Teabaggers march on St. Tammany

Conservative activists proudly allied with wingnut Glenn Beck are attacking the St. Tammany Parish collective bargaining agreement, as reported here by Jim Derry of The Times Picayune.

Since 1993, teachers and school employee in St. Tammany Parish have had a harmonious and productive partnership with their school board. It's the only school district in the state in which every non-administrative teacher and school employee has a binding contractual agreement with the school board (several other systems negotiate with some categories of employees; St. Tammany has the only "wall-to-wall" contract in the state).

St. Tammany is also one of the highest-achieving school systems in Louisiana, so you'd think that people would be loathe to interfere with a process that is working to the benefit of all involved.

But this is a strange political season, and ultraconservative teabaggers are on the march.

Using the same arguments that State Rep. Anthony Ligi recently made in an unsuccessful bid to change state collective bargaining law, the activists are demanding to be included when the board and the St. Tammany Federation of Teachers and School Employees negotiate their contract.

For the record, the contract between the school board and the union cannot be adopted until it has been ratified by the employees and adopted in a public session by the school board.

But the negotiations that lead to the contract are never done in public. And that is for the very same reason that presidents, governors and mayors negotiate all their administrative contracts privately before bringing them to the full body for a public vote.

A lot of ideas are discussed in negotiations. Many of them never get into the contract. Some very good ideas are discarded because the sides cannot come to agreement on them. The same is true of some very bad ideas. And sometimes the discussions get pretty heated before everybody comes together with a contract that they can all agree upon.

As Gov. Jindal likes to say about negotiations to bring new industries into the state, the discussions are just too sensitive to be public until an agreement is ready for unveiling.

But that logic won't cut any ice with the group in St. Tammany. They are not really interested in the collective bargaining agreement anyway. As their leader told the Times-Picayune, the union should be "abolished.

Another Group of Wisconsin Faculty Vote for the Union

Despite ongoing political attacks on unions and public employees by Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, University of Wisconsin faculty members across the state continue to vote for union representation. The latest organizing victory came on March 24, when faculty at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls voted 148-16 in favor of union representation by the AFT and AFT-Wisconsin.

"This landslide election, along with the four other recent University of Wisconsin campus union victories, demonstrates that workers—in this instance, UW-River Falls faculty—will not let Gov. Walker's anti-democratic, anti-worker ideological agenda deny them their right to form a union," says AFT president Randi Weingarten.

To read the rest of this article, please click here.

Poll: Public supports unions, public employees

A new poll published by the New York Times and CBS says that most Americans support public employee unions and collective bargaining rights.

And rather than see public employees such as teachers lose salaries and benefits, more Americans would agree to a tax increase.

The poll, published on February 28, includes these results:

• More Americans have a favorable opinion of unions (33%) than unfavorable (25%), with 19% undecided and 20% needing more information.
• The percentage of Americans who believe labor unions have too much influence over our life and politics is shrinking dramatically.
• A solid majority of American believe that public employee salaries and benefits are either about right or too low: 36% believe the salaries and benefits are about right, 25% believe they are too low, and 26% believe they are too high.

New board will decide Jefferson contract’s fate

Because the outgoing Jefferson Parish School Board could not convene a quorum before the end of 2010, the fate of a collective bargaining agreement with the parish’s 3,000 school support staff rests with a newly elected board. The issue could be decided at a meeting scheduled for January 6 at 5:00 P.M.

Employee hopes ran high in early December, when Board President Gene Katsanis and Member Cedric Floyd led an effort to award collective bargaining rights to unions representing the employees. Despite opposition and legal challenges from some in the business community, the board voted to allow bargaining with the employees.

The Jefferson Federation of Teachers and Service Employees International Union Local 21 negotiated contracts on behalf of employees, who then ratified the contracts. The former board missed its opportunity to ratify in the week between Christmas and New Years, however, leaving the issue for the new board to decide.

Katsanis was one of five board members defeated for re-election in November; Floyd will retain his seat.

JFT President Meladie Munch said that she intends to pursue ratification with the new board.
“Everything is in place for employees to have a contract,” Munch said. “We are waiting for the new board to place the item on the meeting agenda. We hope the board will agree to this contract, which has already been ratified by employees.

“It is truly an issue of respect and dignity for these members of the education family,” Munch said. “Jefferson Parish support employees have the lowest salaries in the New Orleans area, and are $2,000 below the state average."

Judge derails anti-bargaining effort in Jefferson Parish

Efforts to derail the collective bargaining agreement for school employees in Jefferson Parish were thwarted on Friday when a district judge refused to grant a restraining order that would have halt the process.

More than 3,000 paraprofessionals and school related personnel in the parish won the right to negotiate a contract last Wednesday, when the Jefferson Parish School Board voted 5-3 to grant bargaining rights to the Jefferson Federation of Teachers and Service Employees International Union Local 21. The board agreed to negotiate with the unions after JFT and SEIU presented petitions signed by an overwhelming number of employees asking for collective bargaining.

On Friday, an anti-union cabal comprising Frank Morales, Glen W. Hayes, Sr., incoming school board member Glenn W. Hayes, Jr., The Jefferson Chamber of Commerce and The Jefferson Business Council asked District Judge Patrick McCabe for a Temporary restraining Order that would have prohibited the school board from recognizing JFT and SEIU are bargaining representatives for the employees.

To read more, please click here.

Jefferson Parish school employees win bargaining rights

Jefferson Federation of Teachers President Meladie Munch presents petitions signed by thousands of school employees asking for the right to bargain a contract with the Jefferson Parish School Board.





In a historic vote Wednesday night, the Jefferson Parish School Board granted collective bargaining rights to the district’s 3,000 paraprofessionals and school related personnel. The 5-3 vote marked the greatest expansion of bargaining rights in the parish since teachers won a collective bargaining agreement in 1977.

The board vote marked the climax of a campaign by the Jefferson Federation of Teachers and the Service Employees International Union Local 21 to win dignity and respect for school board employees. By gathering an overwhelming number of employee signatures on petitions, the unions convinced the board to grant the long-sought prize.

“This is a great victory for our support employees,” said JFT President Meladie Munch. “This opportunity will provide support employees the long needed dignity and respect that they deserve. These employees work hard and are essential to the success of our school system. We are excited to have the opportunity to represent school employees and help them have a voice in our school system.”


According to the board vote, JFT will negotiate on behalf of paraprofessionals, clerical employees and school crossing guards. SEIU will represent transportation workers, custodial and maintenance employees and child nutrition workers.


While Wednesday’s vote was a crucial step toward collective bargaining for the employees, the process is not over yet. Contracts must be negotiated and ratified by employees and the school board. Both sides are hopeful that the process can be completed this month, making it a great Christmas present for school employees in Jefferson Parish.

LSU profs say collective bargaining might be the answer

Buffeted by an administration that ignores the legitimate concerns of the faculty, LSU professors are now considering collective bargaining, according to this article by Advocate reporter Jordan Blum.

This is from a statement issued by a five-member committee of the Faculty Senate:

“In recent years, the voice, power and morale of the faculty have been eroded by
unilateral actions regarding curriculum, research priorities and initiatives,
and university reorganization by an increasingly imperial upper administration.”

The article quotes a committee member as saying that organizations like the Faculty Senate and American Association of University Professors just aren't firm enough in standing up to administrators in defense of faculty rights.

Jefferson parternship enhances teacher professionalism

Here's a good story to follow as the Jefferson Federation of Teachers negotiates its new contract with the school board. Times-Picayune reporter Barri Bronston is tracking JFT's efforts to rein in the school system's interval testing program.

It is an important story because it demonstrates the power of collective bargaining to bring teachers' perspectives to education issues. While it is commonly believed that bargaining only affects salaries and benefits, partnership with the board also gives teachers a voice in their professional responsibilities.

The issue at hand is interval testing, a series of six tests that administrators feel better prepare students for standardized tests. JFT President Meladie Munch agrees that the tests may have some value, but that too much testing robs teachers of valuable classroom time.

Because of the collective bargaining agreement, the board must listen to the concerns of educators and incorporate them into policy. The contract guarantees the professionalism of professional educators.

Union leader: performance-based pay working in Jefferson Parish

When President Barack Obama suggested more performance-based pay for school teachers, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten gave provisional approval, saying "the devil is in the details."

Here in Louisiana, Jefferson Federation of Teachers President Joe Potts said essentially the same thing when Times-Picayune reporter Barri Bronston sought comments for this article.

The key to a successful program, Potts told the reporter, is openness by administrators:

"Otherwise, teachers start feeling like they bought into a bill of goods," he
said. "Then you start losing the enthusiasm and respect for administrators.
The whole key is in how it is presented."

Potts said the program in Jefferson Parish seems to be working well:

...partly because bonuses, which range from $1,000 to $3,300, are based on how
much students grow academically from year to year, as opposed to how high
they score on standardized tests in single year.

There is another significant factor at work. Teachers in Jefferson Parish have a mature relationship with the school board. Because of the collective bargaining agreement between the board and JFT, it is possible to try new programs in collaboration with teachers.

Similar partnership agreements in other school systems would make it much easier for teachers to embrace change, secure in the knowledge that their concerns must be taken into consideration. Currently, only Jefferson, St. Tammany and three other school systems have collective bargaining partnerships between school boards and their employees.

Charter school teachers demand union contract

Fed up at the loss of their professional rights, teachers in a New York charter school are asking to create a union with a collective bargaining agreement.

A super-majority of teachers in Brooklyn's KIPP-AMP school petitioned for a contract to be negotiated by the United Federation of Teachers, an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers.

According to this article in the blog edwize, teachers wrote in a letter to administrators that "they had decided to unionize in order to secure teacher voice and respect for the work of teachers in their school:"

The letter stressed that the decision to organize was directly connected to the
teachers’ commitment to their students. “[A] strong and committed staff,” the
teachers wrote, “is the first step to student achievement.” Unionization, the
teachers believe, will help create the conditions for recruiting and retaining
such a staff.

With charter schools becoming a permanent part of the education landscape, teachers are taking a closer look at the tradeoffs they must make to work in the schools. In Louisana, for example, teachers surrender their tenure to work in a charter school. They might not be included in the teacher retirement system, and may not have the same health insurance, sick leave and associated benefits as other public school teachers.

In addition, laws protecting teachers from abuse by administrators - like grievance procedures - are not applicable in charter schools.

Writing in The American Prospect, reporter Ezra Klein noted that opponents of teacher unions wrongly assume that they only exist to protect bad teachers:

But it's often the opposite. Here, you have a bright, young teaching staff
advocating for a union. They clearly don't think it will detract from their
professionalism. But they do think it will give them more of an occupational
voice and allow them put in place structures that will ease the burnout and calm
the rapid turnover rate, which isn't good for the school or the students.