EDWIZE TO EDUWONK: Democracy — Try It. You might like it.

16 Comments:

• 1 curious2
  · Aug 22, 2005 at 6:56 pm

  I applaud the UFT for creating a blog that allows dissent. Thanks.

• 2 eddie185
  · Aug 22, 2005 at 8:58 pm

  I love your response to Eduwonk … the arrogant bastards! Eduwonk is a neocon in progressive’s clothing – affiliated with the Progressive Policy Institute and the “centrist” (hah!) Democratic Leadership Council, espousing the Chamber of Commerce-approved “third way.” If these folks aren’t familiar to you, do a Google search and learn all about their “progressive” doublespeak. If you believe that Checker Finn, Fred Hess, and their right-of-center cronies are “progressive,” I have a bridge I’d like to sell you. Edwize is off to a great start!

• 3 msd2005
  · Aug 22, 2005 at 10:17 pm

  If you really want to try democracy, how about letting educators decide whether they want to belong to a union and if they want to pay dues.

• 4 InstitutionalMemory
  · Aug 22, 2005 at 10:32 pm

  MSD: No teacher is obligated to belong to the UFT, or to pay dues. The great majority of NYC teachers choose to do so, but it’s not mandatory. Unions are no panacea, but, on balance, our lives are infinitely better with the union than they would be without it. I believe that even the UFT members who oppose the current administration would agree with me.

• 5 Leo Casey
  · Aug 22, 2005 at 10:56 pm

  Well, MSD2005, educators do decide whether or not they want to belong to an union — anyone with a moral or political objection to unionism can simply not sign a UFT card, and they won’t be a member.

  More importantly, educators decide collectively, through a democratic secret ballot election, whether or not they will be represented by a collective bargaining representative –viz., a union. And that is a revocable decision: a union can be de-certified, if a majority of the bargaining unit decide they no longer want to be represented by it. Moreover, the law in NY State and the US clearly requires that unions function in a democratic manner, with the regular election of officers, the ratification of contracts, etc.

  So your problem is not, with all due respect, with democracy. Rather, your problem is with the idea of a common good, and with the notion that a balance must be struck between the good of the community and the rights of the individual. You object to the fact that democratic decisions by educators as a group can place any restraints on individual choice, and that an individual can not simply choose to be a ‘free rider,’ as philosophers would put it, enjoying the benefits of collective bargaining without contributing to the common pool which makes those benefits possible. You think that you should be able to receive those benefits without making your contribution to their attainment — your dues.

  This is simply not a complaint of insufficient democracy, but of too much democracy — you advocate the extreme libertarianism of those who espouse laissez-faire capitalism, and refuse to accept that the community has any rights that can legitimately limit the choices of the individual, even where those limits are nothing more than a financial contribution for services rendered.

  You are entitled to espouse such views, but let’s call them by their proper names.

• 6 realitybasededucator
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 1:39 pm

  You know, I have my issues with the UFT leadership (I thought agreeing to 100 extra minutes in the last contract set a bad precedent, I don’t think the UFT P.R. campaign does a good enough job explaining how difficult teaching public school truly is). Some of the dealings I have had with mid-level union reps have been problematic (one guy who was supposed to be on my side in a health issue screamed at me on the phone for 20 minutes as I tried to get some test results; he screamed at my school rep for half an hour!!!)

  Nonetheless, I think my life as a New York City public school teacher is better because I have the UFT protecting my rights as a worker. My school reps have ALWAYS helped me, whether I needed salary step advice as a starting teacher or needed an advocate in my dealings with the serpentine bureaucracy that is the NYCDOE.

  I also know that while union rules can protect some people in the system who perhaps should be working elsewhere, many of the craziest people are in the Administration. My first year I worked for a principal who never observed me, wrote up a phony observation report for me to sign, then was sobbing uncontrollably at her desk when I came in to tell her I didn’t want to sign a phony letter. I don’t know what she was sobbing about, but the point is, this was not a person who should have absolute power over teachers, and I would submit that there are others like her in the NYC system who need a union to check their worst autocratic and/or management instincts.

  Without a union, New York City public school teachers would be like Walmart workers: working longer hours in unsafe work conditions for less pay and few benefits.

  Sorry Eduwonkers, sorry Wall Street Journal editors, sorry Mort Zuckerman and sorry Rupert Murdoch, but I don’t trust the goodness of Mayor Bloomberg’s heart to take care of me without a collective bargaining process or a union.

  And that is my right as a worker.

• 7 curious2
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 2:19 pm

  What rights do parents have who are forced to send their children to bad public schools? Should they have a right to choose? Or, as a worker, do you also have a monopoly right to teach our children?

• 8 NaniRolls
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 2:39 pm

  If a public school is bad, it is helpful to look at the individuals within the building, not the teachers as a group.

  My relationship with the union is a love/hate one. I definintely don’t mind paying my dues to get those awesome benefits and to have people fighting for salary increases, improved working conditions, etc. However, there have been times when I feel the union does more harm than good, namely in not being more cooperative about getting rid of bad teachers and discouraging teachers from putting in work without getting paid. Some of us don’t mind making ourselves available to kids after school, and we shouldn’t be tsk-tsk’d for that.

• 9 realitybasededucator
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 2:55 pm

  So teachers unions are the sole reason why some public schools are bad, curious2?
  How about the public schools that are good? Are those schools good despite teachers unions?

  Or is the issue a little more complex than teachers unions make for bad public schools and no unions make for good public schools?

  Sorry, curoius2, the reasons why some schools are bad and some are good go beyond whether they are unionized…and if you don’t think so, take a look at the track record of charter schools. Some are good and some are bad. A few have lost their charters because they were so bad, just the way a few public schools have been closed because they were failing and showing no improvement.

  The right-wing has made a concerted effort over the last 25 years to bash unions and create a perception with the public that ALL unionized workers are lazy, ne’er-do-wells who’d be fired without union protections.

  This perception is no more true than the similar belief by many right-wingers that the free market is ALWAYS more efficient than government. Take a look at how Halliburton has run its war contracts in Iraq (two hundred dollar gallons of gas; millions of dollars in reconstruction funds missing) and ask yourself if their price-gouging and profiteering is better than if the Pentagon was running the whole thing itself with government workers.

• 10 curious2
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 3:44 pm

  Hey realitybasededucator,
  I think you misunderstand my viewpoints (and I am not sure which posting you got your impression from!).

  “So teachers unions are the sole reason why some public schools are bad, curious2?” Of course not. I don’t recall writing anything like that.

  “How about the public schools that are good? Are those schools good despite teachers unions?” Hard to say, but I don’t recall writing that either.

  “Or is the issue a little more complex than teachers unions make for bad public schools and no unions make for good public schools?” It is much different than that, although not much more complex. The current unions promote some organizational structures that generally don’t work very well. That’s why most of our country doesn’t use them. Seniority and tenure rules, for example, generally hurt our schools.

  There are good public schools and bad charter schools. There are many truly outstanding teachers in the unions. That, however, doesn’t justify some of the outdated concepts protected almost exclusively by the unions.

  My simple question (which you failed to address) remains the same: do you think parents should be given a choice to send their kids to schools other than yours? Or do you feel like you should have a monopoly on educating our kids? I would love to get your viewpoint on this, realitybasededucator, because I think you can be part of the solution to improving our schools.

• 11 Leo Casey
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 5:36 pm

  It is important, Curious2, that every public school should be a place where parents want to send their children, and teachers want to teach. The question is how we get to that goal.

  For starters, it doesn’t help to take up the far right wing language that public schools somehow constitute a monopoly. They simply do not. Anyone in the US is free to establish a private school, and to send their children to a private school. Many private schools, especially schools with sponsored by a particular religious body, exist throughout the US, and many parents send their children to those schools.

  What is more, many states — the majority of them — have charter schools, public schools independent of the local school district, to which parents can send their children.

  And finally, many public school districts have elaborate systems of choice within the school district, providing parents with many different choices of schools to which they can send their children. In NYC, one might complain that there are so many choices in the way of high schools — literally hundreds of options — that only ‘insiders’ with special knowledge have a good handle on how to navigate the high school admissions process.

  By any reasonable, non-politicized definition, that is hardly a monopoly. To the contrary, there are a great many choices.

  The problem is that choice is no magic bullet for producing quality schools. Aside from the ‘true believers’ on the far right have a deep and abiding faith that the invisible hand of the marketplace will solve all problems, most educators recognize that quality schools must be consciously and deliberately built and nurtured, piece by piece, and supported by government and society. They recognize that such schools rest, above all else, on a foundation of a solid cohort of experienced, accomplished educators. They see as essential an experienced, knowledgable school leadership that understands teaching and learning and works collaboratively with teachers and parents. They understand that such schools have a solid course of study and curriculum, which the educators in the school have had a major hand in shaping. They see the need for the nurturance of a strong, democratic school culture. The ‘invisible hand’ of the market does not magically bring those things into existence.

  The real problem here is that quality schools and poor schools are not evenly distributed: students from upper middle class and wealthy backgrounds rarely end up in a struggling or failing school, while students from working class and poor backgrounds all too often do. Far too many parents in inner city neighborhoods look at their neighborhood school, and do not see a quality school. And yet we know that students living in poverty are going to being many more academic and social needs to school. So those who need the most, receive the least.

  There is a lot that goes into establishing that pattern. One could say that it reflects the larger political economy, and that is true as a generality, but it makes a rather complex relationship seem too simple. For while it is true that resources are often, as the case is in NY State, not even given to schools serving poorer neighborhoods and districts serving the inner city in the same magnitude as they are given to schools serving wealthier neighborhoods and districts, there are other patterns, such as the constant turnover of novice, unprepared teachers, which are much more mediated expressions of the political economy. Their solution is thus much more complicated.

  All of that means that it would take a package of many different measures to turn around low performing schools. About a year and a half ago, Randi Weingarten put together a package of proposals that are a very good start. [ http://www.uft.org/news/president/spring_conferen/index.html ] The DOE has ignored her proposals.

• 12 curious2
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 6:33 pm

  Thanks Leo. You really make strong arguments, although I disagree. Here are a few comments:

  1. You write that everyone can “send their children to a private school”. That’s true, but I think you know that the biggest problem is for those who can’t afford a private school. How can you leave that out while making your point? How does this affect your argument?

  2. Historically, the union has fought tooth and nail against charters. Now you use them to prove that there is choice? I agree that charters are creating large cracks in the union monopoly. I am very optimistic about the direction we are heading. I am glad that you now support charters implicitly. Can you add your eloquent support to them explicitly on this blog? I hope so.

  3. What makes public education different from other services with respect to competition and choice leading to excellent, although surely imperfect, results? How do private schools survive? How can Google, Apple, and other innovative companies do such incredible, complex things without tenure, seniority, heavy government involvement, significant licensing requirements, etc.? What makes public education at the K-12 level so special? You obviously have given this a lot of thought and are an excellent writer, so I look forward to your viewpoint on these things.

  Finally, thanks for pointing out Randi’s proposals — I will take a look.

• 13 curious2
  · Aug 23, 2005 at 6:43 pm

  Hey Leo,

  I just read the link from Randi in your posting. Bluntly, it suggests that the problem is a lack of funding: more money for teachers and more money for failing schools. Was I missing something?

  I think we should pay teachers more by treating them like professionals in most fields — merit pay, no seniority, no tenure. Great lawyers make more than bad lawyers. Architects aren’t advanced solely by seniority. Incompetent accountants lose their jobs. What do you think of this sort of thing? Why doesn’t it apply to public schools?

• 14 redhog
  · Aug 24, 2005 at 5:01 am

  Does the harping on “getting rid of bad teachers” qualify as a “hobby horse” or as a “red herring”? In either case, it’s a phony issue. Nearly all teachers are too good for the miasma of a work environment in which they must labor. Imposing on them absolute accountability with no authority over the variables that determine “success”, as it is typically but wrongly measured, is a ploy of management,the tabloid media, and a lazy, duty-abrogating parent community. Granting principals greater power over teachers than Henry the Eighth had over corrupt monks is folly. Most teachers are vastly finer educators than are their principals, many of whom are just shrewed and clawing networkers who ingratiated themselves with an influential superintendent in lieu of any real job qualification.

• 15 Mamacita
  · Aug 24, 2005 at 8:13 am

  I belonged to and fully supported the teacher’s union for 26 years, but when I needed them they bailed on me, and wouldn’t even consider backing me. The rep told me she considered our superintendent to be a fine and honorable person and she KNEW he wouldn’t take issue unless something was really wrong.

  Nobody would ever consider my position.

  Sorry. No union for me now. Not ever again.

  And I tell everyone I know not to join.

  I feel like I flushed 26 years and thousands of dollars right down the toilet.

  I couldn’t help but notice, too, that on this site, one must REGISTER in order to comment. On Ed’s site, the comments are for everybody.

  I am not putting down you or this blog. I’m just telling you what my experience with a teacher’s union was. It was worse than bad. I’d rather have the money.

• 16 curious2
  · Aug 24, 2005 at 8:42 am

  Hey redhog,

  You have a tendency to write in an angry and extreme manner. I think you should reread some of your postings and consider changing your approach.

  A few questions:
  1. You write “Granting principals greater power over teachers than Henry the Eighth had over corrupt monks is folly.” Isn’t this an extreme exaggeration? Most reformers just want principals to have the same authority that managers have throughout most of our current society, everywhere from private schools to public companies. Your approach should be to explain why K-12 public schools should be operated differently. Can you explain the difference?

  2. For my knowledge, what exactly are you referring to with the phrase “lazy, duty-abrogating parent community”?

  3. You write “Most teachers are vastly finer educators than are their principals”. I think it is critical to improve our principals and I think Bloomberg and Klein are working hard on that. However, your statement seems to be quite an exaggeration and not consistent with most peoples view. Is it based on a study you have done or read? Also, if the principals were generally good, would you be comfortable with giving them the authority typically vested in a management role? If you answer “yes” and can convince your peers of this, we might make some great progress down the road.