Free Republic

Two teachers have taken Pennsylvania’s largest teachers union to court over its attempt to decide which charities may be supported by teachers as an alternative when they decline to join the union on religious grounds. The teachers, Chris Meier from Lancaster County and Jane Ladley from Chester County, are required—as a condition of employment—either to be a member of the Pennsylvania State Education Association or pay a nonmember “fair share” fee of $435. Last spring, PSEA accepted Meier and Ladley’s status as religious objectors. In lieu of paying membership dues, state law instructed the teachers to pay a “fair share”...

Speaking at the National Education Association (NEA) Representative Assembly at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver on July 3rd, Colorado Education Association (CEA) President Kerrie Dallman referred to the school district of Jefferson County (JeffCo) – where teachers have staged a “sick-out” and students left classes to protest throughout last week – as one of three in her state in which the teachers’ union was “working against hostile school boards.” “I also want to say thank you to the staff and leaders from the 18 states around the country who were sending in 48 staff under the NEA shared staffing...

There’s a big battle brewing in the Jefferson County, Colorado, school system. The manufactured controversy over a proposed curriculum review is generating national New York Times headlines. But the fight is not about what misguided students and biased reporters say it’s about. “Censorship” is a red herring. The real issue is union control. Here’s the deal: Public school teachers in this Denver-area district walked out of their classrooms this week to protest the implementation of performance-based pay. The JeffCo school board approved the new compensation system last week, which rewards the most highly effective teachers with 4.2 percent raises, effective...

Democrat Mary Burke told education officials Friday she would fight as governor to stop the expansion of voucher schools but would leave alone the long-standing program in Milwaukee. "This is something that may sound like a good political sound bite, but it is bad public policy," she said of expanding the voucher program. "I think it is the thing that most threatens a vision of a public school system and an education for students in Wisconsin to be the leaders in our country." Her comments drew applause from her audience at a Wisconsin Association of School District Administrators conference at...

All four Harlem Success Academy charters serve primarily minority student populations (all are 93.5 to 97.1% black and Hispanic) and low-income households (75 to 80% of students at these schools qualify for free or discounted lunch), and yet all are ranked academically higher than about 97% of all schools in New York state based on 2013-2014 standardized test assessments in math and reading. What a truly amazing academic success story! Harlem Success Academy 3, an elementary school where 95.2% of the students are black or Hispanic and 80% are from poor households who qualify for free or discounted lunch, performed...

(D)escriptions, written by Twin Cities area high school teachers, of how their schools teach literature classes. This one comes from Edina High School, which was once known as an excellent institution: Acceptance and inter-cultural understanding can be fostered through the use of powerful texts, discussion, analysis, and exploration in the classroom. An English curriculum grounded in social justice rests on a belief based in equity—that each person should have access to resources regardless of race, gender, ability, age, socio-economic status, or sexual orientation.

Superior Court Judge Robert Hobgood appeased liberal wishes today and ruled against a school vouchers program designed to provide poor and minority kids in North Carolina the opportunity to attend the same private schools as better offer children. Siding with teachers unions, atheist groups and public education administrators, Hobgood deemed the Opportunity Scholarship program to be unconstitutional. The ruling comes less than a week after the program awarded more than 360 lower-income families with education grants of $4,200 per child, providing their parents the opportunity to place their sons or daughters in a school of their choice. Fearing that poor...

Rebecca Friedrichs, a teacher and former member of the California Teachers Association, spoke at the event at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 12, 2014. (CNSNews.com/Penny Starr) (CNSNews.com) – Teachers who left labor unions connected with their jobs said on Tuesday that they felt “bullied” for their opposition to compulsory membership and payment of dues that funded political activities. “We literally felt like little children being bullied on a playground,” Rebecca Friedrichs, a teacher and former member of the California Teachers Association, said at the event at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. Friedrichs, who is also...

The teachers’ union representing the Douglas County school system has lost one-quarter of its membership since last year, signaling a growing frustration within the ranks that dues are used to finance politics instead of professional development. The significant drop in membership of the Douglas County Federation (DCF) was revealed in a July 21 letter from the board of education to Courtney Smith, union president, and was based on the union’s most recently released tax returns. The letter pointed to the drop in membership as undeniable proof that teachers had chosen the district over the union and the need for major...

The president of the nation’s second-largest teachers union said Friday that President Barack Obama’s education chief has turned his back on the concerns of educators and parents, but she stopped short of calling for his ouster. Teachers unions have been clashing with the Obama administration over its support for charter schools and its push to use student test scores as part of teacher evaluations, a relationship that further frayed after Education Secretary Arne Duncan spoke in support of a California judge’s ruling last month that struck down tenure and other job protections for the state’s public school teachers. …

The Jeffco Public Schools Board school board tossed out a tentative deal with its teachers union during Thursday night’s board meeting. Board president Ken Witt said he could not endorse the deal because the agreement provided raises to an estimated 56 teachers who were rated “partly effective” on the district’s evaluation rubric. ... teachers union representatives were disappointed

The public schools in Washington, D.C., spent $29,349 per pupil in the 2010-2011 school year, according to the latest data from National Center for Education Statistics, but in 2013 fully 83 percent of the eighth graders in these schools were not "proficient" in reading and 81 percent were not "proficient" in math. These are the government schools in our nation's capital city -- where for decades politicians of both parties have obstreperously pushed for more federal involvement in education and more federal spending on education. Government has manifestly failed the families who must send their children to these schools, and...

...The National Education Association (NEA), American Federation of Teachers (AFT), National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), and National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), among other organizations were instrumental in bringing together teachers to provide specific, constructive feedback on the standards.

... XYZ educators are highly qualified, responsive teachers who work extremely hard to continue to provide exemplary education for your children. Among these highly qualified teachers we have Fulbright scholars, National Endowment for the Humanities grant recipients, and National Board Certified Educators. We regularly work beyond what the contract asks of us so that your children receive outstanding educational opportunities. Teachers often provide extra help to students before and after their contractual time. They attend evening events and accompany students on out of state field trips and competitions. Teachers voluntarily write many letters of recommendations for students. Without a new...

Just try to envision the scene: A newly elected Republican mayor of a large American city takes steps to close down some of the best schools serving an almost exclusively minority population. You know how it would go. We’d be hearing that Republicans “hate” the poor. The words “cruel,” “vicious,” and “racist” would circle the new mayor like sharks. News organizations would examine where the mayor sent his own children, and his hypocrisy would be fiercely denounced. It is, of course, the new Democratic mayor of New York, Bill de Blasio, who is shutting down a number of highly successful...

When the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation offered Pittsburgh Public Schools $40 million, it was a godsend to the cash-strapped school system. But to the American Federation of Teachers, the city's teachers union, and AFT President Randi Weingarten, the idea that school funding might be tied to improving children's education was anathema. The grant had to go. The Gates foundation's criteria were straightforward: The school district and teachers needed to agree on a method to evaluate classroom performance and to hold teachers accountable for their performance. The union and the district agreed on a metric, but now the AFT and...

The Chicago Teachers Union is demanding that CPS close all schools due to the extreme cold that is forecast for Monday. “Right now, CPS and the City of Chicago’s Office of Emergency Management are sending confusing and mixed messages to the public about what to do,” said CTU President Karen GJ Lewis in a press release. “We believe common sense would dictate that CPS should close schools with at least 10 inches of snow already on the ground and a record-breaking low temperature of -10 degrees forecast for Monday.” ... Schools throughout the Chicago area have announced school closings for...

Note: This article contains explicit language that some readers might find offensive. Liberals in Ohio have used the death of a 14-year-old homeschooler in order to try to pass legislation that would require all homeschooling families to first have a home visit by some bureaucrat or another to see if they’re worthy enough for homeschooling. 14-year old Teddy Foltz was pulled out of school by his mother because teachers suspected child abuse, the story goes. The child was subsequently beaten to death by the mother's boyfriend who is now serving a life sentence for murder and is eligible for parole...

The Michigan Education Association is going to arbitration to try to force the West Branch-Rose City school district to pay a former teacher who was convicted of molesting a student a $10,000 severance buyout. The father of the victim is outraged, calling the union’s efforts on behalf of the sex criminal “ludicrous” and saying any school money due to the teacher should go to his son, who is “out there trying to make it in this world all messed up.” Neal Erickson, a former math teacher at Rose City Middle School, was convicted this summer of raping a young student...

Voters slammed on the brakes last week, rejecting Amendment 66, a $1 billion across-the-board income tax hike, and three heavily-subsidized union school board candidates. Instead, voters gave reform candidates the green light. Jeffco voters elected three conservative school board candidates Julie Williams, John Newkirk and Ken Witt – all of whom opposed Amendment 66. Williams, Newkirk and Witt, who campaigned as the “WNW” ticket, will now hold a majority on the five-member school board that includes union-cozy incumbents Lesley Dahlkemper and Jill Fellman, whose terms end in 2015. The new trio is expected to take office on Nov. 21. Forty-eight...