Weingarten for the Union Defense
Teachers Union Chief Randi Weingarten on charter schools, reformers Michelle Rhee and Joel Klein, and her star turn in 'Waiting for Superman.'
By JASON L. RILEY
New York
Teachers unions are on the defensive these days. The Obama administration is pushing various measures long opposed by the unions: charter school expansion, pay-for-performance, teacher evaluations and more. States and localities are looking to change collective-bargaining rules and scale back costly, bloated education work forces that have grown even when student enrollment was flat or declining. And Hollywood, in recent documentary films like "Waiting for 'Superman,'" "The Lottery" and "The Cartel," has highlighted how teachers unions block or stifle education reforms to the detriment of the low-income minority kids who populate the nation's worst schools.
When I sit down for an interview with Randi Weingarten, who has been head of the American Federation of Teachers since 2008, my first question is whether those films are getting her recognized more in public these days.
"Actually, no," she responds, not particularly amused by the query. "I'm used to the use of scapegoating and demonization and finger-pointing as a mechanism to divert or distract from problem-solving."
"We want to improve public schools," says Ms. Weingarten. "Ninety percent of the kids in the