WA Based Group Wants to Replace Teachers Unions with Local Arrangement

A Washington based organization wants to replace teachers’ unions with local associations.  The group Teachers for Professional Options stresses a platform of local decision making and personal responsibility on the part of classroom instructors.

Paul Guppy with the Washington Policy Center thinks teachers benefit when they can opt out of unions.  “Any professional organization that provides voluntary options that allows teachers to pursue professional development without being forced to join a union and pay dues is a good idea.”

Guppy also contends unions often use money generated from union dues to back political candidates and get involved in controversial issues having nothing to do with public education.

He thinks teachers would be better served if Washington were a so called “right-to-work” state in which workers can opt out of unions and the accompanying dues.  Such arrangements are prominent in states controlled by Republican lawmakers.

Kris Cameron with the Wenatchee Education Association – an affiliate of the state’s teachers’ union – contends groups such as Teachers for Professional Options purposely misrepresenting unions.

“They’re trying to insinuate that somehow local educators are puppets of some larger entity, which couldn’t be further from the truth” said Cameron.  “Our organization is grass roots, bottom up.  All of our educators have input into the decisions and policies that our state and national affiliates implement.  (Teachers for Professional Options) really isn’t about empowering local educators and saving them money.  It’s all about undoing the power and influence that educators have been able to bring to bear on education issues on behalf of kids, by pooling their efforts”.

Cameron further claims organizations such as Teachers for Professional Options are “out to destroy unions, period”.