I’ve often wondered why the teachers’ unions haven’t supported more aggressive tactics to demand better working conditions, better pay, and more inclusion in decision-making for their teachers. Why teachers have accepted the tawdry treatment they receive from the Indiana General Assembly. Why they accept low wages and crowded classrooms. And with the advent of charter schools, the siphoning of their budgets to the private sector.
The 1,000 strong teacher turn-out at the Statehouse on Saturday, March 7, was a great start to right these wrongs. Teachers, through their unions, are demanding satisfaction on their top three priorities: compensation commensurate with their professional status; smaller classrooms; and stopping the flow of money into charter schools from public education funds. Seemingly, they have learned from the suffragist playbook on how to take the power that is denied them.
If 21st century teachers are as successful as the suffragists of the 19th and 20th centuries, they will become more fully enfranchised as a profession. It takes persistence, strategy, education, lobbying and even taking it to the streets, or at least to the Statehouse, to get change on the scale of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote in 1920.
But this right wasn’t secured overnight. It took 70 years to persuade enough in Congress, the public, and 36 state legislative bodies that women, who “hold up half the sky,” deserved the right to have a say in their representation. Teachers have been asking for better representation since they helped elect Glenda Ritz to represent them in 2012 as superintendent of public instruction, only to see then Gov. Mike Pence run an end-game on her power and position, transferring it to an appointed commission he created. And one need only look at the female-dominated teaching profession in 2019 to see teachers have a long way to go in Indiana to gain fair representation.
Currently, House leadership isn’t happy about teachers making noise. But it has deigned to look into their concerns in spite of that fact. This attitude that women should stay in their place, play nice, and let others do their thinking for them is strangely reminiscent of what women faced as they sought the vote a hundred years ago.
Teachers, learn from the suffragists. Keep making noise. You have the public’s support: It is well known teachers go into their own pockets for school supplies; how they face violence in the classroom; how they are blamed for the failure of parents and society to do their jobs in raising responsible children. The Indiana General Assembly should be helping your cause, not standing in the way.
The League of Women Voters Indiana supports teachers and their fair demands. So, too, does the League of Women Voters Hancock County. After all, the League was formed to educate women about the issues important to them. That work is ongoing.
The League of Women Voters Hancock County is showing a 2015 Focus Features movie dramatizing the fact-based suffrage movement. It will be at the Hancock County Public Library, Community Room B, in Greenfield on Sunday, from 1:30-3:30 p.m. The story shows the indignities, violence, sacrifices, and ultimately successes of women to secure the vote. Admission is free. The Hancock County Public Library is not a sponsor.
Network with women who support women. And call your state representative to let them know you support teachers, too.
Donna Steele is a civic leader who advocates for informed citizen participation, transparent representation, and government accountability. You can write to her at [email protected].
