Editorials

It seems that the suggestion in this space and in a letter or two that some teachers somewhere might be less than optimum touched a nerve. We’ve received and printed a number of very defensive letters from teachers, many of them zeroing in on one sentence in a long editorial which was generally supportive of teachers’ demands for better pay and smaller classes. This is the offending sentence: 

Sometimes seriously inadequate teachers who really should move on to another profession are protected by the union for much too long. 

From a math teacher, one whom I remember as having an excellent reputation when my children were at Berkeley High, now more that 20 years ago: 

If I were to ask you, Becky O’Malley, … if you believe in due process, I am sure that your answer would be, “Of Course!” Yet … you seem to support it for everyone except for teachers, the individuals who need to impart an understanding of this very important right to the next generation.  

From a union official and junior high teacher: 

Becky O’Malley’s latest editorial demonstrated a surprisingly shallow understanding of the current contract negotiations between teachers and the Berkeley Unified School District and the realities of teaching in Berkeley. Ms. O’Malley suggests that teachers’ unions are protecting “seriously inadequate teachers,” though she doesn’t make it clear whether she thinks this applies to Berkeley. The Berkeley Federation of Teachers (BFT) does not want the teaching profession to be undermined by people who do not have the capacity to meet the challenges of the job. The BFT initiated and is working diligently to implement a Peer Assistance and Review program, which is a nationally recognized approach for dealing with ineffective teachers. 

Several other letters spelled out details of this program, which sounds admirable if it works as planned. One or two teachers suggested that it wasn’t working as well as hoped, but that the fault for its lack of success lay with the school administration, not with the union.  

Did the Planet come out in favor of summary firing without due process for any teacher about whom complaints have been received? Of course not. But school children are very vulnerable to teachers’ performance lapses, and if a student misses out on, for example, all of seventh grade math, it’s hard to catch up. I’m not talking here about the teacher who can’t control a large class, or the one who lacks good knowledge of the subject matter he or she is supposed to be teaching. Such problems can be handled by peer assistance over a period of years. The union official I referred to as a bad teacher didn’t show up for weeks at a time, leaving the class to substitutes, and didn’t read any of the homework until the end of the year. By the time a Peer Assistance and Review Program is able to respond to this kind of serious failure, the year’s over, and the student has missed it.  

We’ve heard from a number of parents and students who believe that the teachers’ work-to-rule campaign which is now underway is having the same kind of irreparable effect on many children. We’ve printed some of the letters, but some correspondents say they’re afraid to let their names be used for fear of reprisals against their kids. There are two ways to analyze the work-to-rule tactic. One is that the kids won’t be hurt because they don’t really need the services that they’re missing out on. The other is that they will be hurt, because the services the teachers are withholding are essential. The truth lies somewhere between the two extremes. But you don’t have to be a public relations genius to determine that work-to-rule has the potential for PR pitfalls.  

We haven’t heard that either side in the contract dispute is polling the public to see how they’re reacting to the news that’s come out of the negotiations. The unfortunate probability is that the first poll on the performance of BUSD’s administration and its teachers will be the election less than two years hence when taxpayers will once again be asked to support the Berkeley Schools Excellence Project (BSEP), a supplementary local school tax started in 1986. BSEP funds have provided nearly 10% of the Berkeley school district's total budget. The BSEP tax Measure B was one of the few winners in the last election, but if either teachers or administrators or both come out of the current negotiations looking bad, that could change.