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Building a “New Social Order”: Teachers, Teacher Unions, and Equity in the Great Depression

in Uncivil Rights: Teachers, Unions, and Race in the Battle for School Equity

This chapter describes the start of the black civil rights movement for equal education in Harlem, which had a significant impact on teacher unionism. It is observed that in the 1930s both the ... More

This chapter describes the start of the black civil rights movement for equal education in Harlem, which had a significant impact on teacher unionism. It is observed that in the 1930s both the teacher unions and black civil rights movement took a new form in terms of political context. The riot of 1935 in Harlem and the formation of organization of parents and activists led the unionists to respond to new social and political causes. This chapter signifies that race politics was central to the competing political ideologies that resulted from the 1935 split of the Teachers Union into the communist Teachers Union and the socialist Teachers Guild. Thus, by World War II, both unions had a position in the schools of Harlem that were linked to the views about teachers, political action, and building “a new social order” by the schools.Less

Organizing the Oppressed Teacher: Teachers' Rights in the Cold War

in Uncivil Rights: Teachers, Unions, and Race in the Battle for School Equity

This chapter focuses on the transformation of the teacher unions between 1950 and 1960 that came about due to teacher assignment campaigns. Organizations such as the Urban League and various parent ... More

This chapter focuses on the transformation of the teacher unions between 1950 and 1960 that came about due to teacher assignment campaigns. Organizations such as the Urban League and various parent study groups largely focused on teacher quality as the major obstacle to the fair and equal education of black students with the increase in postwar civil rights campaigns. All these investigations were supported by the Teacher Union and it also supported plans of the Board of Education to transfer experienced teachers to minority schools. During this time, the Teachers Guild became more determined to organize teachers and consolidate the city's multitudinous existing teacher organizations into one movement by the use of campaigns focusing on the idea of the “oppressed teacher.” The oppressed-teacher argument helped to depoliticize conversations and it became more difficult to ignore race politics in city schools. The Guild consolidated with other teacher organizations to form the UFT that symbolized the growing division between teachers' rights and civil rights in 1959.Less

From Teachers' Rights to Teacher Power

in Uncivil Rights: Teachers, Unions, and Race in the Battle for School Equity

This chapter explains teacher union campaigns in 1970 and 1980 and states that they were a product of visible efforts towards school reform on the part of black parents and a publicly responsive ... More

This chapter explains teacher union campaigns in 1970 and 1980 and states that they were a product of visible efforts towards school reform on the part of black parents and a publicly responsive image of teacher unions. In this process essential contributions were provided by Albert Shanker, president of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) and the American Federation of Teachers (1974). He put forth a more consolidated message about teacher professionalism than had existed in 1970 in a weekly column in the New York Times and in his support of the Reagan administration's report on school failure, A Nation at Risk. This message was accountable for upholding high professional standards. Though the teachers' responses to this argument about accountability varied, they were also tangential to a teacher power movement that more effectively produced political power for teacher unions than it heightened individual teachers' authority in their schools and their communities.Less

Teacher Power: Black Teachers and the Politics of Representation

Elizabeth Todd-Breland

in Political Education: Black Politics and Education Reform in Chicago since the 1960s

This chapter examines Black educators’ growth from an insurgent group of teachers in the 1960s into a powerful political base of the coalition that elected the first Black mayor of Chicago in 1983. ... More

This chapter examines Black educators’ growth from an insurgent group of teachers in the 1960s into a powerful political base of the coalition that elected the first Black mayor of Chicago in 1983. In the 1960s, Black teachers—frustrated with the inadequate conditions in schools serving Black children and their marginalized role in the schools and teachers union—protested the union and considered creating an alternative Black teachers’ union. Educators like Lillie Peoples, of Operation Breadbasket’s Teachers Division, challenged the racist policies of the union and Board of Education while embracing a self-determinist politics of Black achievement that critiqued racial liberalism. Race and gender shaped Black women educators’ professional lives and political activism, as Black women teachers were never adequately recognized for their integral leadership in these movements. By the 1980s, internal and external pressures on the union and Board of Education resulted in a significant increase in the proportion of Black employees in the school system. Black teachers served as anchors of communities, caretakers of children, and a relatively stable Black urban middle-class labor force through their employment in the public sector during a time of deindustrialization. Black educators transformed Black communities and Black political power in the city.Less

“An Educator's Commitment”: Professionalism and Civil Rights in the 1960s

in Uncivil Rights: Teachers, Unions, and Race in the Battle for School Equity

This chapter elaborates upon the simultaneous changes in unionists' conceptions of teachers' rights and black New Yorkers' strategies to improve their neighborhood schools. This culminated in the ... More

This chapter elaborates upon the simultaneous changes in unionists' conceptions of teachers' rights and black New Yorkers' strategies to improve their neighborhood schools. This culminated in the 1968 Ocean Hill-Brownsville strikes. The members of the Teachers Union in 1963 voted to join the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) because during the immediate post-cold war era their marginalized position left them without influence of their own. The downfall of a radical union in which teachers could fight for race progress serves as an especially powerful indicator of teachers' relationship to the civil rights movement at a time when the movement was most visible and powerful. The black parents and activists being tired of broken premises of integration fought for greater community control over who taught and what was taught in minority schools. The relations between teachers and the minority communities they served were irreparably damaged by 1970.Less

Muscular Democracy: Teachers and the War on Prejudice, 1940–1950

in Uncivil Rights: Teachers, Unions, and Race in the Battle for School Equity

This chapter explains the start of the race progress efforts of teachers in 1942 and the ways in which other union policies regarding schools and race were influenced by these efforts. The aftermarth ... More

This chapter explains the start of the race progress efforts of teachers in 1942 and the ways in which other union policies regarding schools and race were influenced by these efforts. The aftermarth of World War II pressurized city teachers into making efforts to address racism in schools. Bibliographies and other materials for teaching black history were created by the Teachers Union and it also petitioned for a black resident to be appointed to the Board of Education. The Teachers Guild emphasized the need for an improvement of vocational education for black students. Both unions developed relationships with Harlem organizations to press the Board of Education to reduce class sizes, hire more teachers, and adopt plans to integrate Harlem schools. The teachers considered their job quality or job satisfaction to be in conflict with teaching minority students.Less

“A New era of Labor Relations”: Teachers and the Public-Sector Labor Problem

Jon Shelton

in Teacher Strike!: Public Education and the Making of a New American Political Order

This chapter outlines the parameters of the “public sector labor problem.” When private sector unions grew powerful after World War II, public employees organized for similar rights. In many states ... More

This chapter outlines the parameters of the “public sector labor problem.” When private sector unions grew powerful after World War II, public employees organized for similar rights. In many states they acquired the right to organize but not the right to strike. The chapter chronicles the early history of teacher unions—especially the American Federation of Teachers (AFT)—and their quest for meaningful collective bargaining. It uses Pennsylvania—the state that passed the furthest reaching attempt to ensure union rights for teachers—and teacher strikes in Pittsburgh (1968, 1971) and Philadelphia (1970) to highlight the failure of liberal labor policy to prevent teacher strikes.Less

“Who is Going to Run the Schools?” Teacher Strikes and the Urban Crises of 1972–73

Jon Shelton

in Teacher Strike!: Public Education and the Making of a New American Political Order

This chapter chronicles a wave of contentious teacher strikes in 1972-73 and shows that teacher unions’ collective bargaining efforts clashed with the limited budgets of many of the nation’s largest ... More

This chapter chronicles a wave of contentious teacher strikes in 1972-73 and shows that teacher unions’ collective bargaining efforts clashed with the limited budgets of many of the nation’s largest cities. This conflict led many residents of these metropolitan areas to argue that teachers were guilty of both facilitating fiscal crisis and setting poor examples for the young people they taught since dire conditions led many teachers to believe that striking was necessary even though they broke the law in the process. The chapter documents a strike that shut down Philadelphia for three months in 1972-73; turns to Chicago and St. Louis, where teachers were on strike simultaneously; and concludes by examining the lengthy teacher strike in Detroit in the fall of 1973.Less

The “Fed-up Taxpayer”: St. Louis, Philadelphia, and the Eclipse of the Labor-Liberal Coalition

Jon Shelton

in Teacher Strike!: Public Education and the Making of a New American Political Order

This chapter chronicles the new reality faced by urban teacher unions after the emergence of austerity regimes in many American cities. It charts teacher strikes in St. Louis (1979) and Philadelphia ... More

This chapter chronicles the new reality faced by urban teacher unions after the emergence of austerity regimes in many American cities. It charts teacher strikes in St. Louis (1979) and Philadelphia (1980 and 1981). In each case, teacher unions faced staunch taxpayer resistance to salary increases, and in the case of Philadelphia, a mayor who dealt with massive budget deficits by reneging on a collectively-bargained contract. As importantly, in Philadelphia, opponents of the “unproductive” urban poor and unionized teachers began to imagine market reforms of the public education system. The chapter concludes by documenting the emergence of vouchers in order to understand the mounting challenge of neoliberalism to American public education.Less

Conclusion: Moving beyond Rights?: Teacher Professionalism and Civil Rights in the Era of No Child Left Behind

in Uncivil Rights: Teachers, Unions, and Race in the Battle for School Equity

This chapter outlines the recent efforts that teacher unions have made to address the quality of education in minority schools, the limits they have faced in their efforts, and the ways in which the ... More

This chapter outlines the recent efforts that teacher unions have made to address the quality of education in minority schools, the limits they have faced in their efforts, and the ways in which the historical tension between teachers' rights and civil rights has shaped the political landscape. The agenda that the midcentury teachers developed to advance their own professionalism undermined their moral authority in local communities. The legacy of this agenda enabled the design of federal legislation that focuses on teacher quality as the primary obstacle to minority student success. This chapter highlights the importance of rethinking about the centrality of rights to school reform projects and to visualize the empowerment of teachers and students as mutually beneficial goals, along with the failure of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) to improve education for minority students and the historical events.Less

To be a Good American: The New York City Teachers Union and Race During the Second World War

Clarence Taylor

in Civil Rights in New York City: From World War II to the Giuliani Era

The New York City Teachers Union (TU) highlighted the Quinn affair in its weekly publication, New York Teacher News, by placing the episode into a wartime context. The Quinn incident was not simply ... More

The New York City Teachers Union (TU) highlighted the Quinn affair in its weekly publication, New York Teacher News, by placing the episode into a wartime context. The Quinn incident was not simply portrayed by the union as proof of a bigoted school employee who should be fired for her outlandish acts. The incident was also described as a flagrant act of disloyalty during wartime. In particular the union promoted black history and culture, and it argued that this history disproved the claim that African Americans were a detriment to the nation and had contributed little to America. The union's approach was a means not only to prove that blacks were not inferior but to show that racial discrimination hurt the country because such discrimination deprived Americans of knowledge of the rich heritage of blacks and the great contribution they made to the country. However, the union challenged many forms of racial discrimination, including anti-Semitism.Less

Teacher Power, Black Power, and the fracturing of Labor Liberalism

Jon Shelton

in Teacher Strike!: Public Education and the Making of a New American Political Order

This chapter chronicles the growing conflict between the Black Power movement—an extension of the civil rights movement seeking the formation of black political and community institutions—and ... More

This chapter chronicles the growing conflict between the Black Power movement—an extension of the civil rights movement seeking the formation of black political and community institutions—and unionized public employees in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Beginning with the United Federation of Teachers strike in 1968 over community control in Ocean Hill-Brownsville (New York City), the chapter also shows how two teacher strikes in Newark (1970, 1971) drove apart the Black community and a majority white teacher union. A close examination of letters to the imprisoned President of the American Federation of Teachers shows that critics of both urban black populations and unionized teachers had begun to link the two groups together as “unproductive” threats to law and order and economic prosperity.Less

Crusading for Civil Rights

Clarence Taylor

in Reds at the Blackboard: Communism, Civil Rights, and the New York City Teachers Union

This chapter focuses on the New York City Teachers Union's (TU) campaigns to eliminate racist and bigoted textbooks from classrooms, hire more black teachers, and promote Black History Month. By the ... More

This chapter focuses on the New York City Teachers Union's (TU) campaigns to eliminate racist and bigoted textbooks from classrooms, hire more black teachers, and promote Black History Month. By the end of 1950 the TU was in the worst position in its forty-four-year history. Because of the Timone Resolution, it could no longer operate as a collective bargaining agency for New York City public school teachers; it could not represent faculty in grievances or hold meetings in the public school buildings. Moreover, the New York City Board of Education's purge of TU members was ongoing. Despite its inability to represent teachers officially, the TU did not fold in 1950. Its story after 1950 throws into question the argument that popular front unionism in New York City was eradicated during the civil rights struggles of the cold war period. This chapter examines how the TU remade itself into a leading voice in New York City's civil rights movement by challenging the New York City Board of Education's discriminatory policies.Less

Communist Front?: The TU During the Popular Front Era

Clarence Taylor

in Reds at the Blackboard: Communism, Civil Rights, and the New York City Teachers Union

This chapter considers the claim by New York City Teachers Union (TU) opponents and some scholars that the main objective of the Communist-controlled union was not to protect the interest of teachers ... More

This chapter considers the claim by New York City Teachers Union (TU) opponents and some scholars that the main objective of the Communist-controlled union was not to protect the interest of teachers but to carry out the dictates of the Soviet Union. It first examines the Communist Party of the United States of America's (CPUSA) efforts to form an antifascist popular front and the TU's relationship with popular front politics before discussing the arguments of TU defenders who ignore the CPUSA's influence on the union. It then cites evidence showing that the union supported CPUSA policies, and that its position on certain issues was indistinguishable from that of the Party. However, it argues that the TU did not ignore teachers' interests, as its Communist leadership fought for higher wages, better working conditions, and academic freedom. While supportive of Moscow, the chapter contends that the TU also worked to improve working conditions for teachers. In conclusion, it says the union blurred the line between its work on behalf of teachers and pushing CPUSA policies.Less

The Struggle for Status

Campbell F. Scribner

in The Fight for Local Control: Schools, Suburbs, and American Democracy

This chapter analyzes the rise of teachers' unions outside of metropolitan boundaries. As teachers and administrators began to demand tenure protection, rights of collective bargaining, and ... More

This chapter analyzes the rise of teachers' unions outside of metropolitan boundaries. As teachers and administrators began to demand tenure protection, rights of collective bargaining, and professional control of curriculum and hiring, they usurped the responsibilities of rural school boards, which had previously handled almost all aspects of the academic program. The conflict between professional practice and local democracy resulted in scores of lawsuits in consolidated districts, which gave otherwise marginal communities an outsized and understudied significance in public sector labor law. Collective bargaining, in turn, reinforced state and federal calls for more educational spending, obliging school districts to raise significantly more revenue in absolute terms even as state and federal subsidies comprised a larger portion of district budgets.Less

Chicago Teachers: Building a Resilient Union

Jane F. McAlevey

in No Shortcuts: Organizing for Power in the New Gilded Age

This chapter analyzes the history of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) during the quarter century from 1988 to the union’s recent strike in 2012. It shows the CTU’s slow but steady decline from a ... More

This chapter analyzes the history of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) during the quarter century from 1988 to the union’s recent strike in 2012. It shows the CTU’s slow but steady decline from a mighty union into a weak, unimaginative organization. It traces the steps that disillusioned teachers took to rebuild their union in order to beat one of the nation’s then most powerful mayors—Rahm Emanuel—who had set out to break the CTU in the context of a broader and bipartisan assault on public-sector unions. This chapter shows how quickly a union can go from decline to renewal. It illustrates the profound difference between a union leadership that enables the rank and file to fight and a leadership that uses professional staff as administrators of a top-down union, constraining the impulses of its own members.Less

The Pittsburgh Teacher Strike of 1975–76 and the Crisis of the Labor-Liberal Coalition

Jon Shelton

in Teacher Strike!: Public Education and the Making of a New American Political Order

This chapter documents the nation’s longest and most contentious teacher strike in the immediate wake of the New York City fiscal crisis of 1975, after which New York and many other cities were ... More

This chapter documents the nation’s longest and most contentious teacher strike in the immediate wake of the New York City fiscal crisis of 1975, after which New York and many other cities were forced on the path of municipal austerity. In December, 1975 the Pittsburgh school board worried about the high cost of teacher salary increases, even though the city was in a very strong financial position. The Pittsburgh teacher union went on strike and the local court issued an injunction. In the Steel City, a contentious public discussion erupted over the teachers’ illegal strike and the connection between teacher salaries and taxes. Indeed, a robust version of taxpayer resistance to teachers had emerged by the end of the strike.Less

Reform Opponents: Teachers, Unions, and the Implementation of Change

Manisha Priyam

in Contested Politics of Educational Reform in India: Aligning Opportunities with Interests

Collective action of teachers and their unions is assumed to be a powerful weapon, amongst the most formidable opponents of school reforms. The analytical literature on policy reforms considers them ... More

Collective action of teachers and their unions is assumed to be a powerful weapon, amongst the most formidable opponents of school reforms. The analytical literature on policy reforms considers them as classic examples of self-interested actors, who work together only to protect their vested interests and demand mainly higher wages. However, the empirical evidence on state-teacher relationships, and how unions have acted during the course of reform implementation in Andhra and Bihar, is counterintuitive. Andhra has a very competitive and vibrant presence of a number of teacher unions, with units at the state and district level. The State acted politically in negotiating with the largest Panchayati Raj Teachers Union, whose main demand was for government status, not higher wages. In the process, state gained the support of teachers for implementing new policies. Collaborative strategies were helpful for unions as well (in gaining the allegiance of existing members) and this was a disincentive to colliding with the state. Bihar was a contrast with one union the Bihar Rajya Prathmik Shikshak Sangh holding monopoly control, and disinterested in negotiating with the state on teacher issues.Less