The Coming Summer

If you've become used to my inflammatory rhetoric this post may disappoint you. Sometimes you have to be in the forefront of new ideas and new actions and sometimes you have to realize what you know and what you don't know and when it is time to begin to rely on the people and organizations that are around you to do for us what we have affiliated with them to do for us.



Today, June 15th, at the last meeting of the SEA representative assembly I was about as quiet and unconfrontational as most of you will ever say you have seen me. The meeting was at West Seattle High School which is no doubt a beautiful facility. We were organized into regions as opposed to grade level; the NE part of Seattle instead of Highschool. Each grouping of tables had appointed to it a representative from the WEA who has been brought in from Olympia specifically to help us organize our region for the upcoming General Assembly meeting on August 31st where we will vote either to approve the new contract or approve going on strike September 9th, day one of students back in school.



It was a rather awesome feeling walking into our rep assembly and seeing all these "suits" from the WEA main office in addition to the 8 Uniserve members that have been specifically assigned to Seattle. After months of struggling with the sometimes clumsy dealings of our SEA leadership, who are all new, and unfortunately are being confronted with this major contract negotiation with a totally new administration who comes from a state where there is no union organization, I was somehow comforted to see all of these bargain worn veterans of the WEA, who have been brought in to help us negotiate a better contract. In plain English then, we've got some good people behind us. And there's the rub.



These good people are behind us but they can not stand up for us. They can guide us and provide us methods for bringing about positive negotiations, but they can not do it for us. Sure we have a veteran WEA person at our helm in Glen Bafia, our executive director, and sure we have some old bargaining veterans at the table like Verleeta Wooten and John Dunn but the stakes have never been higher. The new Seattle School District administration has come to the table as if nothing has been going on in the Seattle School District before they got here and whatever was going on was inadequate and not up to the task. This is a different sort of administration from the one lead by John Stanford. John Stanford valued collaboration and valued the give and take between the on the job educators and administration. The union contract under which many of us have prospered if not financially at least professionally in terms of being recognized for the professionals that we are, is being summarily curtailed to be replaced by a contract where all decisions are made at the district level. And the district administration has a one size fits all approach to education code named "Excellence For All" the same plan she put in place at Charlston North Carolina with mixed results particularly in the central urban part of the district. (See the attached article.)http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003659942_charleston10m.html

Well, Marie Goodloe-Johnson, has drawn her line in the sand with her latest offer, "all or nothing" and the union responded "nothing" as there was nothing in the "all" part that was even remotely of interest financially or professionally for the educator. Just a litany of the "Excellence For All" mandates and to the extent that this has to do with the labor contract, it is all about holding the educators feet to the uncomfortable fire. A new time of business organization efficiency model, the next new best thing. And it is being presented as the solution to all even the things that are working because why? Because one size fits all.

Anyone who has taught anywhere in this district knows that not one size fits all anywhere, not across schools and not even within schools. There is so much that has to do with the educators professional judgement, because that teacher in the classroom, that is the person in the trenches. That is the person negotiating every new social fad, every new batch of young people being newly influenced by some other part of our free American society which may or may not be condusive to the classroom environment. It's the ground soldiers of education that are fielding the day to day battles, and while generals and presidents may set the agenda, the how to get it done is left to the man/woman in the classroom.

So this new bargaining, these new negotiations are not about money because there is no money. There is no money in the economy and there is no money in the state coffers so it can't be about money even though the continued refusal to pay the middle class a living wage is what has brought the American economy to where it is today. And if it is not about money, what could be so bad that come the end of the summer we will be looking at a contract and being asked to either approve it by our union or to walk away and sit out for awhile until a better contract is offered?

Well, you have always said to me that the teacher is not in it for the money. The teacher is in it for students and the classroom where he/she creates that special nurturing environment to attempt to get the most for every student in their care. So what is the August 31st vote going to be about? It's going to be about nothing less than the "Classroom" itself? These contract negotiations are a battle about who controls the classroom. Will the classroom be controlled by the district and its "Excellence for All" vision or will it be controlled by the educators who are out there every day seeking "Excellence from Everybody"? And which is going to be better for students, the grand scheme "Excellence for All" without distinction, a throw back to the industrial education of the early 20th century, or that "Excellence from Everybody" where that individual teacher is charged with creating as differentiated instruction as they can possibly fashion to appeal to each young and very distinct mind and person that comes under their care. This is what the battle over the summer is going to be about and by the sound of it, nobody is listening to anybody because each side knows what is best.

Well, since Marie Goodloe Johnson has been quoted as saying she never failed at anything while at Charlston County, N.C. I guess she has taken her position. She is right. And I guess that means we are wrong.

So, my friends, we have no choice. The battle lines have been drawn and its a battle over who will control the classroom. Will it be as Marie Goodloe Johnson wants it, "Excellence for All" which in all truth probably means "mediocrity for everyone" or will it be a classroom environment where teachers will feel free and unthreatened to take risks to try to reach every student and try to achieve that lofty and unreachable aspiration of "Excellence from Everybody" where everybody has their own sense of excellence and it is only the educator who sits with them daily who has the true capacity to help them identify their excellence and enable them to achieve it.

These are unnerving times and for my money I am putting my faith in the SEA/WEA to help us through this bargain. I had great conversations with some great WEA people and they said it to me plain; if we are organized and unified behind our bargaining unit and the Seattle School District knows that we are behind them our bargaining unit will have the power it needs to negotiate a contract that continues to resemble the contract we currently have where all district decisions, building decisions and classroom decisions are collaborations of administrative leadership and educational professional. The NEA/WEA/SEA has fought for years to create an environment of collaboration between Employer and Employee. Marie Goodloe Johnson comes to send the pendulum back 40 years, and it is her intent to do it in one bargaining negotiation.

Here's the good news. If we get organized over the summer and the Seattle School District senses our unity and senses the power of our organization and becomes responsive to who we are and what we believe is the right balance between administrative oversight and educator independence, then we will not have to go on strike come September 9th. A reasoned settlement between the many good ideas of Marie Goodloe Johnson and the many good relationships between administration and educators that we have in Seattle will be fashioned into an even better school district. But the line has been drawn in the sand. So we must stand on our side. We must stand strong and unified. Our vision of good education is not in contradiction with Marie Goodloe Johnson and her new administration but how we are to work together to achieve it whether in collaboration or beneathe the strong arm of tyranny in this regard we are as far apart as ever.

I look forward to your comments. You know you can say your piece any time and liven up this blog. Have a great summer educators. You deserve it.

SHMUEL Willner