Quality Edjamacation

I like trade unions. While I was in College, I worked summer jobs as a Union Boiler Maker, Carpenter, and Brewery Worker. I made way too much money, filling in while real workers were on vacation. It was this money that helped me pay for college. Along the way I learned more than I wanted to know about Unions.

Unions helped to create the modern work place. They established the 40 hour work week, paid vacations, retirement plans, and healthcare coverage. Work would be awful today if it were not for the hard work of Unions in the 1920s. But, have Unions lost their way?

Today Unions seem to be focused on unreasonable demands. Union Teachers seem to be the most out of touch. Teachers work nine or ten months a year and only six or seven hours a day but they expect to earn more than other people. They complain about layoffs, when millions of other workers have been unemployed for years. And, they refuse to take responsibility for the students they produce. Now the Teacher Unions want all the rest of us to help them. Fat Chance.

Unions need to accept responsibility for the products they produce. If a product or service can be produced better with a non union work force, where is the value in Union Labor? As a union Carpenter, I helped to build high quality homes. We took pride in the product we produced. How can Union Teachers expect us to support them when they have produced poorly trained and near illiterate students? If Unions want broad support they need to make Union Labor a point of difference in producing quality products and services. Teachers need to be accountable for the students they produce.