Education Week - May 9, 2018 - 11

renewal of teacher unionism, or are
they a crystal-ball glimpse into a
world in which grassroots groups,
not the teachers' unions, dominate
organizing?
On the one hand, the strikes prove
how powerful organizing can be.
Activists and unions alike are sharing what they've learned about new
organizing tactics and strategies,
which are heavily dependent on social media rather than traditional
door-knocking.
Yet the strikes have been
prompted by independent activists-
some union members and some
not-while the teachers' unions have
played an important, but secondary
role. They have lent key support,
communications assistance, and
focus to the protests, but have not
been catalysts.
"If we were going to build a movement to have the power to actually
get a strike, it had to be bigger than
any one organization. It needed to be
a place where the grassroots could
communicate," said Ryan Frankenberry, a former AFT West Virginia political director and one of the core activists in that state. "Having worked
for [a teachers' union] before, I knew
they would respond to their membership, and they absolutely did. But you
have to have people buying into it for
their own reasons before it gets to the
organization level."

The Future of Unions
The relationships between activists
and labor unions have often been productive, but they have also generated
some tension. In Oklahoma, some
teacher-activists are bristling at how
the state union's leadership handled
the strike and are now calling for impeaching its officers.
Where does all that leave unions
in general?

pact on student instruction and classroom
time," Paine said in a news release in February.
Some state leaders pointed to rulings by the
state supreme court and the state attorney
general in 1990, after the last major teacher
walkout in West Virginia.
"There is no right to strike against the
state," the 1990 advisory opinion, signed by
then-West Virginia Attorney General Roger
W. Tompkins, said. "Thus, any strike or concerted work stoppage by the public teachers of
this state is illegal."
"Public teachers in West Virginia have written employment contracts that expressly prohibit strikes or work stoppages," the opinion
said.
But Robert M. Bastress, a professor at West
Virginia University College of Law in Morgantown, said he viewed Tompkins' opinion
as "just plain wrong."
"There is no state law prohibiting, as a general proposition, public-employee strikes,"
Bastress said. "Certainly, if a teacher refuses
to show up for work, when he or she is scheduled to be there, then a [local] board of educa-

tion could pursue a disciplinary action against
the teacher, subject to the substantial procedures available to teachers to grieve disciplinary actions."
Also, a court could order striking teachers
back to work, but there is no available procedure in West Virginia for a statewide injunction, Bastress added. "Such action would have
to be county by county," he said.
Local school boards in the state likely did
not seek such injunctions during the recent
walkout because they were sympathetic to the
teachers' demands and the action was relatively short-lived, Bastress said.

'Just a Word Game'
In Arizona, lawmakers and Gov. Doug
Ducey, a Republican, passed a state budget late last week that included raises for
teachers. The breakthrough came after
thousands of teachers in the heavily Republican state had walked off their jobs for
a week.
O'Brien of the NEA said the state has no
statutory prohibition against strikes by public
employees, only some "musty-dusty old common law" that might lend support to such a
view.
However, Timothy Sandefur, the vice president of litigation for the Goldwater Institute,
a national free-market research and legal
group based in Phoenix, noted that teachers

had used their vacation and personal days in
many cases and had received significant cooperation from school districts, many of which
shut down and declined to dock pay from those
who walked off the job.
"For teachers to collaborate to paralyze the
public school system, under the Arizona Constitution, is unlawful," Sandefur said. "It's just
a word game" to not consider the walkout a
strike, he said.
The Goldwater Institute was weighing litigation against some school districts in the
state because of their alleged facilitation of the
walkout, Sandefur said, but the group was unlikely to proceed if the controversy was settled.
"I'd be surprised if there are any consequences" for the teachers, he said. "I think
they are going to get away with it because they
have power."
One illustration of which direction the tide of
public sentiment may be flowing: In Colorado,
a state lawmaker proposed a bill to dismiss
and jail teachers who go on strike, but he withdrew it after it failed to pass out of committee.
Three of the five recent walkouts occurred
in "right-to-work" states that do not authorize
collective bargaining for teachers. (Colorado
and Oklahoma permit limited collective bargaining by teachers.)
"In our collective bargaining states, we are
engaging our members on these issues with
school districts at the bargaining table," Templeton of the NEA said.

Matt York/AP

David Zalubowski/AP

Carolyn Moore, left, a public
school teacher, marches with
Patrick Thivault during a rally
in Denver demanding more tax
spending on schools.

Teachers crowd the lobby of the Arizona Senate last week as lawmakers debate a budget negotiated by majority Republicans and GOP Gov. Doug Ducey.

"To the extent that the unions are
really a viable and important player
here, I think the likelihood is that
these strikes strengthen the unions,"
said Bill Raabe, a former longtime
National Education Association
staffer, now a consultant. "The challenge becomes if the union is viewed
as a bit player."
It is not merely an academic question. Bargaining is prohibited in Arizona, while labor-representation fees
cannot be collected from nonmembers in Colorado, Oklahoma, or West
Virginia. And a looming Supreme

Court decision, Janus v. AFSCME,
could end unions' ability to charge
such fees for good elsewhere.
So the unions face tough choices,
including whether they will move
away from the service model that
has characterized them for the past
few decades (for instance, the emphasis on offering members liability
insurance) and move more fully toward an organizing model.
If they do, the recent strikes offer
clues about some strategies unions
might think about emulating, Raabe
said, including having a clear, concise

message, communicating effectively,
and finding those issues that spur
teachers to passionate response.
Frankenberry concurred. "I've had
this conversation with a couple of
labor leaders across the country. Basically my answer is that you have
to know your membership and be
engaged, and not just through the
traditional hierarchical structure.
It's easy to fall into that."
There are lessons for the activists
to learn from labor, too, noted Julia
Koppich, a longtime labor analyst
and consultant-like knowing when

further wins aren't viable.
"One of the things I learned many,
many years ago is when you go on
strike, you have to know how you're
going to get back in. You have to
know when it ends," she said. "I
think for the grassroots teachers
who want to be in their classrooms
teaching, they can't sustain this
kind of energy around the fights
that need to be had, without at some
point the unions being involved."
Staff Writer Madeline Will contributed
reporting.

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Education Week - May 9, 2018

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