Educators Rack Up Wins with Student-Centered Advocacy
Something remarkable is happening. It’s happening right now: more than 35,000 members of the Chicago Teachers Union and SEIU Local 73 are on strike for the schools Chicago students deserve. Sound familiar? It should.
More and more educators across the country are organizing around issues that extend beyond wages, hours, and professional working conditions and are unifying around a set of demands that benefit students and the wider community. It’s called student-centered bargaining and advocacy.
We’ve seen it in California where member of the United Teachers of Los Angeles included in its bargaining demands a stop on the so-called random wanding of students, which has resulted in racial profiling in schools.
And it happened in Minnesota, where members of the St. Paul Federation of Educators put a proposal on the table to forbid the school district from doing business with banks or other financial institutions that foreclose on the homes of school-age children during a school year, do not pay their employees a $15 an hour minimum wage, and do not offer paid sick leave to their employees.
Efforts like these have increased, and many local unions have launched impressive bargaining campaigns that elevate educators, advocate for students, and advance the common good. Columbus, Ohio, home to the largest school district in the state with over 56,000 students, is one such place.
The Tipping Point
In 2018, after years of neglect by the Columbus City Schools, frustration reached a tipping point. Class sizes were high, art and music were taken out of classrooms CONTINUE READING: Educators Rack Up Wins with Student-Centered Advocacy - NEA Today
