Unions and Education Part 5 of 6

Don’t Eliminate Teacher Unions—Improve the Process

PART 5 OF 6

Politicians and education reformers are blasting teacher unions suggesting that they are preventing necessary educational improvements.


Based on more than forty years of study and first-hand experience with the issue, I offer this six part series on the problems and benefits of union engagement in education concluding with suggested actions to improve traditional approaches to bargaining and a politically more problematic approach for engaging all concerned.


In previous parts of this series I noted some examples of problems and benefits associated with collective bargaining and education. In this fifth part I offer some suggestions for improving the traditional bargaining process.

Suggestions for Improvement of the Traditional Processes

Because of benefits from the process and in spite of problems, it is neither wise to eliminate collective bargaining for teachers or to retain it without changes. Depending on the courage and foresight of leaders, we can take one of two approaches. We can make needed changes in conventional approaches or we can venture into more radical changes. In this posting I consider three kinds of changes to the traditional process that are the minimal ones needed to ensure balance of power between labor and management if we are to pay attention to the health and quality of schooling of our children: improving the information base, increasing participants’ skills, and improving the means of resolving impasses.

1. Information base

As noted previously, information used for much decision making regarding a wide-range of educational issues is notoriously unreliable. Many labor disputes arise from distrust of management-provided data regarding school district finances. (There are similar problem decisions by legislators as a consequence of poor information about everything from finance to student outcomes including confusing and questionable data concerning dropouts, disciplinary action, and class size.) Without accurate, trustworthy information we will continue to have bad decisions by negotiators and policy makers.

Improved education of administrators in school finance and data systems, strengthened oversight by politically independent school boards, and improved auditing by states along with better definition of standards for information gathering are needed. It would also help if some of the technology experts who are bent on explaining how to improve education would, instead, concentrate on providing better tools for schools to use in gathering and analyzing data.

2. Skilled participants

Since the 1960’s some progress has been made in improving the skills of the people who engaged in collective bargaining for both unions and management. However, the continued bashing of unions and the bargaining process during the first decade of the 21st century and the continued usurpation of local power by state and federal officials, increases the need for skilled negotiators for both sides of the table.

States should provide training and support for people who are involved in these important roles. As changes are made to improve the laws and regulations governing collective bargaining, these sessions should go beyond general conflict and dispute resolution training to include specifics related to the new laws.

3. Conflict resolution

Three actions are needed to improve resolution of impasses in bargaining.

Mediation: Most states that have collective bargaining processes for teachers include mediation as one means of resolving conflicts. Mediation processes now spelled out in state laws need to be examined and strengthened as appropriate.

Unfortunately, there are too few mediators who not only know how to nudge people toward agreements but understand the consequences of bargaining decisions for the educational enterprise. A cadre of such individuals needs to be developed.

Strikes and lockouts with consequences: Within the private sector the union’s right to strike – to withhold services— and management’s right to lock out employees are recognized parts of the process that legitimates each party’s power at the table.

Offsetting those rights for unions is the loss of income and benefits that employees can experience during a strike. Management’s power is limited by its willingness or ability to continue its production without striking employees or to take whatever financial losses may come from being closed during a strike or its counter-part the management lock-out.

In education the equalizing powers are not present. For teachers, because of laws requiring set numbers of days of instruction for students, there is seldom a significant loss of pay from a strike and school districts seldom lose money from either the state or local funding sources. The loss tends to fall on the community and its students who are at least inconvenienced by the schedule changes. At worst parents are out additional expenses such as those for child care and students may be hindered in their pursuit of possible rewards such as scholarships.

The historic resolution to these circumstances has been for courts (or legislatures) to deny teacher unions the right to strike. (I remember an NEA attorney telling me a number of years ago that they would continue to take their right to strike to the courts until one day they found a judge who would agree with them.)

An alternative that should be considered would be to legalize strikes and prescribe that those striking may not have their lost salary or benefits made up and districts may not receive funding for days in which school is closed during a strike. Under such provisions both union and districts would still have to provide the full number of days of schooling required by state law but they would have to do so without funds for days lost due to job actions.

Arbitration: Finally, because schooling for the young should not be disrupted long term while adults settle differences, if a strike, lock-out, or other job action (work-to-rules, slow down, etc.) lasts more than two weeks, the impasse should be referred to a specially trained arbitrator who would be required to approve the last best offer from either the union or the school district (much the same way special arbitrators decide on salary proposals in professional baseball).

Ultimately, such change in conventional bargaining arrangements are more promising ways of improving union-school district relationships than the heavy handed union bashing legislation being put forward by various states. However, as I will suggest in the final part of this series, there may be more productive ways of approaching the matter.

 

What's a Teacher Worth

Read this Op Ed piece from the New York Times.  It's a good answer to the question of what is a teacher worth.

Who's Bashing Teachers

Ken Jones shared this link to a thoughtful message about who is bashing schools and public education.  Check out the statement from Stan Karp published by Rethinking Schools.  Part of what he reminds us is that not all critics have the same motives.  The questions I have is whether he falls into his own trap and finds conspiracies where there may just be well-intentioned but wrong thinking.

Agency Essential

The League of Democratic Schools completed its 2011 annual meeting on March 26.  One comment following that meeting is included below.  Other follow-up communications are on the LODS page of this Blog.

Jim Strickland, Marysville Washington teacher,  shared the following with his colleagues

The Real Source of Our Education Crisis

There can be no doubt that we are experiencing a crisis in American education today. Budgets are being slashed, class sizes are exploding, standards are not being met, and too many of our children are just plain failing to thrive. As would be expected, fingers are pointing to all the usual suspects – incompetent teachers, self-serving teacher unions, disengaged parents, inadequate funding, etc.

While not minimizing the problems in these and other areas, could it be that the real source of our education crisis lies elsewhere? Could it be that the crisis we are facing in American education is not a crisis of schooling at all, but a crisis of agency? By agency, I mean the power and capacity to make real decisions and take meaningful action. Agency becomes a crisis when it is concentrated in the wrong hands.

So who holds the agency in American education today? Is it our superintendents? Our principals? Our teachers? Our parents? Surely not our students? In fact, very little agency is held by any of these stakeholders who are most intimately affected by the day-to-day operations of our schools (emphasis added).

Instead, agency is concentrated in the state and federal mandates that tie local hands by prescribing curriculum, requiring high-stakes assessments, and administering draconian punishments for failure to comply. All of this serves to narrow the curriculum, disempower teachers, principals, parents, and students, and diminish the possibility of creating vibrant, growth-producing learning communities.

Education renewal advocate John Goodlad writes that, “We are not going to get the large supply of good teachers we need until they get the necessary autonomy of agency that good teaching requires. Thinking has been taken out of the schoolhouse just as it has been taken out of the workplace beyond.”

State and Federal governments do have a vital role in public education, but that role should focus primarily on promoting the public purpose of our schools, protecting the rights of learners, and ensuring equitable access. The particulars of education need to be hammered out by those most directly involved in making our schools work – the learning communities themselves.

In his book Reinventing the Sacred, scientist and professor Stuart Kauffman points out that “Meaning derives from agency… there can be no meaning without agency.” Could this explain the lack of meaning that too often characterizes education today? By denying our schools agency, we deprive them of meaning. And without meaning, American education is surely lost.

More Race to Nowhere

If you want to know more than CNN shared about the parents who are fighting back on the manic testing movement created by NCLB check out this recent post by the Race to Nowhere folks.

Politics and Conspiracies: Unions & Education Part 4 of 6

Don’t Eliminate Teacher Unions—Improve the Process

PART 4 OF 6

Politicians and education reformers are blasting teacher unions suggesting that they are preventing necessary educational improvements.


Based on more than forty years of study and first-hand experience with the issue, I offer this six part series on the problems and benefits of union engagement in education concluding with suggested actions to improve traditional approaches to bargaining and a politically more problematic approach for engaging all concerned.


In previous parts of this series I noted some examples of problems and benefits associated with collective bargaining and education. In this fourth part I take a look at to other challenges raised about union-district relationships.

Has the collective bargaining process focused on benefits for employees to the detriment of opportunities for students to learn?

In short, while adults have benefited from collective bargaining it is possible to identify educational improvement initiatives that grow out of the process. Still there have been claims that union-management bargaining has had a negative effect of school improvement.

It is possible to predict the outcome of research regarding educational policy by knowing the ideology of the researchers and the bias of the organizations with which they are affiliated. For instance, researchers from organizations such as the Fordham Foundation and the Hoover Institute have argued for years that bargaining is bad publishing research that the say demonstrates that contracts interfere with reform efforts. From the other side of the spectrum, researchers publish claims that collective bargaining has enabled advances to be made in large and small communities.

In 2008, Nathan Burroughs reported from the University of Indiana that “there can be no verdict on whether collective bargaining in public education is “bad” or “good,” because there is insufficient evidence to warrant a definitive judgment.”

In 2009, reporting from the Center for Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington, Mitch Davis observed that "the basic question that we asked in this study is: Are teachers unions and collective bargaining agreements barriers to high school reform and redesign efforts in Washington, California, and Ohio? Based on our analysis of the contracts that we studied, our answer is: sometimes, but not as often as many educators and union critics seem to think.”

Findings such as these last two are more consistent with my observations than the more ideologically loaded statements by political scientists such as Terry Moe from the Hoover Institute who reported definite harm to school reform from his study of the effects of bargaining in California.

While there is insufficient evidence to conclude that bargaining is harmful to student learning, the concentration of decision making in the hands of labor and management negotiators as they bargain about a wide range of education related issues identified as working conditions for employees raises questions about the extent to which parents and students are excluded from a say on important matters.

Is this attack another part of an overall effort to dismantle public education?

The strong ideological biases in research, associated as they are with various political agendas have contributed to claims that a group of business and political leaders want to eliminate or at least severely diminish public education as part of a grander plan to limit the role of government. Indeed, some of the same individuals, foundations, and NGO’s that push for publically funded voucher systems and reductions in funding for schools and higher education are among the most strident critics of union involvement in education.

However, generally I have trouble with conspiracy theories because they divert attention from thoughtful analysis. It is difficult to discern the motives of these educational critics who for the most part insist they do not want to destroy public education but to reform what has become a dysfunctional system.

In any event, as noted previously, there are continuing problems associated with collective bargaining in education and these problems should not be ignored because of speculation about some people’s motives.

Another voice on Union and Teachers

In a March 22nd posting on Valerie Strauss blog, The Answer Sheet, Stanford professor Larry Cuban weighs in on the irony of praising teachers while bashing them and their unions.

He notes that "one only has to contrast right-to-work states with those allowing collective bargaining to determine whether the absence of contracts has improved schools and made them more solvent financially, or, better yet, raised teacher salaries and demonstrated more trust in teachers. They have not."

Read his entire commentary at The Answer Sheet

Unions and Education Part 3 of 6

Don’t Eliminate Teacher Unions—Improve the Process

PART 3 OF 6

Politicians and education reformers are blasting teacher unions suggesting that they are preventing necessary educational improvements.


Based on more than forty years of study and first-hand experience with the issue, I offer this six part series on the problems and benefits of union engagement in education concluding with suggested actions to improve traditional approaches to bargaining and a politically more problematic approach for engaging all concerned.


In previous parts of this series I noted some examples of problems associated with collective bargaining and education. In this third part I take a look at benefits frequently associated with union-district relationships.

Benefits from bargaining for management and unions

In spite of problems, union-school district bargaining relationships have produced positive results for both systems and teachers.

First, they have created a situation that requires those who are not dealing directly with conditions in the classroom to listen to those who are. When power relationships are relatively equal this increases the likelihood of realistic educational practices and decreases the tendency of management to impose fads or teachers to ignore curriculum expectations.

Some complain about the "minutia" they see in contracts with teacher unions, saying that educators can’t possibly be considered professionals when they insist on spelling out specific hours of work, duty free lunch times and other items that seem like what one would expect in factory workers’ contracts. Such provisions are indeed an interesting part of most teacher union contracts. On the surface they are just what critics say they are. Why would a professional have such things in a contract?

The provisions grow out of teachers’ working conditions before their unions sought to include such language in contracts. Like factory workers, teachers usually have been required to sign into the building each morning. They were often expected to eat lunch with their students, then were required to watch the children on the playground (elementary) or hallways and restrooms (secondary), and were required to sign out any time they left the building (after having obtained permission). It is not surprising the that teachers wanted a little more freedom to function like adults rather than the kids in the school -- let alone being treated as professionals. Factory workers on an assembly line have bargained for breaks from the routine of their work. When schools are created that mimic factories (as they have been) then it is not surprising to see employees mimicking factory workers. As noted before, the provisions are also a result of management negotiators schooled in industrial union contracts who saw little relation between what unions were seeking and the core functions of the organization.

Historically teachers have not been treated as capable adults -- so it is not surprising if they behave as they are treated -- and their working conditions are not productive of good decision making regarding how to help kids learn. Place them in a subservient position as most school systems have and treat them with little respect and they will respond in undesirable ways. As unprofessional as some of the provisions in contracts may appear, they have led to improved circumstances for teachers that in turn may make it more likely they will treat their students with the respect owing them.

In the 1980’s, innovative union leaders and school administrators joined forces in a national group coordinated by a professor from the University of Southern California and a union leader from the state of New York. This group, known as TURN, emphasized collaborative approaches to bargaining that included improving teacher evaluation processes and increasing community participation in school improvement processes. Other groups have begun to develop more collaborative approaches to bargaining and to look for ways to move from confrontation to cooperation (more about that later).

Teacher pay, while still short of most professions, has improved as a result of collective bargaining. To an even greater extent teachers’ job security and benefits have improved to the point that critics cite them in their attacks on unions.

Outside of collective bargaining unions and management groups have joined with higher education forces to strengthen teacher education by creating the National Council for Accrediting Teacher Education (NCATE) as a mechanism for accrediting colleges of education. Also, both major teacher unions (AFT and NEA) have worked with college and school management to develop models of professional development schools that further contribute to the initial and continuing education of teachers. Such benefits for the educational enterprise of union-management cooperation are ignored or discounted by critics.

Finns Get It Right

Educate teachers well, collaborate with unions -- that's what they do in Finland -- just the opposite of what our so-called reformers are advocating.  Check out this Hechinger Report as shared by Huffington.

Unions and Education Part 2 of 6

Don’t Eliminate Teacher Unions—Improve the Process

PART 2 OF 6

Politicians and education reformers are blasting teacher unions suggesting that they are preventing necessary educational improvements.


Based on more than forty years of study and first-hand experience with the issue, I offer this six part series on the problems and benefits of union engagement in education concluding with suggested actions to improve traditional approaches to bargaining and a politically more problematic approach for engaging all concerned.


In this second part of the series I take a look at problems frequently associated with union-district relationships.

Have the problems created by the process outweighed its benefits?

Throughout recorded history those who have capital or wealth and those who perform the labor required to increase wealth by turning it into products have been mutually dependent and have clashed as each group sought greater rewards for their contributions. Whether those engaged were peasant farmers seeking to be free landholders, or miners and industrial workers seeking greater return and safer working conditions, these clashes have ranged from legal arguments and petitions to violent confrontations.

During the twentieth century collective bargaining in the United States evolved into sophisticated and generally productive practices. When operating constructively, these processes produced conditions in which those who represented capital interests were able to obtain fair returns on their investments and labor was fairly compensated for the work it performed under favorable conditions. But these gains were not sustained.

Any consideration of problems associated with unions and education needs to be understood in the context of the general disfavor with which unions in the private sector are increasingly viewed. Unions attempting to hold on to past gains have lost favor and been blamed for having negotiated contracts that companies blame for laying off workers, moving their manufacturing, and closing plants. Corporations have sought increased wealth by outsourcing routine work to non-union employees in this country and under-paid labor in other countries. As a result, union membership in the private sector has declined and with this decline they have lost political power. (And, not coincidentally, it has contributed to a gap between those who are very wealthy and members of the “middle class.”)

Problems – management and union

While unions receive much criticism, it is important to keep in mind that the “union contract” so often vilified by critics is, in fact, an agreement between management and labor. If there are problems with these contracts, both parties must share the blame.

For both labor and management in education the biggest problems come when participants lose sight of the mission of the organization. When those bargaining on behalf of management see their primary mission as securing agreement without regard for the core functions of the organization, they ignore long-term consequences of either compensation or work rules. Such management negotiators buy short-time labor peace at the expense of provisions such as back-loaded salary structures, bad evaluation practices, and restrictions on work schedules. Such contract provisions make it difficult for school administrators to provide leadership to teachers and other employees in their daily professional work.

A second management disconnect with the mission of the organization emerges when individual administrators place their own ambition ahead of the welfare of the students and the people who work with them. Ambition is not bad until it blinds the ambitious to other than self-advancement at which point quick wins at the bargaining table may substitute for wise leadership.

Similar personal agendas derail some union leaders from their primary responsibilities. Such union leaders forget they are representing the interests of teachers as professionals in schools and become most concerned about advancing the union and their own status in it. They begin to distrust the intelligence of their members and insist that they know what is best for them. Such union paternalism is no more beneficial for teachers and their students than similar actions by controlling administrators.

Some union representatives and some management negotiators approach the bargaining process as a game to be won or lost without regard to long-term consequences. These individuals see creating a strike or other form of job action as a victory without regard to the consequences for the membership, the students in the system, or the community. They are stuck in adversarial modes of bargaining where force not reason prevails for both management and labor.

The preceding problems are exacerbated when, as is often the case, there is not an accurate, trustworthy data based regarding issues in dispute. A frequently observed example of this plays out when management insists there are no funds for a salary increase then, after bargaining has concluded, reveals a much larger than previously announced cash balance.

In addition to these problems that are directly connected with collective bargaining, unions (and school systems) seek gains from legislative bodies. As some unions increased in political power they were able to achieve through direct legislation things they could not through bargaining. While all unions have sought and at times achieved expanded political influence, most have not been in a position as are some public employee unions to directly achieve politically what they can’t obtain at the bargaining table. Pension and job security provisions are two examples of legislated gains for teachers that other labor groups have had to obtain more fully from the collective bargaining process.

 Ironically, management, backed by a recent Supreme Court ruling regarding political spending, has become even more politically powerful and uses its power to portray unions as too powerful.

 

Another union paper

Marc Tucker has written a detailed analysis of the teacher union question.  I think it is useful background for understanding today's arguments about the issue even if I don't completely agree with what he says. 

Check it out at http://bit.ly/eRQsqx

Unions and Education Part 1 of 6

Don’t Eliminate Teacher Unions—Improve the Process

Richard W, Clark

March 2011

PART 1 OF 6

Introduction

Unions and collective bargaining for teachers are being blamed for many of the problems in education in the United States. Republican Governors and legislators have taken the lead in efforts to “bust” the unions which they claim have been a primary cause of state financial problems and of difficulties in reforming schooling.

Many of these critics point to state laws that expanded public employee bargaining beginning in the 1960’s as the origin of the union movement in education but the two major unions have been around for a long time. The National Education Association (NEA) was founded in 1857 and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) was created in 1916. Over the past fifty years they have flexed their muscles and, while industrial unions have been losing members and influence, teacher unions have been forces to be reckoned with at the bargaining table and in political venues where policies are made and funds are appropriated.

Why are we witnessing such strong attacks on these unions and their right to bargain? A number of questions come to mind and are addressed in the following remarks: Have the problems created by the process outweighed its benefits? Has the collective bargaining process focused on benefits for employees to the detriment of opportunities for students to learn? Is this attack another part of an overall effort to dismantle public education? What alternatives to eliminating the process should be adopted?

Qualifications

Before I comment on these questions, a word about my own experiences with collective bargaining and education. I spent 20 years with direct or indirect responsibility for management’s side of the collective bargaining process with public employee unions – at one point with seven different unions. Prior to that, I was the president and chief negotiator for a public employee union. In the mid-seventies I was part of a small group of school administrators, school board members, union representatives, and legislators who developed the laws and regulations that still provide the foundation for collective bargaining in Washington State. During the most recent twenty years I have had an opportunity to interact with union and management representatives across the country – some in large urban areas, others in smaller systems.

During these forty years I have seen some outstanding examples of constructive union-management relationships and examples of abuses of individual and public interests in other situations.

As has often been the case in labor-capital conflicts, at times both sides have been right and in other instances both have been wrong. I believe it is imperative that states provide for legitimate involvement by school employees and, at the same time, I believe that actions need to be taken to make these processes more uniformly beneficial to the public and the employees than current bargaining processes.

Please give some thoughts to this issue and share your comments as I post the next five parts in the coming weeks.

First hand knowledge

Bernard Badiali, incoming president of the National Association of Professional Development Schools, shared the following comments at this year's annual conference. Note particularly his observations about the value of first hand knowledge in understanding what should be done to strengthen schooling:

"I feel that I have a unique vantage point from which to see what goes on in schools everyday. Last week, thanks to one of our long-time mentors, Linda Andrews, I was “Snowflake Bentley” for a classroom full of forth graders. Next week I will resume my role as a professor and university Senator representing the College of Education at Penn State’s University Senate. Negotiating two very different cultures is the challenge of partnership work.

I know the names of many children throughout the ten schools in our PDS network; I know some of their families. I also know each of our 58 interns and 70 or more mentorteachers in our schools. I am proud and privileged to know all of the principals as well. And, in my 40 plus year career in education, I have never worked with more skilled or dedicated colleagues than I have in the PDS.

I know all of these folks at very close range. By extension, I think I know you too.

My knowledge is very different from the pundits we hear on TV or the political critics we read in the newspapers and in the Blogisphere. For one thing, my knowledge is first hand. I have to wonder what or who it is that informs their knowledge about schools. If they knew what I know, they would have a very different message for teachers than the vicious critique and heated rhetoric day in and day out.

I see the miracles that occur in classrooms every day. I see children learning and developing every day. Yes, I do see problems, but they are mostly caused by the current policy climate and incessant drum beat of negativity it causes for us. And to what end?

Instead of framing the problems we have in education as finding and firing bad teachers (who we know are the small minority); instead of shaming and blaming schools for low student test scores (as if test scores indicate anything important); Instead of cutting programs rather than supporting schools and their communities (a side of the equation that gets for too little attention); I would begin with two guiding ideas that reframe the way we see the current problems we have in educating the young.

Idea one – every child deserves a skilled, well-prepared, knowledgeable and caring teacher.

Idea two -- every teacher needs the appropriate support to do the difficult work of educating all of America’s children. Where is that support?

educating for democracy

Not sure whether it all classifies as "good news" but Jim Strickland shared the podcast associated with the following link.  It contains a thoughtful discussion of higher education's responsibility for civic education.

http://www.scottlondon.com/doingdemocracy/kf.html

Good news anyone?

Governors succeeding in denying teachers and others the right to bargain.  Education Secretary suggesting that 80% of schools will be failing by 2012.  A "diverse group" advocating a common curriculum. The world's second richest man saying we can solve our education problems by increasing class size (but of course not for his kids).

In the face of such wonderful actions and proposals has anyone heard anything that could be classified as good news regarding education in the United States?

An aunt inspired

Laurie Friedman Adler -- musician and teacher -- found inspiration from her aunt.  Read her story below:

MY AUNT

Laurie Friedman-Adler

I am eternally grateful for the gifts given to me by my Aunt. Those gifts, firmly planted in my heart, are used to harvest the resilience needed when life challenges you. My blaringly honest, passionate Aunt who embraced me without judgment is the spirit of inspiration. Her apartment was located two blocks from the old Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. As I sat in this old grey, soft cushy chair, the sounds and silences of the subway and Yankee Stadium would permeate through the old weather worn windows.

Her stories were numerous; an encounter with the dreaded polio epidemic; the eleven operations to prevent her foot from growing; six years of endless job searches as discrimination for the disabled was common place; the excitement of finally getting a job and working for the same boss for over fifty years; her unabated generosity as she handed out sandwiches to the alcoholics who lined a street called The Bowery; the iron brace on her left leg made going up and down the subway steps an Olympic feat; the alcoholics, grateful for her gift empathy and food, gathered around her to ensure her safety down the subway; an accidental meeting of her future husband; the explosion of independence when she learned to drive a car; her insistence to my parents that my sister, brother and I should always have a “good pair of shoes” so up and down Fordham Road (the steepest hill in the Bronx) we shopped gleefully oblivious to the stamina and strength it took her to get us those shoes!

During a recent musical tour of Prague and Krakow, I had the unique opportunity to perform in halls which captivated the essence of perfection. The timbre of the instruments reverberating off the gilded domes allowed us to dream while communicating a message of hope. When I visited Terezinstadt Concentration Camp near Prague, I followed the train tracks until they abruptly ended at yellow innocent looking building. This was the crematorium, an endless boundary of destroyed dreams. My thoughts were not of hate or anger but of remembrance for those who perished in the ashes of humanity. I felt an urgency to go back to New York City to teach students about defining social justice and the democratic concepts inherent in the beauty of music.

My elation on arriving back in NYC was short lived. My voice, the voice which found a way to lift the spirits of many became silent. Silent….and still. The voices of negativity gained strength through the newspapers, mass media, and internet blogs as they shouted “stupid teachers….lowest third in their class…..responsible for all the ills of the educational mainstream.” I was silenced. Silence can be profound silence, it could be a resting silence, but eventually that silence serves no purpose or function. Yet in the silence my Aunt’s stories offered me solace. Stop…. listen to your voice again and start the process anew.

My Aunt was strength, wisdom and empathy. There were so many challenges and difficulties that life threw her way; as if they were pebbles in the sand rather than mountains she could never climb. Thank you Aunt Sarah for helping me find my voice…. again. My Aunt died one year ago.

You can't win a battle

You can't win a battle if you fire on  your own  troops -- says this animated teacher as she fights back from firing by animated version of Michelle Rhee.

Right to Organize

While working on piece about unions and public education I saw Bob Hebert's Feb 28 NY Times column.  It has an important message and should be read by all.