Professor Saul Rubenstein of Rutgers has made a career out of a peculiar question – what happens when labor unions and management in education work together?
It turns out that everybody wins.
Students win – in the form of higher student achievement. But other results include lower teacher turnover, greater communication between faculty and staff, and fewer formal grievances. Schools become better places to learn and better places to work.
He began by studying a school district in California – the ABC school district. And before you ask, it is actually a real school district.
But now, Professor Rubenstein is taking the lessons he learned from his research and putting them into practice here in New Jersey. Through a partnership with the New Jersey School Boards Association, the New Jersey Education Association, and other stakeholder groups, he has formed the New Jersey Public School Labor Management Collaborative.
This group provides training and support for school districts that want to promote collaboration between their labor unions and their management. That should include West Orange.
Today, you’d probably describe the relationship between labor and management in West Orange as relatively friendly. But it’s not about the relationships that exist today. It’s about what happens when the people in leadership change.
Only a few years ago, during the tenure of the last Superintendent, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone that would describe that relationship as friendly. And ultimately that level of antagonism is bad for everyone involved.
To keep us on the right path, West Orange should join the collaborative and work with Professor Rubenstein to start building structures of collaboration. We should take advantage of this amazing partnership between the NJSBA and the NJEA.