How much work do you put into building a healthy relationship with your teachers’ union?
For an April ASBJ article on unions, I recently examined labor-management relationships across the nation and—and reaffirmed what experts have said for years: How well school boards and unions get along is as much about the people involved as it is about the issues.
Let’s face it: Some school board members just don’t like unions—or their union leader-ship. Others prefer to keep their distance and let the superintendent take the lead when it comes to the union.
I think that’s a mistake. Certainly you don’t want to intrude on specific matters best handled by the superintendent or through the collective bargaining process.
But, as one union leader suggested, school board members "need to establish a relationship with local teacher association leaders. There’s a lot of us-versus-them mentality out there. But sometimes, on both sides of the fence, quite honestly, we need to be working a lot more on relationship building and trust building."
If you think about it, that makes good sense. The more people know about one another, the more likely that trust and understanding can be fostered. That can make a huge difference when the next round of contract talks begins—and some difficult issue arises.
Wishful thinking? I don’t think so. Sure, there are union leaders out there who are stub-born, difficult, and embrace the us-versus-them militancy that plague some school systems.
The same can be said for some school board members, too.
And it can’t hurt to try. I talked to one school system where school board members and the union president meet one-on-one occasionally over a cup of coffee—just to stay in touch . . . just to share their thoughts and dreams for the school system and its children. It seems to work for them.
In fact, it sounds exactly how school board members take a leadership role in their school system. Which suggests that it’s time for you to pick up the phone—and invite someone out for coffee.
Del Stover, Senior Editor