Teacher Organizing

“Across the country striking teachers are pushing district leaders, state policymakers — and increasingly charter school operators — to address salary issues, declines in education spending and conditions in classrooms.”

-Linda Jacobson, 2019

Class Session Recaps & Syllabi

Recaps

Oct 17, 2019

During this session, we opened discussion on teachers unions and the case of Ocean Hill, Brownsville, NY. A large part of the discussion centered around race and how whiteness is maintained in the structure of education. Our readings exemplified what social justice unionism can accomplish, fostering thought around, “what’s at stake?”. We put social justice unionism in Philadelphia context by focusing on The Caucus of Working Educators (WE), a group of rank and file members of The Philadelphia Federation of Teachers (PFT). This upcoming year, 2020, The WE Caucus, is contesting the current PFT leadership for a second time. We heard from two WE members in class who shared their belief in the caucus and their visions for a stronger union. Grass-roots organizing strategy is based on 1:1 conversations and building relationships of trust. We had our class practice organizing conversations to prepare for future phone banking opportunities of calling PFT members to campaign for WE.

Oct 17, 2019

Oct 10, 2019

During this session, the class explored the histories of labor unions in the United States, tracing contemporary efforts for unionization to the long histories of labor organizing. We started with a group reflection, inviting students to respond to the question “What does labor mean to you?” on the white board. We then broke out into small groups to discuss case studies on the following labor events: PATCO air traffic controllers strike, grad student unionization, Ocean Hill Brownsville, and fast food workers. Finally, we hosted a group of education labor activists from a number of Philadelphia-based organizations to speak on a panel about their experiences.

Oct 10, 2019

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Timeline of a Selective of the History of Labor & Educator Organizing in the U.S.

Community Partnership

This year, the Teacher Organizing group is collaborating with the Caucus of Working Educators. For our first class facilitation, we focused on the history of labor organizing in the United States. We invited a panel of educator/organizers from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to come to our class to discuss the intersections of union organizing and education. For the second week of facilitation, we zoomed in to focus on the Caucus of Working Educators, a sub-section of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers (PFT). On this day, we had two PFT members visit our class for a crash-course in phone banking, in preparation for a day later in the semester when our class will cold call PFT members and encourage them to vote in the upcoming 2020 election for new leadership.

Caucus of Working Educators

Ismael Jimenez

A member of the 2016 ABC course, Ismael has been a working educator in the city of Philadelphia for thirteen years. In returning to the course as a community partner, Ismael brings his relationship with both the Caucus of Working educators and the Melanated Educators Collective. Currently, Ismael is co-chair of the Caucus of Working Educators, co-founder of the Philadelphia Black History Collaborative and the Melanated Educators Collective, while being an active participant in several other organizations that seek racial justice in education and across the wonderful city of Philadelphia. Read More →

Teacher Strike Tracker.jpg — Teacher Strike Tracker

Podcast

Hosted by the Teacher Organizing group of the Fall 2019 ABC course, this podcast explores social justice in education unionism. We hear from panelists, John Braxton; former co-president of the Faculty and Staff Federation of The Community College of Philadelphia, Jia Lee; United Federation of Teachers and a member of MORE Caucus NYC, Daniel Symonds; Philadelphia Federation of Teachers and a member of The Caucus of Working Educators and Devin Daniels and Audrey Jaquiss; GETUP Graduate Employees Together at UPENN. Together these activists share their experiences and motivations in their fight for social justice.

Group Members

Featured

Elie Crief

Elie is a master’s student in the Education, Culture, and Society program. Elie is interested in the study of education and schooling which he considers to be an institutional system of oppression and social reproduction. Elie wishes to work toward engaging people’s political consciousness in order to politicize education and class analysis. When academia does not take up all his energy and time, he likes to read and play the drums.

Kaitlin McCann

Kaitlin McCann; ECS Graduate School of Education UPenn; Teacher School District of Philadelphia; Executive Board Member Caucus of Working Educators

Caroline van Zeijts

Caroline grew up in Long Island and New Jersey but most recently moved to Philadelphia from Berkeley, CA. She is studying ECS at the Graduate School of Education. She is passionate about the possibilities in good school finance policy and is excited to teach when she is done with her current program. Caroline also plays roller derby and screenprints at an art studio in West Philly.

Jax Lastinger

Hailing from West Virginia by way of Montreal, Jax Lastinger is passionate about social justice and liberation for marginalized people. Jax is a second year master's student at the Graduate School of Education, studying Education, Culture and Society.