Peter Greene lives in Pennsylvania. He is a retired teacher who spent nearly 40 years in the classroom. He has received postcards urging him to abandon his union. He decided to identify the organizations behind this activity.
Those postcards, he writes, are the product of the same old network of anti-union far-right folks who have been constantly looking for ways to slap teachers down and put them in their place. A full frontal attack on unions has not been as successful in Pennsylvania as it has been in states like Wisconsin….
The good news, so far, is that the post-Janus apocalypse that many unions braced for has not actually happened, and actions by teachers in states like West Virginia have shown that even if you could disempower the union, teachers will find a way to push back if you push them too far.
When you get the card, you’ll see that Williams has provided a handy email address. Feel free to ask him about the time that he angrily gave back the raise that the union negotiated form him, or if, now that he’s retired, he’s planning on doing without that pension that the union won him (actually, he may be well enough paid that he doesn’t need it). But at a minimum, you can safely throw your invitation…in the trash.
Because, look– you will never find me serving as an unconditional cheerleader for PSEA, and local leadership can be a crapshoot. But if a teacher’s plan is to depend on their own negotiating prowess to get a personal awesome contract, or they’re just going to trust folks like the Kochs and the DeVos family to look out for their best interests–well, that’s a bad plan.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I got my postcard last week. Had a ceremonial burning. But I did warn my fellow teachers about it
Ed reformers still working hard to improve public schools, I see.
When do they get around to that part? After they abolish labor unions?
Seems like less of an “educational
“unions will weaken, losing both ability to negotiate for better local contracts and less ability to advocate for teachers and public education in Harrisburg”
I wonder if ed reformers intended this result- that the labor unions they hate became the only people advocating on behalf of students in public schools.
Because that’s what’s happened. Ed reformers do no advocacy at all for public school students, leaving teachers unions as the only advocates for the schools 90% of families use, which is why the public has basically supported the teachers strikes. They essentially drove public school families into the arms of labor unions. They’re the only public school advocates we have.
If teachers hadn’t have walked out in West Virginia public schools would have gotten nothing. No one else could be bothered with them, and they had no other advocates at the table.
Chiara, enough of all this advocating for children and public schools! You are missing your big opportunity to get on the gravy train! See our special offer, below. Earn $$$$ from home in your spare time!!!
MOST essential truth: “If teachers hadn’t have walked out in West Virginia public schools would have gotten nothing. No one else could be bothered with them, and they had no other advocates at the table.”
I read that in New York NYSUT has increased membership since the Supreme Court’s decision. I hope other states see a backlash as well.
Teachers and Ex-Teachers! Earn BIG DOLLARS from home! You, too, and become a front for an Ed Deform network funded by billionaires! No experience or work necessary–we supply everything you need to say or do, including your own grass-rootsy organization name and logo! All you have to supply is your identity! Imagine being the head of your own statewide or nationwide “grassroots” organization! Imagine having your picture in national education media! Who knows, you might even end up on the cover of Time Magazine like Michelle Rhee! And you might just be asked to a conference to get your picture taken with some billionaires IN PERSON!!! Only coin-operated persons need apply.
(Paid for by the Vichy Ed Deform Collaborators HR Committee, aka Parents, Teachers, and Students of America United for Truth, Justice, Sweetness, Light, and Everything “Higher,” Inc.)
I’m genuinely curious. What kind of advocacy for children in public schools would be acceptable in ed reform?
I first have to remove any advocacy that benefits unionized public school teachers, even tangentially, right?
So that’s, what? 27 states where the public school students may not have advocates, because unionized teachers might benefit.
I live in Ohio. Our public school teachers belong to a union. How do I advocate on behalf of my son’s public school without being accused of shilling for teachers unions?
They’ve set this up so that advocating on behalf of students in public schools is per se illegitimate because they’ve equated it with advocating on behalf of labor unions. There’s no way to do it, which may explain who no one in government does it.
What!
I’m shocked!
Why haven’t I received one of those postcards?
I think I should go to court and sue “them” for discrimination or something and force them to mail me one … so I could crap on it as Lieutenant Frederic Henry did in Hemingway’s “A Farewell to Arms” when he visits the spot in Italy where he was wounded.
For the majority of the years, I was a teacher (1975 – 2005), I suspected someone was behind all the insane crap we were being forced to do as teachers and every time these thoughts crept into my head, I dismissed them as conspiracy theory thinking. After all, who could be that horrible, that evil, that psycho, that they would want to deliberately destroy something as good as public education?
Then a few years after I was retired, I discovered what had turned most of my teaching years into a ner nightmare was a conspiracy. Now all I want to do is be a small part in defeating the greedy, power-hungry human vampires behind the privatization movement to destroy public education.
Ideally, every one of these human vampires should be stripped of their wealth and the power it buys and forced into homeless, hungry all the time poverty.
“Free to Teach used to be a project of the…(which was) part of the Koch’s State Policy Network.”
The Koch’s new slogan, “We must stand together to help every person rise”, reflects their colonialism- they want to dispense charity.
Labor collectives are the fight of the people for what they are due.
Koch lies.
The media’s failure to link Bill Gates to the Koch’s and to Z-berg shows Americans which side they are on in democracy’s battle against the richest. 0.1%.
The most important independent member of the Facebook board is the President of the Gates Foundation. If she wanted Facebook to take down the distorted tape of Pelosi, she would make it happen.
Which brings up the sentence which caught my eye:
“He also pushed the usual misleading talking point. . . ”
Why do so many teachers and educators play soooo nice. Call a spade a spade “He also pushed the usual lie.” “Misleading talking point” horse manure. They are lies plain and simple.
Thanks for calling out the Koch Bros and their lies.
Similar things have happened in Florida.
Florida started offering $2 million liability insurance to all teachers, is which is double what the union provides. However, it looks like it only kicks in AFTER any district-provided insurance and other insurances are maxed out.
http://www.fldoe.org/about-us/liability-insurance.stml
There was also an email earlier in the school year from an organization called “My Pay My Say” (https://mypaymysay.com) encouraging people to drop membership in Florida’s already voluntary unions. It was an obvious attempt to encourage membership cancellations in light of the new law for this school year that would decertify local unions with membership under 50%. (Remember that doesn’t apply to police and firefighters unions. I wonder why….) Interestingly, the district responded in force, blocking the organization from getting its emails delivered again.
The exclusion of firefighters and police from the 50% regulation -discrimination based on gender.
Utah’s teacher liability insurance for teachers only kicks in if the district thinks a teacher has been falsely accused. Which the district NEVER believes.
State teacher liability insurance in Utah is a joke.