Collective Bargaining and Teacher Organizations

Welcome back to the new school year. This promises to be a very eventful year for teachers in R-12, with recent reports of failed AYP at 18 schools and all that entails . . . and the district and teachers organizations trying to sort out exactly where they stand regarding last May's Missouri Supreme Court decision restoring collective bargaining rights.

MNEA vs. MSTA - Who Should Bargain for R-12 Teachers?

While MNEA invested four years of legal battles to win the Supreme Court appeal, MSTA's lawyers argued strongly against collective bargaining . . . only to flip-flop once the battle was lost. Read these two contradictory statements, issued barely a month apart, from MSTA's website and a subsequent flyer sent to members:

May 2007 - "Why does MSTA oppose collective bargaining for public employees? . . . We believe that teaching is a public service and that students' education should not be disrupted or held hostage to salary negotiations . . . we oppose collective bargaining on many fronts."

June 2007 - from "Straight Talk About Collective Bargaining and MSTA" . . . Does MSTA Oppose Collective Bargaining? MSTA strongly supports the right of teachers to bargain collectively . . . We have always been advocates for strong professional negotiations."

Always? Well, since June of '07 anyway.

So, what can we conclude about MSTA's "commitment" to collective bargaining for teachers? While we recognize the fact that there are excellent educators in their organizations, the organization itself seems to expose an integrity gap when it comes to representing its members at the bargaining table.

Soon after the Supreme Court decision, SNEA asked the school board to recognize SNEA as the bargaining agent for teachers in our district. We will continue to consistently work toward that goal, holding firm our belief that better working conditions for teachers result in better learning conditions for students.