There is a movement in Sacramento to return teaching back to a time with no rights and no unions. In the next week or so Governor Schwarzenegger will convene a special session of the state legislature, both the State Assembly and State Senate, to try to push through education 'reforms' that will end all job security for teachers and the right to a Fair Hearing before being dismissed. This right prevents capricious dismissals and the abuses that the threat of such a dismissal results in. Teacher's without job security or rights are teachers who can be threatened and exploited at the whim of others.
We need to be reminded of what teaching was like before unions. My father career was spent as a public school teacher. He remembers back to his first job as a public school teacher in a small town. The stories he tells of those pre-union times are a bit chilling to me.
That small town considered teachers to be servants of the town. The teachers were being paid with that town's taxes so the teacher must live in the town and the teachers and their families must BUY all of their needed goods and services from stores and folks IN THAT TOWN. There would be hell to pay if the teacher or his wife were seen in the next town down the road shopping. After all it was the town's money. It should stay in the town. If teachers would not follow those rules, well, they could leave and find work elsewhere.
In addition because the school and teachers all were paid with that town's money, any civic organization could use the school for meetings whenever they wanted and the teachers were required to help for free.
My father remembers being told that he was 'in charge of' the chairs and tables for a dinner meeting on a Saturday night for some town club or another. He had to arrive before the dinner at 4pm to set up all the chairs and tables. He had to stay and watch the important man in town eat dinner WITHOUT being given any food or being allowed to leave to get food. At 8:30 after they had finished their meal and meeting, he got to put all the chairs and tables away.
He was given no help in the set up and no help putting things away. He was not offered any food at all. His job as a public school teacher with no rights and no union was to make sure the important men in the town were well served . After all he was the town's servant. There was no one to complain to. He had to accept assignments like this if he wanted a pay check to support his family. Treatment like this was routine for teachers at the time.
Our Republican friends in Sacramento would like to return us to a time like that again for all teachers even those who have permanent status. They want to return to a time when unions did not exist and public school teachers had no rights, a time when Principals could hire and fire for any or no reason at all.
With new laws passed in the last decade some teachers in our school have as few rights as my father did back in the early 1940's. Those teachers are called probationary teachers. They may be hired or fired for any or no reason for their two year probationary period.
Our Republican friends tried to extend probation periods to five years with a California State Proposition recently, (Prop 74?),but that proposition failed. Their latest brain storm is to turn ALL California teachers for their entire careers into Probationary teachers with no rights. Permanent teachers would have no more rights than Probationary teachers do at present under the Republican plan in Sacramento.
What rights do Probationary teachers have in California? Under current law in California, new hires have ABSOLUTELY no rights. Probationary teachers may be hired and fired for having the wrong hair color or for not be obsequious enough to their principals.
Here is an example of what can happen to Probationary teachers in California and what will happen to even Permanent teachers if Governor Schwarzenegger and his Republican cronies in Sacramento get their way:
The son of a public school teacher friend of mine obtained his teaching credential a few years ago. He immediately got a job at a high school just outside Fresno. In his second year of teaching, just months before he would have received permanent status, he made the mistake of turning down the THIRD coaching assignment in that year that his principal wanted him to take.
He turned down a principals request? How could he be so stupid when he was a probationary teacher? The answer is time. Having been a coach, I can assure you that during the sport season, there is no day when you do not spend three or more hours at practice and even more time on Fridays and Saturdays for games and tournaments.
For an experienced teachers who has taught for years and can put together good lessons plans for his academic students quickly, coaching is a bit of a burden; but it is also very rewarding. But for a new teacher it can be overwhelming due to the large amounts of time the new teacher must spend every single day trying to perfect his skills in his new profession in addition to the hours of coaching duties.
So the son of my teacher friend made the mistake of saying "no" to his Principal when asked to coach the third sport assignment in one year. This was in the Spring of his second successful year as classroom teacher. His principal insisted he coach the third sport. He said, 'no I just can't and still do my job in the classroom.' The principal was forced to find someone else to coach that Spring sport. Three months later my friend's son was non re-elected, the fancy educational term for not being hired for his third year when he would become a permanent teacher with the right to a fair hearing before dismissal.
He now is working as a substitute teacher. His wife retains her teaching job in a different district, but they have had to put off having a baby as they have house payments. Until he finds another job, there is no way they can afford for his wife to get pregnant. Sadly he has found that having been non re elected once makes finding another teaching job more difficult.
Our Republican friends in Sacramento would like ALL teachers to lose the hard fought right of Fair Hearing. Under their proposed legislation any teacher can be fired at any time for any or no reason by a principal who wants more sports coaches or more 'volunteers' for after hours meetings.
Here is the exact quote from local Republican Assemblyman, Brian Nestante's plan to destroy public school unions, and public school teacher's Right to a Fair Hearing, his Republican plan for teachers would "allow principals to hire whomever they think will do the best job and to fire whomever they need to."
Read more here:
http://vistaschools.blogspot.com/2009/10/brian-nestande-r-outlines-his-plan-for.html
or you can read his entire opinion piece in the North County Times where he lays out his plan with nice sounding words in an attempt to to disguise his true intentions for the end of all teacher rights and teacher's unions in California. That opinion piece is found here:
http://www.nctimes.com/news/opinion/perspective/article_69441d31-0f9b-5585-aa64-2ed6878ed6ed.html
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