Teacher Contracts and Green Dot

What about public school teacher contracts - unions. Here is a short opinion piece that has a paragraph of interest.

Most contracts are throwbacks to when nascent teacher unionism modeled itself on industrial unionism. Then, that approach made sense and resulted in better pay, working conditions and an organized voice. Yet schools are not factories. The work is not interchangeable and it takes more than one kind of school to meet all students’ needs. If teachers’ unions want to stay relevant, they must embrace more than one kind of contract.

I couldn't agree more. My entire outlook towards public school teachers changed when I participated in negotiating a teacher contract. The negotiators for the teachers were no longer teachers....they were union members, blue collar attitude union members. They were no longer the professionals I saw every day. The entire negotiation centered around how much pay was going to be given for any perceived "extra work". I was shocked at the lack of professionalism.

It seems however that public schools with a unionized teaching force can be made to work. A group called Green Dot Public Schools in California has joined with the United Federation of Teachers to open a charter school in the South Bronx in the Fall of 2008.

Key reforms embodied in the AMU contract include: teachers have explicit say in school policy and curriculum; no tenure or seniority preference; a professional work day rather than defined minutes; and flexibility to adjust the contract in critical areas over time. Green Dot was able to achieve these reforms by establishing a relationship of mutual trust with the teachers union and committing to pay its teachers above the average of comparable schools’ pay scales. In doing so, Green Dot and AMU share a unique relationship in the world of labor relations, one that is characterized by collaboration and a mutual interest in improving public education.

The teachers in Green Dot operated schools seem to be paid relatively well also. You can also see the Green Dot contract with their teachers here.

The other major difference in Green Dot schools is that parents of students must agree to volunteer 35 service hours per year. Green Dot schools operate on six tenets: Small, safe, personalized schools; High expectations of all students; Local Control with Extensive Professional Development and Accountability; Parent Participation; Maximize Funding to the Classroom and Keep Schools Open Later.

If a school site chooses not to follow a Recommended Practice, they are required to provide a plan that describes why they are not following that practice, lay out the new practice that the school site will employ, and provide support for that new practice in the form of research and evidence from other successful schools. If a school site or teacher is not following the Recommended Practices and does not meet its performance targets, it will be required to adopt the Recommended Practices. Green Dot is continually updating its Recommended Practices through innovations from within Green Dot’s own network and from best practices developed by other school operators.