Visions of Teacher Unionism: Tactics and Directions of the Contemporary Teacher Movement

Visions of Teacher Unionism:

Tactics and Directions of the Contemporary Teacher Movement

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The mass teacher strikes in recent years in Chicago, West Virginia, Arizona, and other places have reasserted teachers’ demands to play a role in shaping education. School shutdowns and teacher outcries against unsafe working conditions have built on these demands during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

What direction should this re-energized teacher movement take? Should it focus on acting as teachers’ voice? Or, should it focus on building coalitions that fight for the broader common good and racial justice? What role should strikes play in these fights? Our panel of teacher activists and scholars will grapple with these questions.

PANELISTS:

• Professor Aaron Pallas (Introduction), Chair, Department of Education Policy & Social Analysis
• Dr. Melissa Arnold Lyon (Moderator), Postdoctoral Research Associate, Brown University; graduate of the TC program in Politics and Education
• Stacy Davis Gates, Vice president, Chicago Teachers Union, which has been at the forefront of the social movement unionism thrust in recent teacher unionism.
• Jay O’Neal, Teacher, West Virginia Teacher Strike Leader, Member of the West Virginia United Caucus
• Kara Popiel, Executive Vice President, Yonkers Federation of Teachers
• Jia Lee, Member, Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE) of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT)
• Professor Nancy Lesko, Chair, Department of Curriculum and Teaching

Sponsored by the Departments of Education Policy & Social Analysis and Curriculum & Teaching