Friday, June 3, 2011

Unions helping to solve problems ... gasp!

Bristol Township School District teachers voted on Thursday to accept a pay freeze, in exchange for a one year extension on their contract. They were due to receive a 3 percent pay increase. This comes on the heels of the superintendent announcing that he was accepting a pay freeze on his own contract. These moves will help reduce a large deficit, and show how bargaining is meant to work. When both sides show willingness to compromise and keep a lid on rhetoric, things get done. It’s really just that simple. The answer to solving many of the problems facing our school districts lies in a willingness on the part of all parties to work hard together in a spirit of compromise and collaboration. It lies in the kind of negotiations, sometimes slow and painful, that parties with relatively equal power often engage in. Individual teachers negotiating with the school system do not reach decisions through compromise and collaboration, but through imposition. Real progress can only be accomplished with strong unions. Unions won’t always make the right decisions, and sometimes they will protect teachers who don’t perform and stop change that would be helpful. What they always do, however, is play a key role in the mechanism by which problems are effectively dealt with. In Bristol Township, we have an idea what that is supposed to look like.

No comments:

Post a Comment