Some of the most dramatic gains in urban education have come from school districts using what is known as a "portfolio strategy." Under this approach, districts negotiate performance agreements with public schools--traditional, charter, and hybrid models. The arrangement affords school leaders substantial autonomy to handcraft their…

Describes Glenbard Township (Illinois) High School District's win/win solution to negotiating teacher contracts. The district's new cooperative approach succeeded because the negotiating team was expanded (weakening the influence of adversarial-minded negotiators), and the system's best teachers were part of the bargaining team. A standing…

If a school board member with teacher union sympathies is leaking critical information to the union during bargaining, changes in negotiations procedures must be made to prevent the spy from being privy to confidential information. (Author/JM)

A description and definition of the type of negotiation currently occurring among teachers, administrators, and boards of education for long-range school improvement programs includes guidelines for negotiating and a detailed agenda that can be used as a model for reaching shared agreements. (CB)

Four decades after collective bargaining came to public education, school boards and the superintendents they hire still routinely blame teacher unions for causing massive inefficiencies, stifling innovation, and preventing change designed to promote student learning. "Our hands are tied," school boards commonly complain when school…

Designed to help school business managers understand management-labor relations, this handbook outlines a managerial approach to negotiations designed to protect the local educational agency's needs. The principles and philosophy of negotiations as well as its legal setting are presented in the introduction and first two chapters. Chapters 3, 4,…