MA Teachers Go Radical In Fight For Public Education
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Barbara Madeloni, newly elected president of the 110,000 member Massachusetts Teachers Association, says that fighting is winning.
EduShyster: I’ve heard you described as *bellicose,* *unapologetically adversarial,* a *firebrand,* and *alarming.* Which of these would you say best describes you?
Barbara Madeloni: Aren’t you forgetting *shrill*? One of the narratives about my victory is that I accessed anger at the rank-and-file level. That’s true, but I also tried to hold up a more positive vision for re-engaging the world. We’re not helpless. We’re not hopeless. We can work together to change things. We can do something. That said, I think we are at a critical moment in history for public education in this country. If we don’t fight, we’re going to lose everything. We’re done.
EduShyster: That’s what a lot of people have been saying about teachers unions in the wake of the recent Vergara decision in California—that they’re done. You don’t appear to have gotten that memo.
Madeloni: This is a critical moment in our history and we have to protect public education or we’re going to lose it. There’s an incredible sea change that’s coming from the rank and file in teachers unions, not just in Massachusetts but across the country. Teachers understand what’s happening. They have a much better analysis than they had even a year ago. They’re moving past *I just have a bad principal,* or *I just have a bad superintendent* and seeing the larger picture. So now what are we going to do about it?EduShyster: I’ll bite. What are we going to do about it?
Madeloni: I think fighting is winning. In a union where members are truly engaged and active, we’re talking to one another about what’s happening, informing each other and making decisions about how we can fight back. The degree to which we’ve been told that our members are unwilling to be active is astonishing to me. If you alienate the membership by continually telling them that things are bad but they could be worse, so we’re going to get behind the bad thing, of course people aren’t going to be active. If we say to members—*We can be powerful. We can use our MA Teachers Go Radical In Fight For Public Ed | PopularResistance.Org:
