Purpose: The unanticipated changes in state legislation in Idaho, Indiana, Michigan, Tennessee, and Wisconsin in 2011-12 significantly restricted or entirely prohibited the collective bargaining rights of teachers. Considering these institutional changes as a natural experiment, we examine the causal impact of weakening teacher unionization on…

Using survey responses from public school teachers and principals in Alaska, this article describes their understanding of tenure statute, and how that understanding affected support, perceived effectiveness, and valuation of tenure. Teachers and principals who inflated tenure protections were more likely to support it; the more teachers inflated…

Teacher tenure rights, first established more than a century ago, are under unprecedented attack. Tenure--which was enacted to protect students' education and those who provide it--is under assault from coast to coast, in state legislatures, in state courtrooms, and in the media. In June 2014, in the case of "Vergara v. California," a…

Between 2011 and 2013 lawmakers in every state proposed, and often enacted, laws intended to impact codified state provisions related to teachers and teachers' unions (author calculation). These new laws either worked against union interests (e.g., by prohibiting collective bargaining) or they aligned with union positions (e.g. by providing…

Massive protests have been the norm in Wisconsin, since Gov. Scott Walker unveiled a plan to strip many collective bargaining rights from teachers and most other public employees. GOP elected officials are pursuing similar measures in Ohio and other states. But in the DeForest district, like some others around the state, collective bargaining,…

This paper examines the potential threat that a conservative sociopolitical culture poses to academic freedom in state colleges and universities. Already a number of states are considering legislation that would restrict professors' rights to discuss political issues within their classes, especially political issues having religious or moral…

The author recounts her experiences as a lobbyist for the Louisiana Vocational Agricultural Teachers' Association during a period of severe financial cutbacks for education in that state. She provides ideas for vocational agriculture teachers in other states on how to influence state apropriations. (CH)

As a policy pronouncement, California's Proposition 227 mandates a duty of care that educators owe their students. Failure to teach primarily in English creates a private cause of action against an educator that overcomes legal and policy concerns of "Peter W. v. San Francisco Unified School District." (Contains 57 notes and references.)

Virtually all state charter school legislation addresses teacher rights and working environment. Relationships with teacher unions are either specified in the law, or approval of the charter requires suitable provisions for employee hiring, firing, grievances, etc. Charter school evaluation almost without exception includes some references to…

The author discusses what he considers to be the 10 leading cases on education labor relations decided in state and federal courts during the 1990s. Concludes with a prediction that efforts to implement merit-pay schemes tied to student performance will lead to employment conflict. (PKP)

Discusses the effects on teacher salaries and employment practices of several Canadian provinces' cost-cutting measures; emphasizes British Columbia's "Public Restraint Act" and public employees' response to it. (MCG)

Within the core of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) are a number of measures to hold states, school districts, schools, and school personnel more accountable for student progress. Summarizes state legislation and court cases concerning school administrators, tenure, collective bargaining, and personnel records. (Contains 32 references.) (MLF)

Shows how political campaigning and legal action won a three-year battle (beginning in 1986) for tenure by an Asian Pacific American professor, D. Nakanishi, at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). Describes the case's academic context, explains the legal alternatives, and analyzes the legal/political strategy adopted. (JB)

Describes to experience of one of professor D. Nakanishi's graduate students, who with others, lobbied the California State Legislature on Nakanishi's tenure denial at the University of California Los Angeles. Describes Nakanishi as a teacher and mentor and links the tenure struggle to the Asian-American community's political development. (JB)