exam in January. My job is challenging and impresses girls when they see my office but still allows me to goof off a lot. I'm not the best in my field, that would require a higher level of motivation and commitment but I am well respected and definitely above average with bouts of inspired awesomeness. I work with a great group of extremely smart people, so it feels great to head home thinking "wow, I was the smart one at the table today".

People who get into teaching straight out of university have a very narrow view of working. In the 21st century I think the average person is expected to have 4 pr 5 distinct careers before they retire. Teachers go into it almost demanding a single career. I think right there it skews their mindset regarding employee/employer relationship and this is exasperated by unionizing.

Some teachers are amazing, some not. I think on the whole that the profession would improve by disbanding their unions and work from professional associations that elevate there profession and professionalism of teachers. The esteem teachers are held in would improve if there were seen to be serious professionals who nine to five everyday, twelve months a year. Maybe with a two week shutdown in the summer like manufacturing companies used to do. Non-teaching days would be used to team build at their schools, upgrade skills and more. Public perception of teachers is harmed by their official work hours and summers off.

Teachers approaching their careers as most professionals do would go a long ways. Acing as if the only way to be properly compensated is by unionizing is just plain a falsehood. Many professions work in public service without feeling the need to unionize and yet get properly compensated. They also manage to not hold kids education hostage along the way, nor diligently work to prevent a change (vouchers) that their customers want.

Just my two cents. I had some bad teachers along the way, my son fortunately had primarily great teachers. Two in particular leaving a positive, lasting effect on him. To no surprise they had no time for their required union membership. Both felt/feel that they would be better paid, have better working conditions and garner more respect if they weren't forced to be in the union.

I'm so grateful for this being moved to a different thread.

I promised to visit, so I'll share something I posted on a teacher message board that happens to have a lot of Chicago teachers on it:

empirically I believe your friends are incorrect about that, regardless of what they felt. There are going to be exceptions, obviously, but unionized teachers make more on average. Someone correct me on that.


Regarding McP's post, your point about how teachers are perceived (and unions in general) is well taken, and it puts them in a tight spot. This country has devalued unions for a long time, and people's response to the benefits they get their members tend to be 'how dare they when I don't have that' more than 'good for them, now how can I get that'. And that puts unions in a strategically weaker position. The teachers have a tougher time too since their basic competence and expertise is under attack in a way that it isn't for a group like police officers.

I'm not sure this is just a PR thing though. From what I know of the sciences as well (basically any creative endeavor that requires institutional funding) the same problem of business interests controlling the way knowledge is generated and disseminated is becoming equally problematic. Even well endowed universities are feeling the same pressures. The problem is the colonization of all systems of knowledge and production by a narrow business ontology. And resisting that requires more than teachers' attempts to assert expertise. Given the amount of resources that can be brought to bear against them I'm not sure that assertion is enough, especially if the solutions generated push back against that totalizing business ontology.

Fighting back WILL require a strong organizational base capable of exerting power. So while I agree that you are totally right about the PR/image management stuff, and that it will be important for teachers to offer an alternative to testing, this is not a fight that is divorced from unions (or some other, better form of organization should one be developed)