School board elections

In yesterdays school board elections in Minnesota one of the larger district, Rosemont, Apple Valley, the winners received about 8,000 votes. There are 2,000 teachers in this district. Unlike the general public, the teachers are organized and interested in this election. The result is that they can generally elect members who are sympathetic to the teachers needs. Just as the teachers union puts teachers first, the elections also put teachers in control. When the union sits down to negotiate with the school board they are looking across the table at people they helped to elect and will help to re-elect assuming they get a pro teacher program. In addition the board is not working with their own money but rather tax payer funds. Contrast this to private unions where the negotiators have a truly adversarial relationship and they are dealing with shareholder money.