Teacher’s Work/Teachers Unions SIG Business Meeting: The Changing Context for Public Sector Unions

Scheduled Time: Monday, April 16 – 6:15 – 8:15pm

Building/Room: Vancouver Convention Centre, Second Level – East Room 8&15

Agenda:

Part A

1. Welcome and Apologies
2. Chair’s Report
3. Program Chair’s Report
4. Secretary/Treasurer’s Report
5. Papers/specific matters for discussion
   1. Draft database (Chris)
   2. “Red Estrado” conference, Chile, summer 2012 (Jill)
   3. Draft of SIG award for Ed D/Ph D dissertation (Chris)
   4. SIG @ AERA 2013 – Connecting with local unions in San Francisco? Any other suggestions?
   5. Other Business

Part B

1. Invited speaker: Susan Lambert, President, BCTF: (a) the current education/labour situation in BC; (b) report about the pre-AERA session hosted by the IDEA network and BCTF

1. Invited Panel: The Changing International Context for Public Sector Unions

Teacher union leaders and researchers from Australia, Canada, England and Mexico will discuss how the context for teacher unions has changed in their educational jurisdiction and how teacher unions in each jurisdiction have responded to the changes.

Invited speakers:

• Jeff Garsed, Research Officer, Australian Education Union-Tas Branch
• Myles Ellis, Acting Deputy Secretary General, Canadian Teacher’s Federation
• Howard Stevenson, Professor, University of Lincoln
• Maria de la Luz Arriaga Lemus, Professor, Faculty of Economics, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
• Mary Compton, Past President, National Union of Teachers

Session Chair: Cindy Rottman, University of Manitoba

At the conclusion of the meeting please join us for dinner and a sampling of the local micro-brews!

Immediately before the AERA annual meeting in Vancouver, BC, the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation will be hosting a conference organised by the Initiative for Democratic Education in the Americas.  The conference will take place on the 12 and 13 April and will be located at BCTF’s headquarters in Vancouver.

The Conference is an opportunity for educators, researchers and students from throughout the Americas to share approaches and experiences of democratic pedagogies  in public education that empower students as subjects of change, equity and social justice. The event will also include special guests from Europe and Asia.

Please see below for further details, a letter of invitation and a registration form.

Cover letter–Invitation to Teaching for transformation forum

IDEA Internat Forum Pedagogy v2 Feb 2012

REGIFORM -English

Further details, and completed Registration forms should be addressed to Steve Stewart (Technical Secretary, IDEA).

We are hoping that many of the delegates to the conference will be able to attend Teachers’ Work/Teacher Unions SIG events at the annual meeting – thus enriching the discussions we have there.

In turn, we hope many SIG members will be able to attend the pre-AERA conference. The SIG is not an official sponsor of the conference, but we have been included in planning discussions and we are extremely supportive of the initiative.   Taken together, these two  events provide a great opportunity for SIG members to participate in what promises to be an exceptional programme of workshops and discussions.

[Please note - the IDEAs event is free, but early registration is strongly recommended as places are limited].

At the AERA annual meeting the SIG continues to build on recent successes and will present a substantial and very high quality program within the AERA schedule.  Cindy Rottmann (program chair) and her team of reviewers are to be congratulated for assembling such an interesting range of sessions.  It is also important to draw attention to the excellent pre-AERA event hosted by the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation and partners.

Full details of the program (and the pre-conference event) are below.  We look forward to seeing you in Vancouver to discuss the issues raised by these papers and symposia.

AERA 2012, Vancouver, BC- Teachers’ Work/Teacher Unions Program

Sunday, April 15th

10:35-12:05- Symposium, The challenges of being a good citizen and a good
teacher: Lessons from the Wisconsin Protests

*    Swalwell, K. “See you on the square:” The contested nature of
teacher’s public activism
*    Anderson, J. When silence speaks: A case study investigating the
effects of restricting teachers’ classroom speech
*    Ward, A. H. “Teacher hat” and “citizen hat”: One strategy for
negotiating tensions between union and teaching duties
*    Klehr, M. The learnable moment: On becoming “political” and taking
action as pre-service teachers

Chair: Hess. D. E

Discussant: Apple, M.

Monday, April 16th

10:35-12:05- Roundtable, Current research on teachers’ work

*    Pollock, K. Non-permanent teachers’ access to work-related learning
*    Bascia, N. Teacher’s work as curriculum innovators in alternative
schools
*    Wokoma, A. H. The secret life of art teachers: the work lives of six
elementary visual art teachers
*    Kee, A. N. Advocating for teachers with critical quantitative
research: An exploration

Chair: Gardner, C

4:05-6:05- Paper session, Teacher unions and educational governance

*    Stevenson, H. & Mercer, J. Industrial relations in transition: an
analysis of employer-union relations in the UK higher education sector
*    Dondaldson, M, Cobb, C.D. Mayer, A. P., LeChasseur K & Welton, A.D.
The role of teachers’ unions in urban school decentralization
*    Jha, N. & Banerjee N. Assessing the role of teachers’ unions in the
adoption of accountability laws in public education
*    Naylor, C., D’Angelo, K., Fast, J., & Champion, K. E. A British
Columbia teacher union and school district collaboration to support
inclusion
*    Tallman, T, Conley, S. C. & Yun, J. T. Generational unionism and
crisis: Conflict within one local teachers’ union

Chair: Froese-Germain, B

Discussant: Williamson, J.C.

6:15-8:15- Business meeting, The changing international context for public
sector unions

*    Garsed, J., Ellis, M., Alexandrou, A. (will be replaced with
Stevenson, H.), Arriaga, M.D.L., Compton, M.

Teacher union leaders and researchers from Australia, Canada, England,
Scotland and Mexico will discuss how the context for teacher unions has
changed in their educational jurisdiction and how teacher unions in each
jurisdiction have responded to the changes.

[The business meeting is usually followed by an informal SIG social event - a visit to a restaurant or bar - all very welcome]

Tuesday, April 17th

8:15-9:45- Roundtable, Current research on teachers’ unions and teachers’
work

*    Couture, J.C., Hargreaves, A. & McRae, P. The future of teachers’
work
*    Pogodzinski, B & Jones, N. Teacher colleagues’ influence on novice
teacher’s perceptions of teacher unions and labor-management relations
*    Popiel, K. teacher union legitimacy and member engagement

Chair: Brunton, R.

Don’t forget about the exciting off-site meeting:

Intercontinental Encounter on Education: Emancipatory Pedagogies and Resistance to Neo-liberalism, A seminar sponsored by the IDEA Network/Red-SEPA

April 12-13, 2012, Vancouver, BC, Canada, Hosted by the British Columbia
Teachers’ Federation

The Intercontinental Encounter will examine how neo-liberal economic and
social policies are affecting education and pedagogical practices, and frame
alternatives to these policies. The focus will be on understanding the
nature of neo-liberal education policies in different parts of the globe,
their impact, forms of resistance, and pedagogical alternatives that are
empowering and emancipatory.

Participants will be researchers and activists from teacher unions and
academic researchers who focus on teachers’ work and teachers’ unions. They
will be from Latin America as well as North America and other regions.
Spanish-English translation will be provided.

The structure of the seminar will be panels of presentations, followed by
working sessions in two languages.

This seminar will precede the conference of the American Education Research

Association (AERA) being held in Vancouver, Canada, from April 14-17, 2012.

The number of participants will be limited by the need for simultaneous
translation. The seminar organizers anticipate that about 20 participants
will be from Latin America. There will be room for up to 50 other
participants.

For more information:

Larry Kuehn, Director of Research, BC Teachers’ Federation
(<mailto:lkuehn@bctf.ca> lkuehn@bctf.ca)

Steve Stewart, Technical Secretary, IDEA Network/Red-SEPA
(<mailto:sstewart@codev.org> sstewart@codev.org)

Please see below details of an excellent event happening just before AERA 2012 and open to SIG members. The event is hosted by BCTF and has been co-organised by SIG member Larry Kuehn. Contact Larry for further details – see below.

________________________________________________________________________

Intercontinental Encounter on Education: Emancipatory Pedagogies and Resistance to Neo-liberalism

A seminar sponsored by the IDEA Network/Red-SEPA

April 12–13, 2012, Vancouver, BC, Canada

Hosted by the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation

The Intercontinental Encounter will examine how neo-liberal economic and social policies are affecting education and pedagogical practices, and frame alternatives to these policies. The focus will be on understanding the nature of neo-liberal education policies in different parts of the globe, their impact, forms of resistance, and pedagogical alternatives that are empowering and emancipatory.

Participants will be researchers and activists from teacher unions and academic researchers who focus on teachers’ work and teachers’ unions. They will be from Latin America as well as North America and other regions. Spanish-English translation will be provided.

The structure of the seminar will be panels of presentations, followed by working sessions in two languages.

This seminar will precede the conference of the American Education Research Association (AERA) being held in Vancouver, Canada, from April 14–17, 2012.

The number of participants will be limited by the need for simultaneous translation. The seminar organizers anticipate that about 20 participants will be from Latin America. There will be room for up to 50 other participants.

More information:

Larry Kuehn, Director of Research, BC Teachers’ Federation (lkuehn@bctf.ca)

Steve Stewart, Technical Secretary, IDEA Network/Red-SEPA (sstewart@codev.org)

*****************************************************************************

The IDEA1 Network/Red-SEPA2 is a network ofteacher unions, student organizations, and other groups advocating for public education in the Americas—South, Central, and North. It co-ordinates research on education issues in the Americas, holds conferences, issues research reports, and publishes a journal on education, Intercambio. Italso co-ordinates campaigns that have common themes across regions.

1 IDEA = Initiative for Democratic Education in the Americas

2 Red-SEPA = Red Social para la Educación Pública en las Américas

The organization’s web site is at www.idea-network.ca/ideas/english/home.cfm; Facebook: IDEA Network-Red SEPA. The most recent issue of Intercambio is at www.idea-network.ca/ideas/english/research.cfm?pagenumber=5.

The organization has a Research Network and an Indigenous Educators’ Network. 2

Tentative Program

April 12, 2012 (9:00 am to 4:30 pm)

I. Neo-liberal education policies and practices—what do they look like in the South and North?

What are the key elements of neo-liberal education policies in each region?

How do neo-liberalpolicies affect the nature of the work of teaching and the role of the teacher?

What are the mechanisms used to spread neo-liberal policies? How can these be countered?

II. Forms of resistance and rejection of neo-liberal education policies.

Role of teachers and teacher unions in social movements and education alliances

Role of teachers and teacher unions in elections

Use of collective bargaining, strikes and other union tools in resisting neo-liberal policies

The role of student movements in galvanizing support for public education.

III. Two stories of resistance—Chile and Honduras

Privatized education and inadequate funding has been challenged by movements in Chile, first by the revolt of the Penguins (secondary students) and more recently by university students and community and political allies.

Teachers and their unions in Honduras were central to the challenge to the coup. The response from government has been to move to privatize education and to repress the teacher unions. This struggle has now been taken up by a revitalized high-school students’ movement throughout the country.

April 13, 2012 (9:00 am to 3:00 pm)

IV. Pedagogical alternatives—emancipatory pedagogies

1. Reports on projects and publications

(Examples: Non-sexist pedagogy project in Central America; outcome of the Education International Latin America Pedagogical Congress; alternative education projects in Mexico; The Federation of Central American Teacher’s organization’s proposal for new pedagogies; publications of Rethinking Schools.)

Developing approaches to sharing the pedagogical work.

2. The role of teachers’ organizations (and other sectors of the education community) in developing and promoting alternatives to the neo-liberal ideological offensive within schools (administration, methodology and content).

The following sessions will be scheduled – when times and dates are available we will post these here.

Paper Session: Teacher Unions and Educational Governance

• Industrial Relations in Transition: an Analysis of Employer-Union Relations in the UK Higher Education Sector—Stevenson & Mercer
• Role of Teachers Unions in Urban School Decentralization—Donaldson, Cobb, Mayer, LeChasseur & DeVawn Welton

• Assessing the Role of Teachers’ Unions in the Adoption of Accountability Laws in Public Education—Jha & Banerjee
• A British Columbia Teacher Union and School District Collaboration to Support Inclusion—Naylor, D’angelo, Fast & Champion
• Generational Unionism and Crisis: Conflict Within One Local Teachers’ Union—Tallman, Conley & Yun

Chair: Bernie Froese-Germain, Canadian Teachers’ Federation

Discussant: John Williamson, University of Tasmania

Symposium: The Challenges of being a good Citizen and a good Teacher: Lessons from the Wisconsin protests

•  “See You On the Square”: The Contested Nature of Teachers’ Public Activism
• When Silence Speaks: A Case Study Investigating The Effects of Restricting Teachers’ Classroom Speech
• “Teacher Hat” and “Citizen Hat”: One Strategy for Negotiating Tensions Between Union and Teaching Duties
• The Learnable Moment: On Becoming “Political” and Taking Action as Pre-service Teachers

Roundtable: Current Research on Teacher Unions & Teacher’s Work

• Teacher Colleagues’ Influence on Novice Teachers’ Perceptions of Teacher Unions and Labor-Management Relations—Pogodzinski & Jones
• Teacher Union Legitimacy and Member Engagement—Popiel
• The Future of Teachers’ Work—Couture, Hargreaves & McRae

Chair: Ron Brunton, Nova Scotia Teacher’s Union

Roundtable: Current Research on Teachers’ Work

• The Secret Life of Art Teachers: The Work Lives of Six Elementary Visual Art Teachers—Herring Wokoma

• Non-Permanent Teachers’ Access to Work-Related Learning—Pollock
• Teachers’ Work as Curriculum Innovators in Alternative Schools—Bascia
• Advocating for Teachers with Critical Quantitative Research: An Exploration—Kee 

Chair: Christine Gardner, University of Tasmania

Business meeting: The Changing Context for Public Sector Unions

Given recent attacks on public sector unions across the globe, fiveinvited SIG members will prepare brief responses to the following two questions in their national/regional context:

1)      How would you characterize the changing context facing teacher unions (and/or public sector unions) in your jurisdiction?

2)      How have organized teachers responded to these changes?

·         Australia/Tasmania: Jeff Garsed, Australian Education Union- Tas Branch

·         Canada: Myles Ellis, Canadian Teachers’ Federation

·         Latin America: María de la Luz Arriaga Lemus, Facultad de Economía Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

·         UK: Alex Alexandrou, University of East London

·         World Bank and British government influence on education in India: Mary Compton, National Union of Teachers

As you may know, the SIG co-hosted a highly successful off-site event at AERA this year with the United Teachers of New Orleans, and also supported by the Critical Educators for Social Justice SIG.  TWTU SIG Program Chair for 2012 Cindy Rottmann has kindly provided a comprehensive report of what was clearly a fascinating evening.  Cindy’s report can be downloaded here - UTNO event, report

At the fabulous off-site event the SIG co-hosted with the United Teachers’ of New Orleans great interest was shown in the book co-authored by Kristen Buras, Jim Randels and Kalama ya Salaam.

The book is titled ‘Pedagogy, Policy and the Privatized City: Stories of Dispossession and Defiance from New Orleans’.

Order it from your local independent book seller, or give even more money to Amazon and buy it here.

Please find copies of all powerpoints used at the excellent session presented by Jill Pinkney Pastrana and her Chilean colleagues at our business meeting.

Movimiento_Pedag_gico 2008

Movimiento_Pedag_gico english

Pinkney Pastrana

Pres ISA2010-97

Public Schools under Emergency

The following is my Program Chair report for 2011, alas submitted in my absence as I was not able to get to New Orleans this year.

Dear SIG member

I hope that if you were able to attend AERA, you are now back home safely.

As many of you know, I was unable to attend AERA this year, but I just wanted to offer some reflections on the conference I didn’t attend! This might also serve as my formal program chair report that I was unable to present at our business meeting. Before I offer some comments I thought I’d include extracts from a couple of emails sent to the SIG Exec during and after the conference . . . they are not the only emails of this nature we received.

“Thank-you for organizing the most moving and important session I have ever attended at/related to AERA! I don’t have words to describe the importance on so many levels of the conversation that took place last night. I do not have email addresses for the panel members, but I would like to thank them for sharing their experiences, knowledge and deep commitment to students, teachers and learning. If we haven’t already done so, perhaps we could put up a link on our blog about Kristen’s book and the other book (the one with teacher contributions that Larry and Jim spoke about).”

“just a quick note while waiting to head to the airport – to let you know that the SIG sessions were just great – great papers and great discussions. Of particular note was our two special events – the evening with the New Orleans Teachers’ Union, and the last evening’s session with our colleagues from Chile – wonderful!

Many, many thanx for all your devoted efforts over the past years – our SIG rocks!!”

I was very fortunate as program chair to have the opportunity to include these two events in our program. Both looked like absolutely the type of events that our SIG should be supporting. I am delighted they appeared to be such great successes.

However, they only happened due to the tremendous hard work of the individuals who suggested these sessions and then worked hard to make them happen. Kristen Buras did a sterling job in pulling together the UTNO event (not distracted at all by giving birth a few short works before the conference), whilst Jill Pinkney Pastrana performed similar feats to organise the Chilean speakers for our business meeting. Behind these sessions was a lot of hard work, considerable frustrations and alot of anxiety – but we got there in the end, and the feedback I have received suggests it was more than worth it. On behalf of the SIG, a big vote of thanks to Kristen and Jill.

Can I also personally thank colleagues in the SIG who took responsibility for things in New Orleans in my absence. I know there was a lot to pull together at the conference, and I am grateful for those who took this on so generously, on top of already busy schedules.

Final thanks go to all those who submitted and presented papers. This is ultimately what the SIG is about and I would like to thank all of those, at all our sessions, who made presentations. There was a very interesting agenda and I am very disappointed I did not get a chance to hear people present.

This brings me to one or two wider reflections . . .

It seems to me that due to the efforts identified above, we were able to punch way above our weight this year. We are a small SIG, but we stretched ourselves a long way, and we were able to offer some fantastic sessions. Much of this stems from SIG members’ contacts and networks, and an ability to connect scholarship with activism. I very much hope this is a tradition we can continue to develop. We are clearly at a crucial time in our history, my own union for example has already commenced a campaign of industrial action in what will be a long and difficult fight to defend jobs, pay and pensions. The SIG is well placed to help us understand these struggles, through the excellent research undertaken by SIG members. My hope is that the SIG will continue to develop, and that the links between academics, teachers and teacher unions/ists will increasingly be seen as a resource to promote the type of work we heard about in New Orleans and Chile. In order to do this, I hope as a SIG member you will consider getting involved with the group, offering ideas and seeing the SIG as a place to share your work. The SIG has its own blog – and this is an easy location to both find out what the SIG is doing, and offer your own thoughts through the ‘comment’ option -

http://aeratwtusig.blogs.lincoln.ac.uk/One obvious and easy way to get involved is to submit a paper for AERA 2012. Please can I urge you to consider doing this. The SIG’s allocation of sessions is based on the number of submissions received. This year we only received sufficient submissions to justify the MINIMUM session allocation (ie one paper session and a business meeting). Only by a little negotiation with AERA (very supportive to be fair!) were we able to secure the roundtable session. Without this I would have had to reject some excellent submissions. It is VITAL therefore that in 2012 we increase the number of submissions. It also helps enormously, given recent changes at AERA, if you are willing to submit as EITHER a paper OR a roundtable. Submitting as ‘paper only’ is likely to severely limit the chances of acceptance. ‘Either/or’ increases the chances of acceptance and provides the program chair with more room for manoeuvre. Your support will be much appreciated.

From a SIG perspective AERA 2012 promises to be every bit as good as New Orleans. Cindy Rottmann is program chair and will do an excellent job. My understanding is that Cindy was able to report in NOLA that she is already working with the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation to organise an exciting off-site and/or pre-conference event with BCTF when AERA goes to Vancouver. More details to follow in due course, but it seems that we are already on course to build on achievements this year.

Apologies for the long email . . .but I hope you agree that sharing this good news about the SIG is worth spending some time doing.

Best wishes (in particular to the new SIG leadership for 2011/12 – Cindy, Jill and Chris)

Howard