After attaining a collective bargaining contract with New York City in 1960, the United Federation of Teachers worked successfully to improve salaries and working conditions. But in the aftermath of the 1975 fiscal crisis, the more equitable participation of teachers in policymaking has emerged as a clear goal. (KH)

Based on an analysis of oral history interviews, this paper examines the events and consciousness surrounding a 1979 strike initiated by 53 female office employees of the Wisconsin Education Association (WEA) Insurance Trust. Faced with sex-discriminatory working conditions, the women at the Trust responded by initiating a strike. For many of the…

This paper examines the Newspaper Guild's efforts to secure three types of contractual rights for newsroom employees: employee voice in news content and quality; protection of employee integrity; and employee privileges when protecting news sources. Specific incidents of the guild's contractual negotiations are discussed as they relate to a…

A primary rule for implementing the collective bargaining grievance process in higher education is to settle early and at the lowest possible level. To achieve this or to prevent grievances, clear contract language, a contract administrator, and a "two-one-one" grievance structure should be adopted. (Author/JMD)

This study investigated the phenomena of strike propensity and strike compliance among teachers in an illegal teachers' strike that occurred in British Columbia, Canada, in 1983. A questionnaire developed for this study was distributed in early 1984 to a random sample of 1,000 teachers from eight school districts; a total of 456 responded. The…

Argues that collective bargaining in the public sector poses insuperable obstacles to educational reform because of the combined effects of the time required for bargaining and mediation and the vested interests of teachers' unions in maintaining the status quo. Reform proposals have thus far failed to take account of the dynamics of collective…

As teacher associations and unions have increased in number and strength, superintendents and education boards have had to devote more time to the process of negotiations. In the winter and spring of 1989, 400 questionnaires were mailed to a random national sample of school superintendents to examine the following areas dealing with negotiations…

The use of seniority in current school layoff and transfer practices and the impact of seniority provisions on school operations are examined in this paper. The data for the study came from two sources: interviews with teachers, principals, union leaders, and district administrators in four school districts (drawn from a national sample) facing…

On the premise that union election campaigns on college campuses can provide useful lessons for public relations practitioners, this paper examines literature pertaining to organizing efforts in order to discover public relations problems that can be posed by the reciprocal nature of the influences between the internal and external audiences…

In spite of recent advances in mechanization, farmworkers continue to be a vital and necessary element in the harvesting of American crops. However, farmworkers, whether migrant or non-migrant, continue to have the lowest annual income of all occupational groups. The overriding concern is one of powerlessness. Farmworkers have been excluded at the…

The rejection of the "Great Forces" and "Great Man" theories of newspaper history allows a middle-range view that seeks to discover the uniqueness of the newspaper business and to explain how that uniqueness shaped the business values of the editors and proprietors. An examination of three Chicago, Illinois, newspapers--the…

This study tests the fit of competing models of strike causes on a sample of public school districts in New York. The models are based on differing assumptions. One is that strikes are the result of mistakes or imperfect information; the other is that strikes are rational choices made in expectation of gain. The differences in these views are…

This paper reviews seven specific components of change that labor militancy in public education will have on the American economic system in the future. First, teacher militancy will influence other public employees to become more militant and will pressure private-sector employees to unionize. Second, additional state and federal public-employer…