Teachers union

Thursday

Larry Sand

In LA, unions are winning at the expense of kids

From our US edition

Service Employees International Union Local 99 staged a three-day walkout in Los Angeles last week after negotiations failed. SEIU, which represents about 30,000 cafeteria workers, bus drivers, special education assistants, etc. called for a strike if their demands were not met by the Los Angeles Unified School District. And the United Teachers of Los Angeles decided to ditch school, too, in what was deemed a “sympathy strike.” The unions’ action forced every public school in LA to shut down from March 21 to March 23. It all played out in the usual way.

teachers unions los angeles

Friday

Cockburn

The miseducation of Randi Weingarten

From our US edition

American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten has had a busy two years. Keeping students out of schools, helping teachers fight for permanent, paid truancy, watching her liberal columnist friends write slobbering, glowing profiles of her in the New York Times — these are things that can really take it out of a woman. So, Cockburn has absolutely no patience for the right-wing internet trolls (or Russian bots, possibly?) who had a good laugh at Ms. Weingarten’s expense this week after she had a small spelling error on Twitter. “We #StandWithUkriane,” Weingarten wrote on Wednesday in a since-deleted post. Big deal, says Cockburn. She was only one letter off, which is almost as good as spelling “Ukraine” correctly. Ms.

randi weingarten

Thursday

James Kirkup

Keeping schools closed until September would hammer poor kids

Schools should stay closed until September, according to a big teaching union: In view of the continued and pressing public health challenges and the considerable task that will be required to ensure that every school is ready to admit increased numbers of children and adults into safe learning and working environments, the NASUWT urges ministers to act to end speculation on the reopening of schools beyond the current restrictions prior to September 2020. That’s the latest from Patrick Roach, head of the NASUWT. This is a hardening of the line from teaching unions, and one that I think has the potential to cause significant tensions with the government.

Monday

Melanie McDonagh

It’s time to cancel the school holidays

It seems that a quarter of A level-students preparing to go to university haven’t been set any work by teachers. So… what does that tell you about the rest of them, the ones who aren’t the focus of teacher attention? Perhaps all over the country, there is a frenzy of education going on. It just hasn’t happened very much in my vicinity. Except, from what I can gather, from people with children in private schools. I do know of teachers who’ve heroically gone out of their way to teach, set work and mark it (it takes more time marking online) but it’s by no means the norm. How about the summer holidays lasting a month rather than six weeks, to take some account of the time lost?