An anti-union group is promoting a stunt to publicize how hard it is to get rid of bad teachers: a $10,000 prize for bad teachers who agree to quit their jobs.
The Center for Union Facts on Tuesday will ask parents, students and other teachers to nominate the ”worst unionized teacher in America.” The center says it will choose 10 and offer each $10,000 to quit; ”winners” must allow the center to write about them on its Web site. The center plans full-page ads today in USA TODAY and The New York Times.
If the idea seems breathtaking in its political incorrectness, consider that it’s the brainchild of Rick Berman, a union-bashing attorney known for his in-your-face attacks on consumer, safety and environmental groups.
”We’re not trying to humiliate anyone,” says Berman. ”We’re trying to jump-start a conversation that maybe people need severance packages to find themselves another line of work.”
Yeah, right.
The story quotes Rick Hess, who co-authored a recent study of 50 large school districts. He concluded that two thirds of union contracts give districts the ability to fire bad teachers. They just don’t use it.
Guess I’m safe. I’m not a union member.
This does not help; I suspect this is going to have the opposite effect.
When you bring up real and specific problems with unions, and people listen to you; when you start pulling juvenile pranks like this, and those valid criticism get ignored as unthinking union-bashing.
Actually, Darren, I think that you might be able to play! The web site says “union-protected.” I know that you *do* have to pay in for the collective bargaining that the union does for you (whether you want it or not…). Does this collective bargaining “protect” you? If so, can play, too!!!!
-Mark Roulo
“The story quotes Rick Hess, who co-authored a recent study of 50 large school districts. He concluded that two thirds of union contracts give districts the ability to fire bad teachers. They just don’t use it. ”
Its not that the schools can’t fire bad teachers, its that the costs associated with suspension, litigation, and such are prohibitively expensive. A relative manages a local branch of a federal office, and he stated that it once took a years worth of documentation to provide enough justification for firing an employee to prevent the union from stepping in.
In my school district, teachers routinely write their own evaluations because our site managers are often “too busy.” Sure, they come in to do their observations, which often last about 5, 10 minutes max. We had one teacher that was horribly bad at my school site that ALL of the teachers routinely complained about to the management. He also got numerous complaints from parents, yet, only after he was arrested for drug possession (methamphetamines) did the school district do anything to get rid of him.
I would argue that good school districts that have no problem hiring teachers are quite different from those school districts who struggle every year to get “any warm body” into the room. (Of course, it doesn’t help that here in California, it seems we go through a cycle of laying off thousands of teachers every five years or so.)
If your a good teacher or even a half way decent teacher you don’t have anything to worry about. What’s the problem?
A relative manages a local branch of a federal office, and he stated that it once took a years worth of documentation to provide enough justification for firing an employee to prevent the union from stepping in.
Why is that a problem? Would you prefer that a teacher be fireable for having a bad week?
There is a very very good reason that so many school systems don’t use their power to remove a “bad” teacher-no one to take their place!
We can’t even find teachers for open positions now. We have to have a perm sub in classroom all over our system due to not having any qualified applicants available for interview.
Why is it a problem? Because anyone who has a bad week that lasts for more than a couple of months probably isn’t having a bad week, they’re just bad. It shouldn’t take an entire year to figure out that someone isn’t doing the job they’re being paid to do.
i think this is the stupidest thing ever published…not cool
I’ve come to draw a major distinction between public employee unions and those in the private sector, where at least economic reality tends to check excessive power. Private sector unions have been seeing a lot of economic reality in recent years; I’m not sure what it will take to counter the excesses in the public sector. I thought the following was an eye-opener:
http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:p7pfxF6UO6EJ:www.irs.princeton.edu/pubs/pdfs/503.pdf+%22public+employee%22+%22private+sector%22+union+membership&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us
“While the union membership rate in the private sector fell from 25 percent in 1975 to 8.2 percentin 2004, the rate in the public sector increased from the same level in 1975 to over35 percent in 2004.”
Sorry, here is the original pdf for the above link:
http://www.irs.princeton.edu/pubs/pdfs/503.pdf
I wonder if anyone will get sued for slander or libel after they try to nominate someone.
Why is that a problem? Would you prefer that a teacher be fireable for having a bad week?
Because a year of bad teaching will have very bad effects on the teachers’ students.
Everyone knows who the bad teachers at a school are….it’s the administrators that don’t know how or afraid to do their jobs. They are the ones responsible.
A union member
I would love to see the price go up to remove bad teachers. After all, the price to a child as a result of horrible teaching can be lifelong. It should be handled like a malpractice suit. Suspension while under investigation; however, administrators do little more than issue rhetoric like “what’s best for kids”…moving a teacher around in the district does NOT solve the problem, it just exposes more kids to it! I do not believe it is as hard to fire a teacher for cause as some say.
i don’t believe it’s legal for me to name this high school, but what i will inform you of right now is these few things that have occurred within the 2007-08 year.
School psychologist, returns with hickey on neck.
Global teacher, should wear clothes that compliment the body. Teenage girls having sexual intercourse may be lead from these types of things..
Living Environment teacher, gets kid nearly blind because she did not require goggles in an acid lab experiment.
Many Teachers use vile language, no matter how mad you get..you should not.
School walkway collapses, luckily no one was injured..even killed.
cockroaches and mice crawl throughout the basement and ceilings, they might be in every school but they should not be witnessed and have nothing done about it..
teachers do not give respect, thats why most of them do not get any.
what would you think? I’m not quite sure myself..
what do parents pay taxes for? this school as a matter of fact has NO CONTRACT and refuse to stay and give our children the help they deserve.