Ruling: Fired D.C. teachers must be offered jobs, back wages (teachers union)

washington examiner.com ^ | February 8, 2011 | Lisa Gartner

[2harddrive]

I heard those teachers were fired for functional illiteracy!

[apoliticalone]

Public unions I totally agree.

But concerning private sector unions I have a comment. As long as the high paid corporate CEOs who run and control the business get the luxury of iron clad employment contracts that dot every "I" and cross every "T" from their shareholder owners, instead of depending upon their own abilities and success and results to hold onto their job and pay, I'm not critical of those private sector employees at the bottom also asking for some employment security.

How many CEOs have destroyed shareholder value yet they walk away with huge bonuses because they have an employment contract that are often much more binding than union contracts? Most are only managers and not entrepreneurs and have risked nothing.

Let's eliminate all employment contracts for all employees including the NFL and not just those of rank and file.

[RobbyS]

I was talking about DC. Look who's running DC. as far as administrators are concerned, there are two to ten times as many administrators in a large district as are absolutely needed. Best example I can give off hand is what I read in an article in the New York Magazine in 1983. It was about a Catholic elementary school in the Bronk, I think. The school had had very good luck with poor kids with poor/single mother families. A nun was the principal. The article was mainly an interview with her. The nun said the secret of her success was the attitude of staff and parents. They busted their guts, as did the kids, to do well. Public schools nearby were not nearly so successful even though they spent much more, had many more staff.

Sister got very little money from the archdiocese more than she needed to keep the doors open and the school going. I remember that the reporter said that the archdiocese budget was hardly more than the office supplies budget for the NYPS. She asked the sister if she hoped that the feds would send money to the archdiocese. She smiled and demurred. "The archdiocese mainly leaves us along. If they got more money they would just meddle.

You see the money people, the people who control the funding always think they know what they are doing. That attitude is the root cause of the rig disaster in the Gulf. The bookkeepers always want to control things, and it is worse when they know just a LITTLE about operations." A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."

[RobbyS]

I agree, but the situation is hopeless. Our society is held together by contracts, and the lawyers control the process. Union contracts are written by union lawyers who basic alliance is to their employers, the union officials. The rights of these officials are secured. The rights of the managers across the table are secured. The workers and stockholders are really in the same boat. Their interests comes second.

[apoliticalone]

I agree with your posts. Many public school systems today have as many administrators and staff as teachers. They need to get back to basics and give teachers more control, but also require tangible results from them individually and from the overall school, and its district. Compare them each against other teachers and schools in that district and against other schools in the county and state. They need competition for results instead of competition for more funding.

In the end you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear and you need dedication from parents and students. Too many inner city kids have neither and throwing more money (which is always the bureaucrats solution) is no solution.

With money always comes strings and the strings aren’t always pulled by those of competence.