Chicago Teachers and the Tip of the Iceberg

The Chicago teachers are on strike.  I know this sorry territory from the ground up.

            I was a teacher/principal/college professor for 30+ years.  As far as education goes, I consider myself a, “lifer.”  While in the classroom I was active in the local chapter of the National Education Association.  [While the NEA hates to call itself a union, if you waddle like a duck, quack like a duck, swim like a duck and hang around in the pond with other ducks, you are probably a duck.]  I was a building rep, grievance rep, the token Republican on their PAC, and co-chair of the negotiations committee.  I was a picket captain through three strikes. 

Missouri was a, “meet and confer” state.  That means we met with the board at their pleasure.  They did not need to discuss anything with us, but they did because, as a group, we were hard to turn down.  

            I am not opposed to unions.  I see unions as a needed counter balance to the power of management.   Power is a predictable and seductive master.  "Absolute power corrupts absolutely" is the oft and aptly quoted observation of Baron Acton, otherwise known as John E. E. Dalberg Acton (1834-1902), a British historian and moralist.  As old sayings go, this one is spot on.  If management is unfettered you have the Triangle Factory Fire.  If unions are unfettered, you have Greece.  That being said, I am opposed to all public employee unions having the rights and powers of negotiation given to industrial unions.  Why?  Because when you negotiate with private management you have two forces with the same vested interest.  When you negotiate with people whose salary comes from taxes, there are no direct consequences for behavior.  No one in the negotiation bears the full weight of winning and losing.  Because taxes are spread throughout the population, so, too, is responsibility.  There is no ownership for actions. 

            Teachers are public employees.  They have a right to act as a group and present their wants and needs to the boards of education.  They do not have the right to require negotiation.  But teachers are in a tough spot.  They are now (thanks in large part to the much maligned but increasingly correct George W. Bush) being asked to show proof of efficacy.  Testing (which is in terrible disarray) is the best way to know if a teacher has taught his class anything in the year for which he has been paid.  Unfortunately, testing and teaching don’t reflect just teaching ability.  They also reflect parenting skill, socio-economic factors, student attitude, all of which are out of the control of the teacher.  It is hard to teach students who:

a.       …haven’t been taught their first and last name by their crack head mothers.

b.       …have been taught they are richer, smarter and better than their teachers by their society mothers.

c.       …have been passed along without instructions by lousy teachers protected by the union mothers.

We must require our teachers to perform better, smarter and without excuses.  Unions need to stop blindly protecting bad teachers as long as they pay their dues.  Teachers and their unions could be a force for improving instruction, but they have to admit their flaws as well as their strengths.  Instead, teachers are being used as shills for power brokers with expensive suites and self-serving attitudes.  Union leaders are too busy collecting money for PACs to care if students are learning.  

            Chicago is in a mess, and it is just the tip of the iceberg. 

            Work for better education, and keep the faith.