[Follow this link for a review on essential bargaining preparations].

COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AND STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT

•  Teacher Union Contracts and High School Reform. NEW Center on Reinventing Public Education. University of Washington. January 2009. "The basic question that we asked in this study is: Are teachers unions and collective bargaining agreements barriers to high school reform and redesign efforts in Washington, California, and Ohio? Based on our analysis of the contracts that we studied, our answer is: sometimes, but not as often as many educators and union critics seem to think (pg 27)."
• Arguments and Evidence: The Debate over Collective Bargaining's Role in Public Education. Education Policy Brief, Vol. 6 No. 8, Fall 2008. Center for Evaluation & Education Policy, Indiana University. By Nathan Burroughs.  This policy brief describes the major arguments on whether collective bargaining has a positive or negative influence on student achievement. The brief concludes "The intensity of the debate over the role of collective bargaining has obscured the fact that empirical evidence supports either side of the discussion. There can be no verdict on whether collective bargaining in public education is “bad” or “good,” because there is insufficient evidence to warrant a definitive judgment (pg 16)."
• Tales of Teacher Absence: New Research Yields Patterns that Speak to Policymakers. Center for American Progress, October 2008, By Raegan Miller.  The report analyses data from an anonymous, large, urban school district in the northern United States. The data include dates and “excuse” codes for 130,747 absences taken by 5,189 teachers in 106 schools over four years. The data also create profiles of average teacher absence behavior for each of the 106 schools. The profiles share an underlying seasonal trend, with rates of discretionary absence rising from September to December, falling until February, and then rising again to their highest levels in June. Differences between profiles show that schools operating in the same policy jurisdiction can have surprisingly different absence profiles, even after accounting for characteristics of teachers in the schools.  See also Absenteeism.
• The Benwood Plan: A Lesson in Comprehensive Teacher Reform. NEW Education Sector.  Author: Elena Silva. Publication Date: April 7, 2008. Hamilton County, Tennessee, is home to one of the nation's most widely touted school-reform success stories. Beginning in 2001, eight low-performing elementary schools began an ambitious upward trek. With $5 million from the Chattanooga-based Benwood Foundation and funding from several other local organizations, school and community officials launched an intensive teacher-centered campaign to reform the inner-city Chattanooga schools. The effort, now known as the "Benwood Initiative," drastically improved student achievement, and education observers took notice. The report observes that "the improvement in the... schools turns out to be in large part" due to "steps Hamilton County officials took to improve the performance of existing... teachers," such as "adding teacher coaches and reading specialists, reorienting administrators to instruction,...and signaling through bonuses for raising test scores and other rewards that the teachers' work was valued."  For a description of the collective bargaining see Reducing the Achievement Gap below.
• Teaching Quality in California. A New Perspective to Guide Policy.   NEW Wechsler, M. E. & Shields, P. M., The Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning, March 2008. A panel of experts in education reviewed research and met with outside experts for an in-depth examination of teacher quality. There is no single output or input that can be used to gauge teacher quality. The panel urges a positive approach to teacher quality based on the assumption all teachers can provide quality teaching when the appropriate supports and opportunities are in place.
• Improving Instruction Through Effective Teacher Evaluation: Options for States and Districts. NEW February 2008.By Carrie Mathers, Michelle Olivawith Sabrina W.M. Laine, PhD.  National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality.  The Teacher Quality Research & Policy Brief provides policymakers with a "comprehensive understanding of the measures used in teacher evaluation-- their strengths, limitations, and current use in policy and practice.  The brief also reveals results of a November 2007 research study from a REL Midwest study of district guidance to schools on teacher evaluation policies and presents policy options for states and districts.
• What Keeps Good Teachers in the Classroom?  Understanding and Reducing Teacher Turnover.  NEW Issue Brief, February 2008, Alliance for Excellent Education.  Several studies have attempted to identify why teachers leave and how to stem their turnover, but few have identified the quality of teachers who are departing. As in any profession, not all attrition is bad, but whether bad or good, it has financial ramifications. This brief explores the costs associated with teachers leaving the profession and their schools, the characteristics of those likely to leave, and what can be done to prevent unnecessary and costly turnover.
• Rush to Judgment: Teacher Evaluation in Public Education.  Education Sector Reports. January 29, 2008. NEW By Thomas Toch and Robert Rothman of the Annenberg Institute for School Reform . According to the report, the troubled state of teacher evaluation is a glaring and largely neglected problem in public education, an enterprise that spends $400 billion annually on salaries and benefits. They observe that teacher evaluation is at the heart of the educational enterprise -the quality of teaching in the nation’s classrooms-it has the potential to be a powerful lever of teacher and school improvement. The report concludes that that potential is being squandered throughout public education today. A host of factors-a lack of accountability for school performance, staffing practices that strip school systems of incentives to take teacher evaluation seriously, union ambivalence, and public education’s practice of using teacher credentials as a proxy for teacher quality-have resulted, according to the authors,  in teacher evaluation systems throughout public education that are superficial, capricious, and often don’t even directly address the quality of instruction, much less measure students’ learning.
• School Employee compensation and Student Outcomes. Report to the Joint Task Force on Basic Education Finance.  December 2007. By Steve Aos, Marna Miller, Annie Pennucci  Washington State Institute for Public Policy.  The task force examined the two main elements of  the single salary schedule: years of experience and graduate degrees earned and their effect on student outcomes.  They systematically reviewed the results of all methodically sound research studies addressing these issues.   The report found that there is no consistent relationship between teachers with graduate degrees and increased student outcomes as measured by test scores.  Teacher experience does affect student outcomes considerably in years one to five and then levels off rapidly so that the marginal gains in effectiveness then become smaller.  The implication is that within the context of the single salary schedule academic performance would be improved by adjusting salary schedules to place more emphasis on experience and less (or no) emphasis on graduate degrees (pg 21).
• Are Teacher Absences Worth Worrying About in the U.S.?  By Charles T. Clotfelter, Helen F. Ladd, & Jacob L. Vigdor. NBER Working Paper No. 13648.  Issued in November 2007.  Abstract: Using detailed data from North Carolina, we examine the frequency, incidence, and consequences of teacher absences in public schools, as well as the impact of an absence disincentive policy. The incidence of teacher absences is regressive: schools in the poorest quartile averaged almost one extra sick day per teacher than schools in the highest income quartile, and schools with persistently high rates of teacher absence were much more likely to serve low-income than high-income students. In regression models incorporating teacher fixed effects, absences are associated with lower student achievement in elementary grades. Finally, we present evidence that the demand for discretionary absences is price-elastic. Our estimates suggest that a policy intervention that simultaneously raised teacher base salaries and broadened financial penalties for absences could both raise teachers' expected income and lower districts' expected costs.

• Reducing the Achievement Gap Through District/Union Collaboration:  The Tale of Two Districts.  On November 13, 2007, the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future (NCTAF) released a report that documents the journey of two school districts to improve teaching quality and reduce gaps in student achievement. The report highlights the progress, challenges and lessons learned from two districts (Clark County, NV and Hamilton County, TN) that are at the forefront of addressing achievement gaps through collaboration of the local teachers' union and the school district. The strategies employed by these two districts and outlined in the report help to ensure that educators remain at the center of reform efforts in their districts and schools. Their stories are proof that unions and districts can collaborate successfully to improve student achievement.

• Do Teacher Absences Impact Student Achievement?  By Raegen Miller, Richard Murname, and John Willett, August, 2007. This study examines longitudinal evidence from one urban school district and finds that the impact of absenteeism is estimated to be that each 10 days of teacher absences reduce students' mathematics achievment by 3.3 percent of a standard deviation.  This is the first study to place a quantitative impact on of absenteeism on student achievement.  Previous studies have shown the the rate of teacher absences are positively associated with the generosity of contractual leave provisions.  
  • Absence Management.  A 2004 presentation by Elliot Susseles of the Segal Co. at the 35th NAEN Annual Conference in New Orleans.  The presentation describes bargaining strategies and policy implementation of absence management programs in a unionized environment.
• Teachers Unions and Student Performance: Help or Hindrance?  By Randall W. Eberts.  The Future of Children, Spring, 2007 vol. 17, no. 1.  This paper explores the role of teachers unions in public education. Dr. Eberts focuses particularly on how collective bargaining agreements shape the delivery of educational services, how unions affect both student achievement and the cost of providing quality education, and how they support educational reform efforts.  This chapter is part of a larger publication , Excellence in the Classroom, The Future of Children.  The articles in this volume explore key tools available to policymakers.  The Future of Children is a publication of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University and the Brookings Institution.
• Collective Bargaining and Student Achievement: Vacancies & Transfers.  By Stephan Lewis March, 2001.  Oregon School Boards Association Negotiator's Notebook.  A collective bargaining agreement affects how teaching resources may be allocated within a district. For example, staff at low-performing, high-poverty schools often have less experience than staff at other district schools. If you want to move experienced staff members to these schools, you need to examine the provisions of collective bargaining agreement vacancy and transfer language. Vacancy and transfer articles typically create workplace rules about how employees may move from one position or assignment to another. These rules cover posting of vacancies, voluntary transfer possibilities, involuntary or district-initiated transfers, prep time implications for assignment changes, and other employer rights and restrictions.
• Critical Issue: Rethinking the Use of Educational Resources to Support Higher Levels of Student Achievement.  By Karen Hawley Miles, North Central Regional Educational Laboratory, 2000. Creating standards-based schools that are accountable for helping all students reach higher levels of achievement requires schools and districts to rethink their educational resources--especially time, staffing, and money. As districts begin to support schools in becoming increasing accountable for results, they are finding that schools need: more time for students in academic subjects and more individualized attention; time and dollars for ongoing teacher professional development and planning; and investment funding for the purchase, introduction, and classroom implementation of new curriculum materials and teaching practices aimed at higher standards.
• The Life Cycle of Labor-Management Relations.  By Ron Wilson, December, 2000. Oregon School Boards Association Negotiator's Notebook.  This paper analyzes the differential use of collaborative (interest-based) versus the more traditional (proposal-based) negotiations models.  It posits that on a practical level there may be no pure traditional or collaborative technique, but only mixtures of both with one technique predominating. There are some "hybrid models" that deliberately take elements from both techniques and attempt to mold them together.  There is a pattern in the cycling of labor management relations between cooperative and competitive negotiations styles.
  • Examining Collaborative Bargaining Techniques.  By Ron Wilson, June 1995. Oregon School Boards Association Negotiator's Notebook. A companion piece to the Life Cycle article above, it examines the efficacy of interest based/collaborative negotiations processes and techniques. 
  • Teacher Union Tactics: Fifteen Tricks that Teacher Union Play on School Boards.  Based principally on material supplied by the Madison-Oneida counties, sole supervisory district, Multi-Boces Labor Relations Office, Verona, N.Y.
• The Effects of Collective Bargaining on Student Achievement.  By Ron Wilson.  June, 1999.  Oregon School Boards Association Negotiator's Notebook.  More than ever before, Oregon schools are being held accountable for student achievement. There are many factors that impact how well students perform; some are directly controlled by school districts; others are completely outside district control.  This article examines the interplay of money, class size and collective bargaining on student achievement in Oregon.

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(Last updated: 05/06/2009 10:34:10 AM )