Michelle Rhee Supports Collective Bargaining for Teachers

[jsteele]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michelle-rhee/why-studentsfirst-support_b_842220.html

"However, in no way does this mean we should take away teachers' rights to collectively bargain."

"StudentsFirst absolutely supports the right of teachers to collectively bargain on many issues, such as base compensation and professional development."

I could have sworn that she was opposing collective bargaining not long ago. I wonder how this position will play with her Republican governor friends, not to mention Gov. Walker-supporting Adrian Fenty?

[jsteele]

Okay, now that I thought about this, I realized that Rhee punked me. Her support for collective bargaining is limited to salaries and vaguely defined "professional development". All other stuff is off the table. This is just her earlier position being re-spun. Even Governor Walker allows collective bargaining for salaries (though the salary limit is set by the legislature so the bargaining is a bit useless).

These kinds of limitations on what can be collectively bargained is a trap for union members. If teachers want to negotiate the conditions under which they may be fired, that's off the table. If they want to negotiate the allowed class sizes, that's off the table. On the other hand, when they show up to bargain over their salary, Rhee and her ilk can accuse them of only being concerned about money.

So, Rhee's position was anti-collective bargaining and is anti-collective bargaining. The only thing that changed is how she wants to spin her position. An interesting question is why she has chosen to spin it differently all of a sudden?

[Anonymous]

Not much interest in why or if she's "spinning" her stance differently now, but I agree with your 2nd post that she supports collective bargaining for some things but not for everything. I think that's a view held by many and not just the far right (i'm about as moderate as they come) in that the union stances making it extremely hard to get rid of bad apples, requiring those w/ shorter tenures to be always be fired first, limiting what can be expected in a teacher's responsibilities, and forcing those trying to balance budgets to fire people instead of allow for furloughs (as we've seen in MoCo) are not constructive and have over-reached.

[Anonymous]

I'm not surprised. She can't do much to influence education in this country if she alienates teachers unions entirely. They will block her before she even sits down at the table.

It is pretty ironic that a website called Students First has as its banner a graphic that says "Save Great Teachers".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not surprised. She can't do much to influence education in this country if she alienates teachers unions entirely. They will block her before she even sits down at the table.

It is pretty ironic that a website called Students First has as its banner a graphic that says "Save Great Teachers".

I don't see the irony, if the organization supports retaining teacher based on merit, not on date of hire. Merit is a nebulous term, but in theory I totally agree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not surprised. She can't do much to influence education in this country if she alienates teachers unions entirely. They will block her before she even sits down at the table.

It is pretty ironic that a website called Students First has as its banner a graphic that says "Save Great Teachers".

I don't see the irony, if the organization supports retaining teacher based on merit, not on date of hire. Merit is a nebulous term, but in theory I totally agree.

Of course it's ironic! The only point of a group name called Students First is to imply that there are other points of view aren't putting the students first. Who do you think she is referring to? The groundskeepers?

[Anonymous]

that there are other points of view aren't putting the students first.

of COURSE there are other points of view not putting students first! That's the JOB of the teacher's union - to prioritize teacher's issues, which are not necessarily aligned w/ students' interests. It's in teachers' best interests (as a large group and especially those there longest) to fight furloughs or a small across the board salary cut to balance the budget while accepting increases in class size instead due to having to fire teachers entirely to balance the budget. The exact opposite is true in terms of what benefits students most.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

that there are other points of view aren't putting the students first.

of COURSE there are other points of view not putting students first! That's the JOB of the teacher's union - to prioritize teacher's issues, which are not necessarily aligned w/ students' interests. It's in teachers' best interests (as a large group and especially those there longest) to fight furloughs or a small across the board salary cut to balance the budget while accepting increases in class size instead due to having to fire teachers entirely to balance the budget. The exact opposite is true in terms of what benefits students most.

Yes, and therefore it is IRONIC that the banner on Students First is sucking up to teachers, and why the subject of half of the articles on the front page are about teachers.

[Anonymous]

Furloughs are temporary. Firing teachers - and NOT rehiring - only increases class sizes.

What's your point?

If education is like a for profit industry, you get what you pay for - an education of dummies.

Sincerely,
a teacher

Anonymous wrote:

that there are other points of view aren't putting the students first.

of COURSE there are other points of view not putting students first! That's the JOB of the teacher's union - to prioritize teacher's issues, which are not necessarily aligned w/ students' interests. It's in teachers' best interests (as a large group and especially those there longest) to fight furloughs or a small across the board salary cut to balance the budget while accepting increases in class size instead due to having to fire teachers entirely to balance the budget. The exact opposite is true in terms of what benefits students most.

[Anonymous]

Furloughs are temporary. Firing teachers - and NOT rehiring - only increases class sizes.

What's your point?

You made my point - firing teachers increases class size and so is a direct harm to students (and a huge harm to those who are fired). In contrast, furloughs, although temporary (and something temporary can be repeated), diffuse the pain and avoid negative impacts to students from herding them into larger and larger class sizes.