United Teachers Los Angeles supports merit pay “on a cold day in hell”
The Detroit Federation of Teachers shut down city schools to stop 15 charter schools from being built for free
The California Teachers Association has compared school vouchers to child prostitution
The Washington Teachers Union has withheld kids’ college recommendations for parents who didn’t oppose school reform
In Illinois (outside of Chicago), two union-protected teachers out of 95,500 are terminated for incompetence annually
In Illinois (outside of Chicago), it costs $219,504.21 to fire a bad union-protected teacher
In New Jersey, five union-protected teachers out of more than 100,000 are terminated for incompetence annually
In New York State, seventeen union-protected teachers are terminated a year
In New York State, it costs $128,941 to fire a bad union-protected teacher
In New York City, only ten out of 55,000 tenured teachers were terminated in 2006-2007
In Los Angeles, only eleven out of 43,000 union-protected teachers are even considered for termination annually
The National Education Association received $50 million for shaky investment advice in 2004 alone
NEA members are suing over the union’s endorsement of “Valuebuilder,” a plan with over $1 billion of members’ money invested
New York State United Teachers received $3 million for shaky investment advice in 2005
Washington Teachers Union embezzlement tab: $5 million
United Teachers of Dade (Miami) embezzlement tab: $2.5 million
Massachusetts Teachers Association embezzlement tab: $800,000
Michigan teachers unions' embezzlement tab from one thief: $218,000 in bad checks
 
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For Immediate Release
August 19, 2008
Center for Union Facts

“Winners” Announced in “Ten Worst Union-Protected Teachers Contest”

Washington, D.C.—Today the Center for Union Facts (CUF) announced the “winners” of its “Ten Worst Union-Protected Teachers” contest, which the group launched in March 2008.

The contest allowed anyone 13 and older to nominate the worst union-protected teachers in America through CUF’s website www.TeachersUnionExposed.com. After receiving over 600 nominations, CUF has identified the ten worst and offered each of them $10,000 to quit the profession forever. The purpose of the contest was to illustrate that unions have made it so difficult and costly to get rid of bad teachers that it can be easier to pay them to quit.

“Unsurprisingly, none of the ‘winners’ chose to take the prize money,” said CUF Executive Director Richard Berman. “When your job security is virtually guaranteed--due to outrageous union tenure rules--regardless of your performance, why would you quit for $10,000?”

Had one of the chosen “ten worst” opted to take cash and quit teaching, he or she would also have had to allow his or her name to be made public. In the absence of any “winners” agreeing to take the money, the CUF will not be publicizing their names. However, below are some examples of “winning” behavior verified by news reports:

“While many of the ‘winners’ were teachers who committed reprehensible acts and yet were not fired, the majority of the nominations we received were for teachers who simply didn’t seem to care about teaching,” continued Berman. “The fact is, our education system isn’t imperiled as much by the rogue teacher who has a sexual relationship with a student (that person should simply be in jail) as it is by the entrenched mediocrity that is bred by bad union policies such as teacher tenure and the absence of merit pay.”

Berman concluded, “We held this contest to jump-start a conversation about the negative impact teachers unions are having on our public education system and to advocate on behalf of good teachers by promoting merit pay and opposing teacher tenure. We hope to continue to promote these ideas any way we can.”

TeachersUnionExposed.com is a project of the Center for Union Facts (CUF) (www.UnionFacts.com). CUF is a non-profit organization supported by foundations, businesses, union members, and the general public. We are dedicated to showing Americans the facts about today's union leadership.

Media Contact: Sarah Kapenstein – 202.463.7106