When school administrators turn to privatization to improve school services, most often they end up exchanging one set of problems for another. That's one of the messages the AFT and its affiliates have worked to get across to districts around the country that see contracting out as a simple solution to complex problems.

In Compton, Calif., one of the AFT's newest affiliates--representing custodians, maintenance workers, and facilities and grounds employees--is facing a state-appointed school superintendent who has threatened to privatize the troubled district's custodial operations. When many schools were rated unfavorably, union members turned out in force to meet with administrators and push for improvements. To move the district toward addressing the real problems, the AFT also brought in a highly respected national expert on custodial operations in schools to meet with AFT members and Compton's director of facilities, Tim White.

Ed Feldman, an Atlanta-based engineer and independent consultant, toured a number of Compton schools to assess the schools' need for improvements. When his final report is finished, union leaders will meet with Compton's administrators--including the state-appointed superintendent--to talk about Feldman's findings and possible solutions. Among his major conclusions:

• custodians have inadequate or no equipment to do important parts of their jobs properly;
• the district schedules the majority of custodians to work when the schools are still in use, instead of later shifts when they can work more efficiently; and
• the custodial operations suffer from a flawed chain of command with principals, rather than someone knowledgeable about facilities, in charge.

By bringing in Feldman--someone who is more often hired by school-district managers--the AFT and its Compton local are trying to move beyond the common problem of contentious labor-management relations with both sides blaming the other for whatever problems exist. A more productive solution, and one that has proved successful in many districts, is to first analyze the operations, then bring workers and managers together to jointly develop solutions that draw on research about the most effective ways to improve quality and efficiency.

Richard Mease, a plant worker at Lincoln Elementary, says that regardless of what the Compton administration does, he and his colleagues have been working hard to improve the environment at their school. For example, the workers met with the principal to talk about the problem of unsupervised students littering at recess, which takes away from custodians' time to complete bigger cleaning jobs. "With the principal's support," Mease says, "our school implemented a plan where the kids now work with us to pick up the litter and are assigned to monitor recess behavior."