Teachers unions are among the most powerful, yet least studied, actors in public education today. Although public attention focuses on the influence of national unions, the policies that most affect teachers and schooling are bargained by local unions and school boards. Interviews with 30 recently elected local union presidents reveal that these…

Peer Assistance and Review (PAR) is a promising program to improve the teacher evaluation system and teaching quality more broadly. Under PAR, an innovative approach that uses expert teachers to conduct regular evaluations for novice teachers and underperforming veterans, districts can focus attention on instructional quality, retain the most…

Concludes that labor relations among districts vary in response to and enforcement of specific contract provisions and that labor relations at the school level vary within districts, influenced by such factors as administrative leadership, staff allegiance, and student needs. (JOW)

The effects of collective bargaining contracts on school administration and teacher-principal relations are neither as visible nor as far-reaching as has been believed. Interviews with 189 teachers and 100 administrators, conducted in 18 schools in six diverse districts in as many states, indicate that implementation of contract provisions varies…

Many of the educational reforms being implemented become union issues when they reach the local school district levels. Presents a study of four school districts with such reforms under negotiation. Although administrators proposed the changes, the teachers and their local unions often proved to be constructive participants in those changes.…

Collective bargaining contracts with teachers unions have reduced principals' autonomy but have still left them opportunities for effective administration of their schools. Interviews with 289 educators in six diverse school districts across the country show that contracts have limited principals' powers both from above, by centralizing labor…

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…

In response to declining enrollments, some local school districts are using performance criteria to determine the order of teacher layoffs. The difficulties of implementing this practice are illustrated by the experiences of four Massachusetts school districts. Interviews with principals reveal the adverse impact upon teacher-principal relations…

To clarify the role of collective bargaining in defining and reforming local school district staffing policies, an analysis was made of 144 teacher contracts gathered from a stratified, random sample of districts. In five of these districts, selected for their diversity on a number of variables (state, region, size, labor history, contract, and…