THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 23, 1995 TAG: 9507210193
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 13 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ALETA PAYNE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 111 lines
Two local teachers are hoping to give their classroom colleagues a new option when it comes to professional organizations - one they say will be less politically active and less expensive than education's two best-known national unions.
Bill Carson and Wayne Adamson have set up the Professional Association of Teachers, a group they hope will draw educators from throughout Hampton Roads. Although such associations are still a fledgling movement in the state, there is a growing national trend of independent teachers groups taking pains to distinguish themselves from the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers.
``We want our organization to be affordable and professional and non-partisan,'' said Carson, a teacher at Bayside High School. ``We don't want bargaining power. We're not going to get politically involved with candidates.''
Adamson, also a Bayside teacher, said, ``We're basically to promote the professionalism of teaching and education.''
About 20 teachers have joined the Professional Association in its first month, but not everyone has welcomed recruitment efforts. The two teachers have gotten permission to distribute information about their group in the Chesapeake and Williamsburg schools and are waiting to hear from Norfolk and Suffolk. But their initial request to use the Beach's internal mail system and bulletin boards was denied because of a district regulation. A second request is under review. Portsmouth also has turned down their request.
Leaders of the national organizations say splinter groups may weaken the position of teachers.
``The danger of organizations like this is in generating factionalism. It makes it difficult for the education community to come to agreement on what's needed to improve America's schools,'' said Nelson Canton, a spokesman for the NEA in Washington.
Vickie Hendley, president of the Virginia Beach Education Association, said she would not view an independent group for teachers as a threat or a problem as long as its focus was improving education, but she, too, had concerns about the splintering effect.
``I worry a lot today that public education is under attack. What we're finding out in the public schools - it sounds hokey - but we truly are better together.''
But leaders of independent organizations say that part of the problem is in the national groups' assumption that all teachers are together in their thinking. While they might agree on the desired outcome - a better education for kids - they are not unanimous in their opinion of how to get there. And, critics say, the unions have not always respected those distinctions.
``We're concerned when the NEA speaks, the public thinks that's how we all think,'' said Gary Beckner, executive director and founder of the independent Association of American Educators in California. ``We are an organization that speaks to the rights of children to a good education rather than teachers' rights.''
The Professional Association of Teachers will offer some benefits similar to those of the national organizations, such as liability insurance, the opportunity to attend seminars and special training sessions and a chance to win grants and scholarships. Membership would cost teachers $80 per year, Carson and Adamson said, as opposed to $300 to $400 annually for a combined local, state and national membership in NEA or AFT.
While the organization will not offer services as extensive as the national groups, its founders hope to provide a supportive, professional network that will improve the stature and the pay of teaching while stopping short of being a union.
Independent professional teachers groups have been spreading across the country for about 20 years, said Mark Weston, state services coordinator with the Denver-based Education Commission of the States. Weston tracked non-union teacher groups while working in the U.S. Department of Education during the Bush administration.
In general, Weston said, the independent organizations object to what they consider to be the unions' broad, often liberal, political agenda, its emphasis on contract negotiations and the cost of dues, which can run into hundreds of dollars.
At the same time, Weston said, some of the most recent attempts at education reform, including private school vouchers, merit pay and charter schools, were supported by a significant number of individual teachers but opposed by the unions.
``This reflects that a lot of teachers are interested in figuring out how they can best do their job and not in maintaining the status quo,'' he said.
While the NEA and AFT have their critics, supporters of both organizations say they have grown into powerful advocates for the nation's young people and its educators.
NEA spokesman Canton said his group has been compelled to enter the political arena because education decisions are often political ones.
``We are involved in politics because we have to be,'' Canton said. ``Kids don't vote.''
Nationally, the NEA, with 2.2 million members, and the AFT, at 875,000, overwhelmingly outnumber the independents. Independent membership stands at about 200,000 collectively, said Beth Graham, chairman of the Coalition of Independent Education Associations, an umbrella group.
However, in some states, including Texas, independent membership exceeds that of the national unions. Virginia's other independent is the 600-member Association of Fairfax Professional Educators, starting its fourth year.
The independents present ``no more of a threat than a third (political) party,'' said University of Virginia education professor Daniel Duke. But ``they do siphon off dues.''
Neither Carson nor Adamson is plotting to drain the local NEA or AFT chapters of their members or their money.
``We think they're honest, upstanding people who provide a service much more extensive than we will offer,'' Carson said.
At the same time, ``We want to provide an option,'' Adamson said. ``We want to provide teachers a choice.'' by CNB