In Washington State, we have recently watched as our Washington Education Association, (WEA) (or state branch of the National Education Association, the NEA, (or teacher's union..) encouraged school teachers to don
go on strike. In other-words...the teacher's union, is encouraging and organizing it's members to oppress parents and students and politicians in order to strong arm their own way... and get what they want.
, but this is a type of bullying. Let's consider....
"Bully," as in to bully someone, is a verb. It means, to "use superior strength or influence to intimidate another person," ( typically to force him or her to do what you demand.) The word, bully has synonyms, including words like to oppress, intimidate, strong-arm, and coerce There have been mass anti-bullying
ads on television renouncing
"bullying" as typically is done between school children, alarming the public as to this problem of bullying in the schools, but bullying is not just a problem with kids... no... no...
adults do it too.
"Teachers in eight Washington school districts have decided to walk out of class for one day to protest what they say is too little funding for the state’s public schools. Teachers want to see better health-care benefits for school staff, more money to pay for voter-approved class-size reductions and higher cost-of-living raises than the state House or Senate have proposed so far." SeattleTimes, Originally published April 17, 2015
"Higher cost-of-living raises."....
Interesting note here might be that there is never any issue of curriculum content, better textbooks or free pencils and crayons for students. No, when it comes to teacher strikes it is always about the pay check and the hours.
The teacher's union, the NEA, does not advocate bullying, In fact, they have their own "anti-
bullying" campaign. So why then does the NEA use teacher power intentionally... to inflict pain on the education system in place by striking? The answer is easy.... It works. Then get what they want, because after all, they have the power to disrupt the flow of things and inflict pain in doing so.
"Bullying is aggressive behavior that is intentional and that involves an imbalance of power. Most often, it is repeated over time." http://www.violencepreventionworks.org/public/bullying_tips_for_administrators.page
Make no mistake, teacher have power. They control grades and seating in classrooms, they dominate parent teacher conferences. Unions have power too... over teachers.... and therefore students and parents too.
"The last time teachers across the state held similar, one-day protests was in 1999, when thousands of teachers from about 50 school districts voted to walk out over a period of weeks, Wood said. That year, lawmakers granted a 3 percent raise for all public-school employees in the state." SeattleTimes, Originally published April 17, 2015
This year teachers in Seattle were on strike for a week. Current headlines read,
" School will resume Thursday for Seattle's 53,000 students after teachers who have been on strike for a week reached a tentative agreement with Washington state's largest school district."SeattleTimes,
Bullying works.
Teacher strikes are no small matter.
They negatively affect everyone in the community, and unions use this to their advantage as they tear down local control of schools by encouraging their members, local public school teachers, to strike, and to make it hurt parents, students and legislators s much as possible when they do.
You can bet that legislators feel the pain when they work for votes after the public sees how the strikes are handled, or scramble for more funding to pay for the effect of a teachers strike and facilitate the legal ramification that ensue. You can bet that parents feel oppressed as they are challenged to make adjustments for the absence of a child's
overseer for the day if the parent is working outside of the home, or come up with activites and lesson plans to keep the kids busy while at home. You can be confident too that they and their children all feel the threat of a loss of normalcy for the month of September, an effect that could quite possibly last the entire year. Concerns about academia,
sporting events and future in-school relationships with those who had been depended upon to teach that use the civic duty entrusted to them by the public for personal gain.
Students not only feel the abandonment of not having a classroom to go to or a teacher to teach, but must also pay the penalty of extended days of school to make up for the lost required hours of learning mandated for schools and teachers to provide in a year.
In the city of Seattle this year, the strike cost $100,000 per day. Striking for five days cost the city $500,000. Tax dollars are supposed to be hard at work, instead they were on strike. It makes you wonder what kind of learning could have taken place per buck, but teacher strikes are not done with students and their needs in mind. They are about money, and control of the schools. When all is said and done, the net result will be the
nationally organized unions, such as the WEA and ultimately the NEA, ( opposed to local/state governments and legislation,) will have more power over the management of our public schools.
Yes,
striking teachers walk on out on students, parents, and legislators,
ignoring laws, and contractual agreements. you don't see the teachers marching for their own cause on the street in July or August, because they know
all about bullying in the union, and it works. A strike will most effectively strong-arm the public into giving-in to their
demands.
And what about
teachers, parents or
students, who c
ross picket lines? Oh, it's dangerous to think differently than the crowd, You have to consider what you plan to do and why you do it, because history shows us that often, these people are "
bullied" too.
