At the Newark bargaining table, a place for the president of the American Federation of Teachers
By John Mooney
When the two sides sit down to discuss the Newark teachers contract, it’s a pretty high-profile group at the bargaining table. In a half-dozen discussions so far, joining Superintendent Cami Anderson and Newark Teachers Union President Joseph DelGrosso has been New Jersey’s acting education commissioner Chris Cerf.
NJ Spotlight spoke with Weingarten yesterday about her participation in the talks for the contract that will be central to the success or failure of Anderson and Cerf’s reform efforts for the district.
The former president of the New York City teachers’ union also expounded on the reform proposals themselves, including plans to close six schools, and the $100 million Facebook gift that has made Newark schools a national story.
Question: The NTU is a unit of the AFT, of course, but is it typical for you to sit in local talks yourself?
Answer: “I am a big believer in using the collective bargaining process as a vehicle for school improvement. Take the chancellor’s district that we negotiated in New York City, long before Mayor Bloomberg. If you look at the last 25 years, I think it is one of the most effective efforts we have yet, not just in what happened initially but in its sustainability. And there are other examples that have succeeded over a long period of time, in Cincinnati and New Haven.
“We [at the AFT] have been very activist. People are good at different things and negotiating just happens to be one of the skills I have gained over time. I feel the president needs to roll up sleeves and not just send staff.”
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