Teacher Education with an Attitude: Preparing Teachers to Educate Working-Class Students in Their Collective Self-Interest

14. “We Cannot Avoid Taking Sides”: Teacher Unions, Urban Communities, and Social Justice in Historical Perspective

14 “We Cannot Avoid Taking Sides”: Teacher Unions, Urban Communities, and Social Justice in Historical Perspective Lauri Johnson LAURI JOHNSON, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR in Educational Leadership and Policy, University at Buffalo, State University of New York, tells the story of the Teachers Union of New York City whose members worked from the 1930s through the 1950s to make the communities where they taught a better place for their students and their families to live.This historical case provides a vivid example of how unions might educate teachers for social justice and how teachers, teacher educators, parents, and community members can work together to address equity issues in the larger society. She suggests that as progressive teacher educators we must reclaim these submerged historical narratives in order to provide today’s teacher education students, a majority of whom will become members of teachers unions, with a vision of social justice unionism . She urges teacher educators to collaborate with teachers unions that forefront teachers as public intellectuals and view urban schools as sites of educational and social reform. ❖ Today’s teacher unions and teacher education programs inhabit an uneasy, and often conflictual, relationship with urban communities. First, urban teachers are overwhelmingly white and middle class, while urban students are predominately students of color and often poor. In Buffalo, New York, for example, students of color constitute 74 percent of the student population and over 77 percent of the students qualify for free and reduced lunches (New York State District Report Card, 2004).The predominately white teaching force, on the other hand, lives in middle-class enclaves within the city limits or nearby suburbs and represents some of the highest paid city employees. Most teacher education students in local universities and colleges grew up and attended school in these same white, middle-class suburbs and have had little exposure to the realities of urban neighborhoods. In our financially strapped community, teacher union leaders gain the public spotlight chiefly when they press for higher salaries for teachers, defend 217 218 TEACHER EDUCATION WITH AN ATTITUDE contractual demands, and block school reform efforts, such as charter schools. As in many urban communities that experience chronic unemployment, deteriorating city services, and budget crises, teacher unions are often viewed by local parents and community activists as self-serving, out of touch with community concerns, and obstructionist in the face of school reforms that give more power to urban parents.1 As Karp (1994) notes, today’s teacher unions are seen as “defenders of privilege and bureaucracy rather than as agents of change or allies of the communities that public schools serve.” Teacher union reformers and community activists alike agree that a new vision of teacher unionism must be built in city schools that moves beyond a traditional industrial approach and recognizes that teacher unions can help teachers create better schools and work with parents and community activists as part of a broader movement for social progress. Peterson (1999) terms this “social justice unionism,” a position that defends the rights of teachers as workers but goes beyond teacher professionalism and bread-and-butter issues and grounds itself in a commitment to social justice (p. 16). The key components of social justice unionism are articulated in the document Social Justice Unionism: A Working Draft that was developed by 29 teacher union activists at a three-day institute sponsored by the National Coalition of Education Activists in 1994 (NCEA, 1999). In their view, social justice unionism should: 1. Defend the rights of its members while fighting for the rights and needs of the broader community and students; 2. Recognize that parents and community members are key allies and build strategic alliances with parents, other labor unions, and community groups; 3. Involve rank-and-file members in running the union and initiate widespread discussion on how education unions should respond to crises in education and society; 4. Put teachers at the center of school reform agendas, ensuring that they take ownership of reform initiatives; 5. Encourage those who work with children to use curriculum and pedagogy that promote racial and gender equity, combat racism and prejudice , encourage critical thinking about society’s problems, and nurture an active, reflective citizenry that is committed to real democracy and social and economic justice; 6. Forcefully advocate for a radical restructuring of American education; 7. Aggressively educate and mobilize its membership to fight for social justice in all areas of society (pp. 129–130). [18.226.222.12] Project MUSE (2024-04-18...