In February the California Teachers Association initiated sponsorship of legislation in Sacramento to give teachers more control over professional issues that impact students, teachers, and their local schools. Given the current political climate of mandated high stakes testing, unrealistic content standards, and demoralizing threats against teachers and principals who "fail" to raise test scores, it is high time for teachers to assert their professional prerogatives. AB 2160 is authored by Assembly Member Jackie Goldberg (D-Los Angeles), Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson (D-Los Angeles), and Assembly Education Chair Virginia Strom-Martin (D-Santa Rosa). The bill will expand collective bargaining to allow local teachers to negotiate with districts over decision-making procedures for:
- Developing and implementing any program designed to enhance student academic performance.
- Selecting textbooks and instructional materials. Developing and implementing local educational standards.
- Developing and implementing the definition of educational objectives, content of courses and curriculum.
- Developing and providing additional professional training for teachers.
- Involving teachers on school site councils and other advisory or representative committees that make decisions about their school and school district.
- Developing and implementing programs to encourage parental involvement in student education.
- The maintenance of school facilities.
- The utilization and assignment of mentors.
- Selecting external evaluators and school assistance and intervention teams for IIUSP schools.
Opposition to this legislation has been swift and predictable from the power base that has the most to lose if teachers are required to be included in professional decision making. The Association of California School Administrators (ACSA) has denounced the proposed legislation and claimed that it will block educational reform, bar parental involvement, and harm low performing schools. This criticism is disingenuous, to say the least. School administrations historically have not been the champions of parental involvement in decision making any more than they have championed teacher involvement in professional decision making. Under current law, districts do not have to ask teachers to participate in selecting curriculum, textbooks, or instructional methods. These decisions can be made solely by school boards with little or no discussion with teachers or parents. The potential exists for political, religious, and ideological interests to intrude on the professional decision making process. In many districts in California this has, in fact, happened — the most notorious example being the use of "literacy police" to monitor the implementation of scripted phonics instruction in LAUSD.
In Burbank, Article 4.6 of our contract requires the District to consult with us on the definition of educational objectives, the determination of the content of the courses and curriculum, and the selection of textbooks. Additionally, the District recognizes the right of the Association to voice its views in the formulation of educational policy. The new legislation would require the District to bargain these issues, giving teachers an important, irrevocable role in deciding what and how we teach. Using new textbook adoptions as an example, we would continue to form textbook adoption committees to study alternative offerings, but the recommendations of the committees would then be used to inform the bargaining process for determining the final selection, instead of leaving it to the sole discretion of the School Board.
The ACSA attack is also disingenuous because it has not been teachers who have created the many extreme "pendulum swings" in instruction and curriculum that have characterized education reform in California over the past three decades. Teachers did not concoct "new math" any more than they invented "whole language". Nevertheless, these became the new "holy grail" of education for a time, only to be replaced with the current "back to basics" pendulum swing which embraces "drill and skill" math and isolated phonics instruction. The reformers who would "save us" rarely seek the middle ground of balance and common sense. It is teachers who have been "whipsawed" by this incessant meddling in education by bureaucrats and politicians. It is teachers who now find their instructional day eroded by endless testing, excessive paper work, and an obsessive pressure to raise test scores. It is teachers who have to endure the constant assault from politicians who benefit from promoting the false crisis in education, and then posturing to be the savior of public education by offering up false solutions.
Finally, the ACSA attack is disingenuous because they know full well that it is CTA that has been out front in championing the cause of schools of greatest needs, bringing it to the consciousness of the public and lawmakers.
According to CTA President Wayne Johnson, "This bill takes control of the classrooms away from distant bureaucrats and puts more decisions into the hands of the educators who work with the children every day. By expanding the scope of the state’s bargaining law, teachers and their union representatives will be able to negotiate the procedures by which decisions about curriculum, textbooks and teacher training are made – and about how to increase parental involvement. By empowering teachers, you empower public education." Teachers’ unions consist of 100% college graduates — almost half with higher degrees.
Through collaboration teachers bring hundreds of thousands of hours of collective teaching experience into the professional decision making process. It is unconscionable that such a group of professionals would not have full partnership in decisions on how to best educate children. The simple fact is we don’t — and it’s time to change that!
You can help by contacting your state legislators and urging them to support AB 2160. The easiest way to send your message is to do it online at: www.cta.org. Click on "Politics and Legislation" and then on "Contact Your Lawmaker." Click on "CA State Legislature." Scroll down and enter your 9-digit zip code or enter your address and 5-digit zip code.You will see the names of your state senator and assembly member. Click on "Compose Your Own Message."