Four out of 80

Years of organizing work to get to point where there would be four schools out of the 80 charters in New Orleans where the staff are unionized. That is, if BAE is successful. 

The vote is set for May 28, according to the release issued by United Teachers of New Orleans, a citywide union and local affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers that has helped the charter school educators organize.

Bricolage Academy Educators, collectively known as BAE-United, spent weeks petitioning the school's governing charter board to voluntarily recognize their union. 

Bricolage organizers have said 80% of eligible teachers and staff signed a petition in favor of organizing, and they submitted the request to the school's board of directors in late February.

Eighty percent of the staff signed up in advance of the vote is a good sign. It's only in the last few years that teachers have gained something like momentum in the long effort to overcome structural barriers to organizing imposed by the depowering and isolating nature of the charter arrangements. When New Orleans Public Schools made the big move to charters, it not only immediately fired 7,000 people, it set back the work of reclaiming power by at least a decade.  Four out of 80 would be better than three.  But there is so much left beyond that.

Doing it the hard way

 Looks like the Bricolage board is choosing the way of pain. 

Bricolage Academy Educators United, a group of Bricolage educators seeking union recognition from the Esplanade Avenue charter school’s board, has filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board after the charter’s nonprofit board failed to respond to the group’s February request for voluntary union recognition.

Since receiving the group’s Feb. 24 letter, the board has only met once. At that meeting, on March 10, the board met in a closed door session with its lawyers for advice on the union drive. After the private discussion, board president Yvette Jones said the board must do its “due diligence” before it would take a vote on whether to recognize the union. She could not be reached for comment on Tuesday.

Well it's April now and they still haven't finished the "due diligence" delaying so the teachers have to ask for an NLRB election which is an arduous process that is more or less designed to prevent an organizing campaign from succeeding. That doesn't mean the teachers can't win.  The International School staff unionized via an election in 2016 but not without a fight. And the Lusher board actually beat back a similar effort.

Of course, the PRO Act legislation waiting for action in the US Congress would make things easier. Call or text your Senator.