AFT Launches Union Reform Effort Aimed at Helping Members Improve Skills,
 Career Prospects
Model Inspired by Success of British Union Program
Pilot Sites in Baltimore; Rhode Island; and Niles Township, Ill.

WASHINGTON – After an intense study of a work-site learning model created by British unions, the American Federation of Teachers announced today that it will assist three of its affiliates in piloting a new effort to help members enhance their skills and their work.

Union learning programs are union-driven professional development, implemented in partnership with employers and education providers, which provide training and other work-site programs to help members improve their skills and career paths.

Union learning representatives, the lynchpins of the program, will be members at the workplace selected by their peers, who can guide employees to the best forms of professional development, technology supports, and skill training conveniently available to them. Some of these may be union programs—such as the AFT’s long-standing Educational Research and Dissemination Program (ER&D)—while others will be offered by community colleges and other outside groups.

The AFT’s first pilot union learning programs will be with the Baltimore Teachers Union; the Northern Suburban Teachers Union in Niles Township, Ill.; and the Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals.

 “We have seen what the British unions are doing firsthand. It’s the kind of innovation at the local level that has energized the unions by providing new educational services at the work-site, where it counts,” said AFT President Randi Weingarten, who, together with the affiliate leaders in the three pilot sites, met with British union learning representatives on a 2007 fact-finding trip sponsored by the Albert Shanker Institute.

The 42-member AFT executive council approved a resolution today that calls for the union to seek legislative, public, employer and other support to assist AFT affiliates that want to launch learning representative programs. This program “is in the finest tradition of the AFT,” the resolution said, because of the union’s long record of supporting innovative programs to promote and enhance the professional development and career prospects of its members.

“We will help our affiliates succeed in what is essentially a bottom-up reform,” Weingarten said. “This is in keeping with the recently announced AFT Innovation Fund, a major educator-led reform program, putting the AFT in the forefront of genuine workplace reform.”

While inspired by the success of the British program, the AFT will help affiliates tailor their models to meet the unique needs of American workers. The AFT will provide basic training modules and sample resource materials. It also will support ongoing conversations among the pilot programs, encouraging the affiliates to share the lessons of implementation as they move forward.

Lorretta Johnson, newly elected AFT executive vice president and longtime president of the paraprofessional chapter of the Baltimore Teachers Union (BTU), said the building representatives in the Baltimore schools were enthusiastic about the program. “They’ll have a say in choosing the professional development they need, which is a giant first step in improving their skills,” Johnson said. For the new professional development program, the BTU plans to engage community colleges that already service the school district.

Dan Montgomery, president of the North Suburban Teachers Union, which is involved in the Niles Township, Ill., pilot, sees this as “a practical solution to building the kind of teamwork that schools really need to succeed.” 

The Rhode Island pilot is looking to develop a statewide effort. “We will partner with other state players, such as the University of Rhode Island and the Rhode Island Institute for Labor Studies and Research, to help us improve the skills of all our members,” said Marcia Reback, an AFT vice president and president of the Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals.

The learning representative model was supported by the AFL-CIO as part of an Aug. 5 statement titled “Learning, Working, Investing and Succeeding in America,” calling for financial supports to “assist employers and unions in developing subsidized on-site learning representatives who can help employees with career counseling and access to training needs.”

# # # #