According to the Detroit Free Press, Aug '05:

Thompson's original plan to build charter schools was opposed by many in Detroit who said more charter schools would further drain students and money from the financially fragile Detroit Public Schools.

District Administration Magazine says that Thompson's plan additionally "raised concerns" over who would "control the new schools" and "equity for the rest of Detroit's schools."

Rather than trying to work within Detroit's existing public school system, Thompson
wants to come in with charter schools of
his own.

Thompson's charter high schools would be run independently from the Detroit Public School system. They wouldn't be bound by it's policies or its labor rules.

The city's top students would likely gravitate toward charter schools, if they can't afford private schools, leaving "at risk" students trapped in a school system replete with old buildings, shrinking resources, and teachers fearing for their future.

The lack of enthusiasm by the teacher's union is certainly understandable.

Great post, Ed. Obviously, unions work to protect the (perceived) interests of their membership. But in this case, I think better schools will ultimately benefit the teachers as much as the students.

JohnS wrote:

Thompson's charter high schools would be run independently from the Detroit Public School system. They wouldn't be bound by it's policies or its labor rules.

You're right. And given the miserable track record of Detroit Public Schools, how can this be regarded as anything but a good thing? The schools would be controlled and administered by a university, in this case by Grand Valley State. The fact that the DPS objected to the schools not being controlled by them is precisely why I make the argument that their real problem with this is twofold. A) they don't want the competition and B) they don't want anyone showing that Detroit students can do better if given a better educational environment.

The city's top students would likely gravitate toward charter schools, if they can't afford private schools, leaving "at risk" students trapped in a school system replete with old buildings, shrinking resources, and teachers fearing for their future.

So then we should hold those top students back and not accept an offer to give them an opportunity for a better education? You'd rather have those top students languish in bad schools? Detroit already spends more per student than almost any other public school system in Michigan. It's not a problem of underfunding, it's a problem of the system itself. And I maintain that the thing that DPS feared above all else was that the new schools would succeed.

It isn't a problem unique to Detroit schools, I think it's a problem in all public schools. I've seen firsthand the fact that protecting one's turf almost always takes precedence over improving the educational opportunities for kids. In my own school district, there was a meeting of the language departments where they asked the language teachers what they would do with that department if money was not a problem. A french teacher said that he thought they should offer Chinese and Japanese because these would be major languages that students would need to have access to in business and diplomacy over the next few decades. The other teachers were up in arms over that proposal because it would take students out of their classes. They were more interested in protecting their turf than in helping students have greater opportunities. And that is true throughout the system.

The union supports school choice among public schools, but not charter schools, because it says charter schools drain funding from traditional public schools. The Detroit district would lose per-pupil state aid if the charter schools reduced public-school attendance. And the charter schools, as you mention, would stay outside the authority of local school boards.

All those kids --- not just the city's top students --- should be provided with a high-quality education. According to the NY Times, In 2004 the Education Department released data showing test scores among children in charter schools and regular public schools with charter school students often doing worse than comparable students in regular public schools. Additionally, the Times noted that 80 charter schools around the country were forced to close largely because of financial misdealings.

Regarding the Skillman Foundation, the Detroit Free Press says that union is upset over Skillman's demand to force union employees at the school to agree to longer days and different working conditions.

Again, the opposition of the union seems understandable. Although I'm sure there is a certain measure of self-interest involved, I'm also absolutely certain that it's not the entire sum of it's concern. (Two of my great aunts were dedicated teachers, one a nun in the Catholic School system, another was a teacher in the Newark public school system. My mother, who also loved her profession, had her master's in teaching and taught in the public school system.)

Anyway, good for Thompson Foundation's commitment to our children's educations --- I'm just sad that it's their way or the highway.

Interestingly, Apple Computer is doing something similar in Detroit. I don't know how I feel about corporations funding the education system, but I doubt it could make it any worse than it already is. Getting the public education system to the point that it is actually a positive influence on kids' lives will take a lot of work. It will be painful. But it is necessary, probably moreso than almost any other area of public policy.

Why don't entities with this kind of funding set up their own school, completely independent of the public system. They could then educate whomever they determined in most need and do that free of Detroit's public education snafu.
I just hope that the state universities would acknowledge courses and methods from an independent and successful high school within their state that choose to divert from those failing ways.

According to the NY Times, In 2004 the Education Department released data showing test scores among children in charter schools and regular public schools with charter school students often doing worse than comparable students in regular public schools.

If this is the article you're thinking of, I remember it, and it proves nothing but that the cities most likely to seek the "treatment" for their school systems are those with school systems that are already "sick." (If this was not the article that you remember, this is still most likely at least an important part of the explanation for the gap in the article that you did read.) Adjusting for race, income, and whether the schools are rural or urban is not enough -- every major city has a large number of traditional government schools, but there are far fewer charter schools, and they do not usually exist in places where traditional government schools (even if they are poor and "urban," however that was defined by those making the adjustments) have done well. It is the fact that existing schools have failed in a locality that results in the chartering of the charter schools. The Wall Street Journal also responded to that New York Times article.

John S,

The NY Times article you refer to made the critical error of simply running with the teacher's unions "study" of charter schools. Shocking that said study was an exemplar of exactly what Ed is blasting-- selfish turf defense. Of course in the typically unaccountable world of journalism, anyone who reads the NY Times alone would likely never have found the bogus methods that reek of public manipulation.

Thank God for blogs:
http://www.eduwonk.com/archives/2004_08_15_archive.html#109276562985558383

JohnS wrote:

The union supports school choice among public schools, but not charter schools, because it says charter schools drain funding from traditional public schools. The Detroit district would lose per-pupil state aid if the charter schools reduced public-school attendance. And the charter schools, as you mention, would stay outside the authority of local school boards.

Exactly. They are more interested in protecting their turf than in expanding educational opportunity. School choice is fine as long as they are in complete control. But given that the performance under their control has been nothing short of abysmal to the point of crisis, why should their desire to control things be given any credibility? Don't results matter at all in deciding who should be in charge of things? Yes, they will lose the state aid for each pupil that goes outside the public schools. But they already spend much higher than the state average per pupil as it is, and with dramatically worse results. It makes no sense to keep pouring money down this rathole.

All those kids --- not just the city's top students --- should be provided with a high-quality education.

I agree, and I believe that competition is one way of making that happen. The public school monopoly is clearly terrified of competition and insists that, despite their miserable track record of success, someone should just hand them $200 million and let them figure out what to do with it. That would be foolish beyond belief. And there is nothing to indicate that the new charter schools would take only the top students. I don't know what the criteria is. But even if it was only the top students, isn't it a good thing for those students to be challenged and given an opportunity for greater achievement than to have them dragged down with everyone else?

According to the NY Times, In 2004 the Education Department released data showing test scores among children in charter schools and regular public schools with charter school students often doing worse than comparable students in regular public schools. Additionally, the Times noted that 80 charter schools around the country were forced to close largely because of financial misdealings.

As Peter points out above with links, the interpretation of that data is highly suspect. It also doesn't control between charter schools run by universities and ones run by private corporation; these would be administered by a university. The problem is that the term "charter schools" can cover virtually anything, so merely comparing "charter schools" to "public schools" doesn't tell us much, particularly if they're not being compared to the worst public schools like those in Detroit.

Regarding the Skillman Foundation, the Detroit Free Press says that union is upset over Skillman's demand to force union employees at the school to agree to longer days and different working conditions.

Different is not necessarily worse, of course, especially given that the system works so badly now. I think it's a good thing to have alternatives that try doing things differently. If they're successful, we can learn from them. But we'll never learn from different approaches as long as the teacher's unions and educational establishment refuse to give up any control and insist on doing things the same way that continues to fail us. We need innovative approaches because what they're doing now is condemning half of those students to a life of poverty and ignorance. Why should the new schools be unionized at all? If they can find enough quality teachers and other personnel to fill the available positions without a union, why should they need a union at all?

Anyway, good for Thompson Foundation's commitment to our children's educations --- I'm just sad that it's their way or the highway.

I think you have this backwards. He's willing to put up $200 million to try and find a better way. It's the educational establishment that says "our way or the highway". They actually want him to just hand over $200 million to them when they have demonstrated for decades now that they can't educate effectively. Only a fool would continue to throw money at a system that already spends more than most school systems and still has less than a 50% graduation rate.

If someone runs a failing business, they don't get bailed out by constant infusions of other people's money into that failing business. They just go bankrupt and their more effective competitors keep growing because they do things a better way. Here we have a complete failure, but they have enough political clout to get their performance protected from competition, even at the expense of our children's future. It has to stop.

Ed Brayton -

Sure, competition is great ---within the public school system. But any money that flows to charter schools is not going to public schools. Normally, there's a fixed amount of money that communities have been willing to spend on education, so if you spend on charter schools, you take dollars away from the public schools.

In this case, Thompson's infusing new money. However, the Detroit district would lose per-pupil state aid when his charter schools reduced public-school attendance.

I agree that different is not always worse, but I would have to assume that in the case of the Skillman Foundation, the union is annoyed over longer working hours because there was not a commensurate raise in pay. And I doubt that the union would be opposed to better working conditions. The Det Free Press doesn't spell it out specifically, though I guess anything is posssible...

If someone runs a failing business, they don't get bailed out by constant infusions of other people's money into that failing business.

I don't think you can realistically apply business models to running a government or a public school. And besides, the airline industry and George Bush's entire business career stand as testament to the (slight) inaccuracy of that statement! Sorry, I couldn't resist.

"Calling itself an education association is like calling the United Auto Workers union a driving association." – Columnist Patrick Chisholm, referring to NEA. (August 24 Christian Science Monitor)

http://www.eiaonline.com/communique.htm

JohnS wrote:

Sure, competition is great ---within the public school system. But any money that flows to charter schools is not going to public schools. Normally, there's a fixed amount of money that communities have been willing to spend on education, so if you spend on charter schools, you take dollars away from the public schools.

But bear in mind that Detroit already spends considerably more per pupil than all but a tiny percentage of school systems in the state, and despite that fact they still fail miserably at their sole job, which is educating students. So the key to educational success obviously has little to do with amount of funding and everything to do with the way the system operates.

I agree that different is not always worse, but I would have to assume that in the case of the Skillman Foundation, the union is annoyed over longer working hours because there was not a commensurate raise in pay. And I doubt that the union would be opposed to better working conditions. The Det Free Press doesn't spell it out specifically, though I guess anything is posssible...

But I don't think this is the union's business at all. If the foundation is able to fill the available positions with people who accept the rate of pay they're offering for the amount of hours that they are expected to work, then what business is it of some other group of teachers who don't teach there? If they can't find enough quality teachers to do so, they'll have to change the arrangement. That's how it should work, with the free exchange of labor and the market setting the optimal price for their services. No one is forcing the Detroit school teachers to change anything. They can choose to apply for those positions or choose not to do so, but they shouldn't have the power to stop them from offering that situation to other teachers.

I don't think you can realistically apply business models to running a government or a public school.

I'm not really applying a business model, I'm just making an analogy. Schools are not in business to turn a profit, of course. But the point is that when you have an organization that has shown nothing but abject failure for decades on end, the solution obviously does not lie with maintaining the status quo. The educational establishment needs a shakeup. We need innovative ideas and new ways of educating. We need a wide variety of alternative methods and alternative systems, which we can then evaluate to see what works and what doesn't. But we already know that what we've been doing doesn't work.

First, the goal of at least some of the backers of the charter schools IS to eliminate public schools. Sometimes they even admit it.

You should never have used business even as an analogy, Ed. That's what seems to be one of the major Republican diseases, the belief that everything should be run like a business and that there is no such thing as public service that just can't work that way. Even though you say that you only meant it as an analogy most modern Republicans don't. A recent example is the methods of operation of the car licensing offices in Missouri. It's always been a patronage system and the young Republican governor decided that it was a good way to operate so he made it even MORE of a corrupt system of patronage, including converting more offices from being state operated to being operated by private contractors complete with questionable transfers of state property to the governor's friends and contributors who got the contracts with the state. Among their improvements in service is one of the offices being understaffed to the point of being closed over lunch hour when many people try to get this kind of business done. Undoubtedly done to pad the already healthy profits generated. The defenders of this cesspool claim that all the people have to do is go to a different office if they're not happy and thus the miracle of the free market will take place. OTOH, none of the governor's cronies are really running anything any better than their friends who also got sweetheart deals and he closed the single busiest office in the Kansas City area which was the state run office in downtown, forcing people to go to his friends' for profit offices.

And exactly where are the parents in this argument, BTW? The great weakness of the "teachers are evil" crowd is that they completely ignore the responsibilities of the parents once the kids leave the classroom. What about a decent home environment? What about at least trying to make certain they study and do homework? When a teacher only has perhaps 50 minutes with a group of students and has to worry at least as much about discipline as teaching their subject there will never be nearly enough education taking place.

Jim S wrote:

You should never have used business even as an analogy, Ed. That's what seems to be one of the major Republican diseases, the belief that everything should be run like a business and that there is no such thing as public service that just can't work that way. Even though you say that you only meant it as an analogy most modern Republicans don't.

Honestly, I don't really care about "Republican diseases" or what most Republicans say or don't say, or mean or don't mean. I don't speak for Republicans or support the Republicans; I speak only for me and my own beliefs. The point - again - is that Detroit schools are by any reasonable measure a failure and those who are defending the status quo are inevitably defending that failure.

And exactly where are the parents in this argument, BTW? The great weakness of the "teachers are evil" crowd is that they completely ignore the responsibilities of the parents once the kids leave the classroom. What about a decent home environment? What about at least trying to make certain they study and do homework? When a teacher only has perhaps 50 minutes with a group of students and has to worry at least as much about discipline as teaching their subject there will never be nearly enough education taking place.

I don't think teachers are evil, and I never said any such thing. I said that they are defending their own turf at the expense of students and I think that's a reasonable conclusion. And I fully agree with you that parents have probably an even more important role to play in education than teachers do. But that doesn't mean that we can't do something to improve the educational system, to challenge parents and students to reach for excellence rather than accepting failure and mediocrity.

Ed Brayton-

Charter schools drain state funding from public schools and you expect the union to embrace that?

The Communication & Media Arts High School is in the public school system, so the union has an obligation to bitch if Skillman wants to demand longer hours without a commensurate pay increase.

Finally, an idealistic friend of mine left a successful career to teach NYC kids computers and computer graphics. She loves her new job, but it was a rough transition. In the best of circumstances, teaching can be difficult for those not blessed (or teaching something interesting like computer graphics!) --- but add crumbling down schools, overcrowding, and having to dip into your own pockets to provide supplies for your classroom, and I imagine it could be debilitating if you are not devoted 110% to the profession.

I am certain those Detroit teachers face similar difficult circumstances, if not worse. The first thing we could probably do to improve the situation in Detroit schools is to show those teachers a little respect...

John S wrote:

Charter schools drain state funding from public schools and you expect the union to embrace that?

Embrace it? No. But use their political clout to try and stop it? That's absurd. See, I look at this whole thing from an individual level. The true purpose of education is to give each individual person the opportunity to maximize their potential. Some will never take advantage of that opportunity, but we should still try and maximize that opportunity. For some people, they can find a better education, a more challenging environment that is more conducive to helping them achieve, in a private school. And yes, every student who leaves a public school for a private school means one less per-pupil funding unit for the public school. I don't expect the public school establishment to like it, but for them to use their political clout to eliminate that opportunity for those with the capability and ambition to make use of it is unconscionable in my view.

Ed Brayton -
Embrace it? No. But use their political clout to try and stop it? That's absurd.

We'll just have to agree to disagree. I suspect that the union probably thinks that some major experimentation is needed, too, but from within the school system.

I'm just not following the logic that says the union should support the creation of these charter schools that would drain money from the public school system. You expect the union to shoot itself in the foot!

I also think the posture of the union is understandable when you consider that many of those who champion charter schools in general, are on the same side of the political spectrum as those who have long called for an end to public schools and the rest of "the welfare state." The union may see these schools, rightly or wrongly, as weapons against them, not noble experiments for the benefit of Detroit's kids.

Ed

The problem here is the children who are left in the drained public school system until an option becomes available to them. Creative destruction works great for businesses, but when it's the life possibilities of a young citizen to whom we are legally bound to provide an education it becomes hard to justify letting situations getting even worse so that they can become better. As an educator in an alternative education setting that serves "at-risk" students I can say (and with backing of good evidence) that the failure of most very poor school systems wouldn't be solved by new schools or a business model, but is rooted in social issues that stretch far beyond the purview of educational facilities.

Schools in Oakland that offer counselling and medical services are making great strides towards easing some of the failures of society as a whole in an educational setting. Those who aren't actively involved in education often fail to recognize that schools aren't some magic catch all that with an infusion of capital can reverse negative processes of socialization.

I am certain those Detroit teachers face similar difficult circumstances, if not worse. The first thing we could probably do to improve the situation in Detroit schools is to show those teachers a little respect...

I think John S has it backwards. The greatest respect we can show teachers, and the whole system, is to find innovative ways to improve the failed school districts. It's too bad that the unions have made (some) teachers blind to that opportunity.

Nice try Adam, but it was comments like these I was referring to, regarding lack of respect shown to teachers:

"The other teachers were up in arms over that proposal because it would take students out of their classes. They were more interested in protecting their turf than in helping students have greater opportunities. And that is true throughout the system."

and

"Calling itself an education association is like calling the United Auto Workers union a driving association."

Perhaps if teachers treated themselves as a profession -- no unions; creation of organizations that actually set high professional standards and live by them (something the NEA and the AFT don't really do); acceptance of the reality that not every teacher is a good one and thus not deserving of the same wages and benefits as those who are deserving -- perhaps teachers would get more respect. So long as they continue with union representation, which by its very nature cares more about job security, seniority and generating dues than about high standards or improving education, teachers as a collective won't get much respect. That's reality.

As for charter schools? They are public schools, with public financing and held to standards set by public agencies. The only differences between traditional public and public charter schools are 1)that private or nonprofits can run them instead of a public agency (even some school districts, notably Los Angeles Unified and Decatur Township here in Indianapolis, are now converting some of their schools into charters or starting new ones and getting out of actively managing them) and 2) they don't have the cash-draining bureaucracies with which traditional public schools have saddled themselves. To argue that charter schools drain money from public education is a ridiculous claim. They do get money that would otherwise go to traditional public schools, but since charters are public schools, it's not a drain from public education. And considering the number of charter schools are far smaller than the number of public schools, the claims of draining don't stand up to any sort of scrutiny.

I suspect that the union probably thinks that some major experimentation is needed, too, but from within the school system.

If there was any evidence of this, I doubth there would the big push for charter schools.

Teachers don't deserve our respect because they're part of a union? Wow. I guess you don't have much respect for airline pilots, either.

These charter schools are not public, they are being paid for by a private foundation and would not be administered by the city of Detroit. The district loses per-pupil state aid as the charter schools reduce public-school attendance.

The cash-draining bureaucracies with which traditional public schools have saddled themselves are indeed a problem. Chucking the whole system is perhaps not the solution. Here in NYC we attempting to deal with that by putting the system directly under the control of the mayor's office. We'll let you know what happens.

Oh JohnS, you should actually learn to read. I didn't say that teachers didn't deserve respect. What I said that considering that teachers like to consider themselves professionals in the manner of doctors or lawyers, continuing to ally themselves with organizations (or organizational structures) that don't promote such professional aspirations by their very nature makes such pretensions difficult to swallow. After all,
unions are not about professionalism; they're about promoting job security by demanding more in the way of benefits than in such things as merit raises based on perfomance, raises based on seniority instead of talent and the ability to pick jobs based on ease instead of on the challenged involved. None of that squares with the ideals of professionalism. One can't be a highly-paid professional and a shop steward all at once. It doesn't square.

As for New York's efforts? Good luck. However from what Ryan Sager and others have been reporting, Michael Bloomberg and Joel Klein aren't exactly succeeding in taming the bureaucracy.

"Oh JohnS, you should actually learn to read. I didn't say that teachers didn't deserve respect."

You RiShawn Biddle, should learn to take a less condescending tone. And that is PRECISELY what you said:

"So long as they continue with union representation, which by its very nature cares more about job security, seniority and generating dues than about high standards or improving education, teachers as a collective won't get much respect."

Collective bargaining and job security don't square with professionalism? Tell that to 2,700 graduate teaching assistants at the University of Illinois who just joined the AFT. Professionals are seeking union representation, and they're getting it. See: "Rising Tide: Professionals: The New Face of Americaâ?™s Unions."

Please. Reforming the bureaucracy is going to take time. You are talking NYC politics after all!

Doesn't the structure of this whole debate point to an obvious solution acceptable to all sides of the political spectrum? More money for education, especially federal money for failing districts, in return for an openness to more flexible uses of that money (charter schools and vouchers).

To return to the original point, Ed points out that in this respect the teacher's unions sometimes, many here would argue very frequently, shoot themselves in the foot when zealously promoting of their own interest. The rejection of $200 million from a private source in Detroit seems very short sighted. With $200 million to help those students most in need, can't the unions work out a compromise instead of insisting in essence "give it to us or go home"? On the flip side, I think Robert Thompson should realize that the offer of his generous gift is most likely to be effective if he's willing to compromise to address the unions concerns as well.

I sometimes wonder about the notion that with charter and vouchers in effect, the best students will leave the public schools resulting in a pool of terrible students in terrible schools abandoned by the system. But does that necessarily follow? Assuming that the students with the highest familial and economic barriers to success are pooled in the public schools, isn't it at least a possibity that the public schools serving these populations would be able to tailor their methods and their goals to be most effective in addressing the particular needs of these students? Granted there is a lot of assumptions here, and as usual the devil is in the details, but the apocalyptic worst students feeding off one another in abominable public schools scenario invoked by opponents of vouchers and charters certainly have their own assumptions. Shouldn't experimentation happen on local levels to find out who's right?

In the end, this is the most troubling aspect I find in the unions behavior. There obviously are some exceptions, but collectively they seem to act in an exceptionally obstructionist manner when such experiments are proposed. Such behavior does not serve students, parents, or even the teachers they represent.

"Oh JohnS, you should actually learn to read. I didn't say that teachers didn't deserve respect."

You RiShawn Biddle, should learn to take a less condescending tone. And that is PRECISELY what you said:

"So long as they continue with union representation, which by its very nature cares more about job security, seniority and generating dues than about high standards or improving education, teachers as a collective won't get much respect."

A prediction that teachers collectively will not get much respect until they abandon the self-centered priorities of their unions is not the same thing as arguing that teachers are collectively undeserving of respect. I think the difference would have been clear enough even if he had not added "That's reality" after the sentence you quoted.

Collective bargaining and job security don't square with professionalism? Tell that to 2,700 graduate teaching assistants at the University of Illinois who just joined the AFT. Professionals are seeking union representation, and they're getting it.

Even assuming that teaching assistants are professionals (maybe they are, but I have not heard that term used in reference to them before), that argument doesn't make sense. "Professionals" can become unprofessional. If those teaching assistants intend to push policies that promote their own interests at the expense of students, then no, that would not be professional at all.

"Collective bargaining and job security don't square with professionalism?"

Last I checked, that is so, dear JohnS. After all, doctors aren't clamoring for collective bargaining agreements and guarantees of job security and benefits. Neither do lawyers or bankers or most groups in which a college degree is required. That's because it's accepted from the get-go that merit -- either in talent or accomplishment or even the ability to schmooze clients or higher-ups -- is the rule of the day. One's job security ultimately is based on one's ability to master new skills, succeed in challenging roles and being able to demand a higher paycheck and perks for that.

Teacher unions on the other hand, don't accept that concept. As with any other union, guaranteed benefits and retirement packages are what they demand, protection from job lose in the form of tenure is what they expect and higher salaries based on length of service is what they attempt to gain. None of that has anything to do with making gains based on talent, skill and mastery of new challenges.

Again, if teachers collectively want to be considered professionals, they can only gain that by casting aside the union label. Not only would it help them gain respect, but it would help schools. After all, a veteran, highly-skilled teacher willing to take on a tough assignment in a underperforming urban school will get rewarded for that; the students in turn, will get something that they don't currently get -- a teacher committed to their success. Meanwhile poor performing teachers would be weeded out, ensuring that fewer students will drop out or leave school without a proper education.

Unions are good for unskilled labor groups such as janitors; after all, a good janitor isn't likely to see a rise in pay. But for college degree-toters such as teachers, it does little but reduce their worth when it's the last thing they need.

Of course Mr. Biddle knows that there was never a time when the educated teachers needed a union. There was never a time when they were underpaid and had no benefits. Never. And for Mr. Biddle's information with the possible exception of the lawyers most of the professions he spoke of and many others have people among them trying to figure out how to have some kind of group representation because in today's world individual achievement will NOT necessarily be rewarded. That's yesterday's world. Nowadays the good are just as likely to be downsized as the bad. Try to stay caught up.

Your attempt at sarcasm, Jim, doesn't work well in print. I'd recommend you stick to your usual schtick and leave sarcastic comments to those who've learned to do it.

One isn't saying that teachers have never been underpaid. But let us remember that such underpayment came for several reasons, one of them being that teaching has long been a female-dominated profession; young women took the jobs until they got married and if they stayed after marriage, the fact that their husbands received a family wage meant that school systems could deliberately underpay them.

One can say that teachers are underpaid today. Actually, as I've mentioned previously here and elsewhere, certain teachers are underpaid, notably those who teach in shortage areas such as special education, mathematics and science. So are experienced, talented urban teachers who decide to ignore the usual trend of moving off into suburban districts (based on the established mindset that the best teachers should teach the best students) and those young teachers who are energetic, talented and willing to put in the work.

But teachers unions are the very reason for that. Why? Since unions oppose higher wages for those shortage positions and for more talented teachers-- in essence, oppose market forces -- it's more difficult to fill those jobs. After all, a talented physics major can get a job in the tech field and a top biology student can go into biotech; both will make more money.

The opposition to differential pay by teacher unions means that urban districts have a tougher time keeping experienced teachers from leaving; they can get better conditions and more importantly, smarter students and not work as hard. More money offered by urban districts could keep them there, but since it can't be offered, they leave.

And since unions oppose merit pay of any kind, the top performing teachers are forced to make the same wages as mediocre and laggards. For a talented teacher, it's not exactly encouraging, especially since top teachers, like other human beings respond to incentives (i.e. more money and the greater challenges) like folks in other professions.

This comes as evidence from researchers such as Caroline Hoxby at Harvard show that thanks to teacher unions, the wide pay gap between top performers and laggards have narrowed (http://www.educationnext.org/20052/50.html). The result: Fewer talented women, for example, go into teaching because they can't get paid for their performance. Why? Teacher unions discourage that as part of their emphasis on job security, pay based on seniority and solidarity at the expense of reality: Some people get paid more because they're more talented.

Again, teachers can't expect to be viewed as professionals so long as they embrace unions.

As for professionals banding together to form unions. Some certainly are. Yet unions representation remains less than ten percent of total workers. As you can see from what I've mentioned about teacher pay, why would anyone save for those who have maxed out their talents want a union. Sorry if you don't like the facts or my statements. But I'm not apologizing for explaining cold hard reality.

RiShawn, I agree with most of what you are saying regarding differential pay, and you succinctly underline why the union position is so frustrating from the perspective of talented or in-demand teachers.

However, one thing that you are papering over is that differential pay doesn't help urban districts. They can't afford to pay as much as suburban schools, and this is a huge incentive for the best teachers to move out, I'm sure accounting for much more of the difference in teaching quality than a desire to teach the smartest students. In order to make differential pay lure the best teachers to poor urban districts would require concentrated non-local funding of the urban schools.

RiShawn Biddle

"Last I checked, that is so, dear JohnS. After all, doctors aren't clamoring for collective bargaining agreements and guarantees of job security and benefits."

Check again, RiShawn Biddle. (Oh and 'dear JohnS.' Truly you are a pip!) Doctors are indeed mulling over the idea of becoming card-carrying union members, both those in private practice and those who are salaried employees. That is in response to the mountains of paperwork generated by HMOs, and the second guessing they must suffer at the hands of "non-professional" gatekeepers at the HMOs, among other reasons.

"Unions are good for unskilled labor groups such as janitors; after all, a good janitor isn't likely to see a rise in pay."

The industry I work in is also heavily unionized. They include production designers, art directors, scenics, sound designers, lighting designers, directors of photography, motion graphics designers, musicians, actors and directors. Some of these union members receive awards for their work, you know, the Academy Awards and the Emmys. Not professional?

I know, I know, the biggies get agents to negotiate their deals, not their unions. So here's an idea: those Detroit teachers (you know, the ones who generate some real 'heat' in that school system) who finally decide to get some professional respect should get some high-powered representation. Mike Ovitz's career may be over in L.A., but maybe not in Motown!

The bargain struck decades ago on health care -- companies take on the primary role of paying for its middle class workers; the establishment of government agencies such as Medicare, which have helped inflate the cost of health care -- are the reasons why doctors are in their predicament. The solution isn't unionism, but a more rational and free market health care system where the actual consumer makes decisions. When doctors get that point,they'll improve their lots in life.

But apparently JohnS, we'll have to agree to disagree. Your view of the world is somehow that unions are a boon to education; as someone who actually studies education as part of my job, I can tell you that it's not true. Teacher unions have done little to boost the respect of teachers among those aspiring for careers that give meaning to their lives or have done much to boost academic performance. Look at the graduation rates throughout urban school districts (not the official inflated rates, the actual ones as published by such organizations as the Schott foundation).

When you're ready to make a real argument, let's talk.

For now, the majority of doctors agree with you
regarding unionizing. However, I couldn't disagree more with your solution to their predicament. But that's for another time.

As for teachers and unions. Agreed. We disagree. However, I do not necessarily consider unions a "boon to education," but rather a necessary evil.