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The cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul – as all districts in the state of Minnesota – have been negotiating their teachers’ contracts over the last many months, some arriving at agreement well before some others. St. Paul in the throes of its negotiations. Minneapolis concluded theirs last Fall.
Reams of data have now shown that the core cities, especially the Minneapolis District – with more kids of color than white students filling their classrooms – remain among the worst in the nation for their achievement gaps – that chasm separating white children from kids of color, especially Black, Latino and Native children. Some Minnesota citizens would see this as another sign that children of color cannot, somehow, learn, because – well, because they’re not white.
Others know better. But this sense of white supremacy can have devastating effects on those children as their mentors try hard to move the State Legislature toward funding the closing of such gaps, but them widening when efforts fail. Lawmakers have done little to adequately finance education or its funding mechanisms while insisting that all education decisions are so local that they can do little to even up the disparities, especially in districts where the gaps are so blatant, they can’t be assigned anywhere but to a persistent race and class bias at almost every level. Poverty is not an uncontrollable element of society. It’s a reason, not an excuse.
What roles do our teachers play in maintaining this gap? Many parents, advocates and educators cite the clear disparity in the color of students and the person teaching them. Many also say that the system of teacher seniority, or tenure, is archaic as the sole determinant for decisions affecting who gets which classrooms where and who gets laid off first if the crunches come – as they most certainly have. Older teachers may be the best. But they may not be, and the system, for the most part, cannot take reality that into consideration in its hiring or firing decisions.
Change comes hard for most people, not least for organizations who have maintained insider relationships long enough not to want other stakeholders involved in their “business.”
The Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) – the city’s teachers union is no exception, certainly. As the long-standing bargaining unit for all those who earn their livings at the front of all classrooms in the city’s school district, it, like all others of its kind, want very few changes – aside from a few harmless tweaks – not only to the way they’ve represented those teachers and maintained their contract provisions, but also to the very act of negotiating what is clearly a public document. Anyone outside the union and the district’s negotiating team and, finally the School Board, they say, is a non-expert, no matter whom the outsiders represent, and should have no say in contract terms.
Those groups, like Action for Equity and Put Kids First Minneapolis, both insisting they are strong progressive, even DFL, parents and citizens who support collective bargaining, tried putting several ideas on the negotiation table for last Fall’s bargaining, and generally hit a stone wall, essentially dismissed as interlopers with no business being part of the process.
In St. Paul, the School District is currently in negotiation with its teachers’ union – the St. Paul Federation of Teachers, whose President, Mary Cathryn Ricker, has been our guest a couple of times. That union group has, for the first time in Minnesota, it is said, asked for a provision casting classroom sizes in concrete – specific sizes for specific grades – right in the contract, which would essentially nullify what has thus far been an entirely administrative function.
How much of an uproar is this causing? We’ll try for some answers to that question.
Join TTT’s ANDY DRISCOLL and MICHELLE ALIMORADI as we give some vent to and ask some key questions of critics of the Minneapolis bargaining process and let St. Paul’s Chief Negotiator explain where the laws and contract terms diverge.
Guests:
LYNNELL MICKELSEN – Co-Founder of Put Kids First Minneapolis and one of the authors of the Contract for Student Achievement
LOUISE SUNDIN – Past President, Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT);
CHRIS STEWART – former Minneapolis School Board Member; CEO, Action for Equity; and Co-Chair, Education Work Group of the African-American Leadership Forum
JAY RITTERSON – retired Minneapolis School teacher; President, Committee of Thirteen (MFT Pension PAC); Professional Development Trainer Consultant;
TIM CASKEY – Chief Negotiator/Director of Human Resources, St. Paul Schools