Book Title: The Alliance Against Education Reform
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Teacher Unions: Chief Impediment to Education Reform
The unionization of teachers has had a negative impact on public school education.
· Student achievement has declined, when additional resources are factored in.
· Collective bargaining excesses have deprived school districts of vital funds for needed innovations.
· The teacher labor contract has paralyzed the status quo, making significant reform impossible.
· Union leaders and their minions have broken the vital bond between employee and employer, transferring the loyalty of teachers from their communities, which pay their salaries, to their unions.
· The unionization of teachers has ruined what could have been a true profession.
· The astounding success of teacher unions has corrupted needed political balance in public school governance.
· In sum, the public’s servants have been transformed into the public’s masters.
I have served as a chief negotiator for a number of school boards and in a variety of administrative positions for school boards. I can honestly say that where there is strong union presence, making decisions that significantly improve student learning is impossible. The union can stop almost anything that threatens the status quo. I am not alone in my hard-earned views. According to Myron Lieberman, a leading expert on teacher unions (1), the principal obstacles to reform are the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers. Lieberman maintains that these two unions are the most powerful forces in public education today. With more than 6,000 active staff members, these organizations have more operatives than the Democrat and Republican parties combined. Such power enables them to stop anything they don’t like.
Unions Stifle Reform in New York.
In 1997, writing for the Manhattan Institute (2), Sol Stern stated, “…schools can’t improve until reformers confront the deadly consequences of the power that teachers’ unions wield over a monopolistic industry, not only through contracts but also through the unions’ influence on the elected officials who regulate the education industry. Until then, any reform – whether more money for the schools or smaller classes or high national standards or charter schools – will get short-circuited from the very outset.”
In his excellent treatise, Stern follows the inexorable expansion of teacher unionism (especially in New York) to the point that it “now plays a pivotal role in electing (and defeating) mayors and governors and has often exercised virtual veto power over the selection of school chancellors.” He goes on to describe how principals are emasculated in their power to act on behalf of students by the teachers’ labor contract and the ever-present shop steward looking for a grievance to lodge. He concludes, “What I have described is not fanciful. It is occurring in fits and starts all over the country and is bound to grow. The only thing that can prevent the teachers’ union reform movement from expanding is the one thing the teachers’ union can’t seem to deliver – a public school system that works.”
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