Do You Approve of Teachers Union Strikes?

Of all the profession who should NOT have a union, teachers, doctors, nurses, firefighters and police should be at the top. I agree they should get representation for themselves in issues of dispute but to be able to strike - NOT! There are so many bad teachers with tenure that continue to stand in front of our kids - especially those who are teaching their own progressive agendas and revisionist history.

ust like any union, the teachers unions exist for one purpose only - to continue to exist ... they manipulate their members into supporting politicians with ill intent, and squeeze communities with threats of strikes in order to strengthen their own positions ... they twist truth and force decent teachers to fill the heads of our young folks with these perverted platitudes supporting socialist agendas, all the while leeching from the memebers - and therefore the general public - funding to continue to grow wealthy and powerful ...

Exactly when are they supposed to strike? During the summer when everything is closed down? Is anyone bothering to ask the question: Why are they striking? Perhaps there is a grain of truth (or more) behind their reasoning. There's far too much assumption going on for me in most of these responses.

"Perhaps there is a grain of truth (or more) behind their reasoning." "There's far too much assumption.."

Could that be considered an oxymoron?

The two statements are unrelated. The first is regarding the reasoning behind the strike. The second is regarding the assumptive nature of the comments on Sodahead.

Unrelated? But you base your position completely upon assumption...Why answer a question based solely upon an assumption? What's the point?

Get rid of them.. We don't need them and at a time when the economy and budget cuts are so bad, they want more and more.. Bring Chris Christie into every state to battle then unions out... Strike all you want.. We need to eliminate them...

Teachers Unions are the single biggest threat to our country. They are destroying an entire generation.

The public schools are no longer schools. They are government indoctrination centers, owned and operated by government and staffed by government employees who have every reason to teach dependency on government and no reason to produce a generation of children who have learned how to depend on themselves.

The single most prevalent form of child abuse in this country is the act of sending a child to a government school. We worry incessantly about the separation of church and state. We would do well to devote half as much attention to the separation of government and education.

In FL we have 300 applications for every open teaching position....let 'em strike!

My kids have been in private school for nine years, youngest still there...This is my oldest daughters first year in public school....freshman in high school, what a difference! Thank goodness SHE can see the difference and realizes that she has to step up, because these teachers....I just don't know!

I am a teacher in Texas and it is a right to work state. If we strike.. we get fired! We are here for your kids. Our unions work for us within the confines of the law. Our unions do a good job representing us at the statehouse. I don't believe we teachers in Texas would do anything like this. However, in states where Unions have a lot of clout, you see this horrible tactic. It shows no respect for kids or the taxpayers. It is a thug tactic.

Unions do not produce a product. They are strickly overhead paid for by empoyees that have no say in what their dues are used for. They suck the life out of companies and employees.

The unions are what is causing the teacher lay-offs. Refusing to negotiate.

They are doing it here again! Every year they pull their crap and our cowardly governor just sits back and watches!

Hopefully you can get a new governor with the momentum from the conservative resurgence.

Teacher Unions support the political status quo. They really don't give a rat's a about education.

The unions have our failure for a governor in their back pockets (WA State).

They do this every year, and I have always felt as we need to let them, our public systems are inundated with progressive liberal teachers that use fear tactics to get more from the public for less performance

Strikes are good because they demonstrate the excessive number of teachers and the bad and ineffective education system. It is time that this system be restructured and the education system be fixed because it is a failure.

no, teachers need to teach not go on strike for more money or what ever they feel they need more of.

Teachers make chump change compared to politicians, and work twice as hard in my opinion. I think the teachers have every right to bitch.

What happened to the Zero Tolerance rules ?

The two main things of public "education" that I completely disapprove of:
1) The union known as National Education Association (NEA), as it is one of the biggest pieces of manure ever created;
2) The system of "education" (read indoctrination) known as the public school (fool) system.
My solution: Homeschool!!

What nerve these people have-they get life time jobs with almost no firings or lay offs! Yet they want to strike when we have a 9.7% unemployment rate at the same time? They should be kissing the tax payers feet for not firing the first moron that walks out instead!

Ugh, I don't blame some teachers for wanting to be paid more. Around my area, the average salary is about 30,000 per year...it's pathetic. They need to raise it, and until they do, I can understand the teachers unions.

They would have more $$ in theri pockets if tey weren't paying unio dues. The average teachers' salary isn't asecret. They knew that they weren't going after 6 figure income jobs when they chose teaching.

I don't see a great deal of evidence that anyone under 30 has been taught one thing of value.

It is all about money and themselves and not finding responsibility and raising the standards of education. The truth is the teachers need to have the same pension plan and benefits as the private sector.

Wish we could fire them all. Take the Money and allow private schools the ability to compete for it. About all they teach is Socialist Propaganda in order to protect the system that sustains them.

"Considering todays economy, how can so many states operating in the red, and their citizens in general bringing home less money, afford to pay teachers more year after year?"

The same way that we manage to pay doctors more and more every year. The same way that we manage to payer higher health insurance premiums year after year. The same way................

The waah waah waah about the poor parents having to find something to do with their kids is really, really lame. It's their kids - what did they do with them all summer? Do that!

Well then with that manner of thinking - you should want your teacher to make "gobs of money" so that they will teach your children effectively. If your doctor or teacher would do less of a job because of the MONEY, then neither should be in their profession.

If they would put together some type of incentive/bonus program for teachers that overachieve or over perform, then make all the money you want to make.. If you can't perform or meet the high standards, then you are put on probation and if you don't do it the 2nd year, then you're fired.. The problem is that teachers want more and more and want lifetime benefits and pension, but they are not put on any performance meter.. If you are in business you have goals, quota's and if you reach them you are usually paid bonuses, if you don't you are given probation and then you're fired.. There should be similar consequences with teachers, but with these unions, you can't get fired.. It takes something really bad to get fired otherwise you're put on paid leave then in many cases you're brought back. It's ridiculous.. I agree, teachers should make more money or have the opportunity to make more, but you enter into a job knowingly that the pay is bad, but the benefits are good..

And - just FYI - I never belonged to a teacher's union. We never went on a strike. We had a bargaining association that would sit down with our school board and work out the best salary/benefits that were available. To be able to do that and in a civil manner, we also agreed to a No Strike clause. There were many, many years when we either got NO raise, or a 1% raise. We were really, really greedy and selfish, weren't we? And I couldn't even start to tell you how much money I spent out of my own pocket for not only classroom supplies, but for students who didn't have lunch money, notebooks, paper, pencils, or even clothes. I twice during my career had a student living in my home who had no place to go. So - when people attack teachers - that we're greedy, selfish, and "don't do their jobs" - that really pushes my HOT button!!

Well I'm not saying you are not working hard nor teachers don't work hard.. but there's just no way to move forward with unions are wanting more and more and there is less and less money available and now you are seeing fighting between government and teachers unions all of which unions are deciding to not take recessionary cuts and it's now causing hundreds to thousands of layoffs.. It's all a mess... Education should be considered a business because it is... It's a business of education and teachers should have business type incentives... It's the only way to offer higher pay opportunities while getting rid of those that don't over achieve or fulfill standard requirements.. The world changes and until unions understand that what was good in the past might not be working today... and in order to move forward people and unions need to change.. It's just a known fact that there is no money in education, but there is usually good benefits.. So teachers knowingly enter into a profession of being underpaid. Is it right, no, but you do get a good pension where in the private sector, you make higher wages, but have no pension... IT's just all a mess

Agreed!