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The impact of No Child Left Behind will compel major changes in the collective bargaining process and a new focus on closing achievement gaps. Some participants questioned whether teachers unions can adapt to this new context, while others maintained that "no one is not for the kids." It was noted that evidence is scant about the impact of innovative collective bargaining practices on student achievement; participants disagreed about how to even define student achievement.
+ Nature of teachers unions
+ Defining and measuring student achievement
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Can teachers unions advocate for the welfare of their members and the achievement of their members' students at the same time?
Some felt that asking teachers unions to advocate for student achievement is to ask them to go against their nature, since the unions' main function is to protect the rights and welfare of their members. Others argued that teachers have always been concerned about the achievement of their students and that improving student outcomes would be impossible without including the voice of teachers through collective bargaining.
 Warren Simmons
Executive Director,
Annenberg Institute for School Reform
Both sides see each other as enemies. Out in the community, that creates the belief that there is no reason to support either management or labor, that it would be better to move towards an alternative.
(1 minute, 55 seconds)
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 Adam Urbanski
President, Rochester (NY) Teachers Association
Director,
Teacher Union Reform Network
Play Audio
The most important thing for me is student achievement, and the members of my union keep electing me.
(45 seconds)
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Mary Harrison
President & CEO, The College Crusade of Rhode Island
Alan Bersin
Former Secretary of Education
California State Government
Harrison: Education is a failed industry; if we're all in the same boat, why don't we get off this boat and onto a new one, starting with no contracts?
Bersin: That's not politically feasible.
(3 minutes, 17 seconds)
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Richard Stutman
President,
Boston (MA) Teachers Union
Play audio
Unions don't see themselves as only protecting members' interests; collective bargaining is how teachers promote what they think is best for schools.
(45 seconds)
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How do you define student achievement, measure it, and include it in collective bargaining?
Little evidence is available about whether the innovations in collective bargaining that have occurred in some districts have improved student outcomes, although some participants offered anecdotal support. A major point of discussion was: If you are going to include accountability for student achievement in contracts, how do you define and measure it? Participants disagreed about the appropriate degree of reliance on standardized-test scores; some cited other possible measures such as leading indicators, college-going rates, and value added.
Julia Koppich
Education Consultant
There are several promising practices for measuring teacher effectiveness, including value-added, peer review, and examining student work. We have to think more broadly about what we are measuring and how we'll know when we have it right.
(1 minute, 52 seconds)
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Peter McWalters (Audio)
Commissioner,
Rhode Island Department of Elementary and
Secondary Education
As an industry, we do know the indicators. The SALT framework gives you seven or eight indicators of whether a system is moving to accountability, including student attendance, parent satisfaction, and personalization.
(1 minute, 29 seconds)
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Valerie Forti
President,
The Education Partnership
Alan Bersin
Former Secretary of Education
California State Government
Randi Weingarten
President, United Federation of Teachers, New York City
Forti: We've been talking about everything except students. How do we put the words student outcomes in collective bargaining?
Weingarten: A lot of things in the contract are about how to support student achievement, but management has wanted to get rid of them to concentrate on NCLB. How do we define student achievement? Is it acquiring life skills? Moving up a couple of points on a literacy exam?
Bersin: There is no broad consensus over goals. If we could get communities to agree on specific goals of education, we would see progress being made, but that would require more genuine parent engagement than what we do right now.
(6 minute, 9 seconds)
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Peter McWalters
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Rhode Island and other states are looking for ways to have a labor/management conversation that focuses on student results.
(3 minutes, 46 seconds)
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