Open government has a strong distaste for secrets. Chicago is a city known for secret deals made in smoke-filled back rooms. President Obama wrote in his memoir that he was rejected early in his political career by a mysterious boss man hidden in some back room who famously rejected Obama who was a “nobody sent by nobody.” Secret dealing pervades Chicago politics for a reason, and a lot of it is the toxic labor strife in the city and state.
Secret negotiations control most public education spending.
The place I’ve seen the greatest impact of secrets is in deal-making between school boards and teacher unions. Deals between Illinois teacher unions and school boards are negotiated in secret before being made public. Most decisions about education happen in those negotiations, so secret dealings between unions and boards control almost all educational decision-making. Union contracts make up most spending in education, so secret union-board negotiations mean almost most public education dollars are bargained in secret. The decisions that are left to talk about in the light of day are minuscule by comparison.
Ordering a pizza
Most of the secret deals between unions and board are made even more secret because few if any real decisions are made at the bargaining table. I worked in a school where the union brought ten people and the board brought ten people to the negotiation table. Twenty people in a room will have trouble negotiating what toppings to put on a pizza much less come to agreement on how to run a school.
This leads chief negotiators to use backchannels. The backchannels might be secret, but they aren’t anything special. The meat of union negotiations comes during formal negotiating breaks while walking to the bathroom or while smoking cigarettes shivering in subzero temperatures. I worked with one lawyer who didn’t smoke but was frequently seen puffing next to chatty smoking union leaders on negotiation breaks. Collective bargaining law allows secret negotiations, and the knock-on effects of those secrets play out in schools across the country.
Should unions bargain in secrecy?
Voices today reject the value of secrecy for collective bargaining much more than in the past. Liberal democracy requires open government, and nothing about union-board negotiations is open.
Cultural and political expectations of privacy and openness vary wildly, often with ironic twists. I live in China. In traditional Chinese schools, student performance information is posted on the classroom door for the world to see. The US passed the Federal Education Rights and Privacy Act to keep personal student information secret. At the same time, we have no problem with most schools in the US accepting free Gmail for schools despite knowing that Google sells it. We know Facebook sells our data, but we still willingly login and give them more. Values are cultural. Why we expect government to be transparent in all things except when negotiating contracts that will spend the majority of public dollars is worth considering.
Having worked for government in the US most of my life, I err on the side of freeing secrets. In schools, ending union-board secrecy is an essential next step to opening and therefore improving public education.
Some laws have made moves in that direction. Years ago, Illinois passed one statute requiring unions and boards to publish their final offers to the public. The law was a start, but boards and unions bypassed it. The law simply pushed ahead secret negotiations. Now boards and unions are careful not to call any offer a “final offer,” which triggers public disclosure.
Cardinal Richelieu and the dark side of secrecy
“If one would give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, I would find something in them to have him hanged.”
Richelieu fears others’ taking advantage of openness. Fear drives secret-keeping today. Fear of harm from our secrets keeps us quiet, whether it’s letting our competitors know our plans, letting our boss know our true feelings, letting the government know our highway speed, letting our friends know our finances or, for some of us, letting Facebook see personal photos.
Richelieu ruled France before the French Revolution. His words reek of distrust and fear. Fear and distrust continue to drive board-union relations today. Richelieu lived and worked in a world where nation-states vied for power. Today’s America is equally about opposing forces vying for power. Richelieu’s wisdom is still our conventional wisdom. We praise shrewd, savvy, cunning dealmakers because we believe dogs eat dogs more than neighbors help neighbors.
Having the courage to trust each other is the only hope to improve education.
More openness builds trust. Ending secrecy in board-union dealings will have a greater effects on the quality of schooling than almost any other change proposed. States across the US have done a poor job moving in the direction of more trust and openness.
To support greater transparency in public education, these secrets need to
Negotiations between unions and boards. This is the granddaddy of all secrets. Until unions become transparent, the public has to exist on an equal playing field.
School leader meetings. Open-door policies are common for individual leaders, but far more happens in secret than in public.
Union meetings. I’m a big supporter of unions, but public sector unions must be more transparent. Public sector union meetings are no different from public sector school board meetings. These are all public entities and need to follow open meetings laws.
Communications by board members. Boards needs to consider issues publicly. Most communication is electronic, so all those communications need to be transparent to the public.
Contract negotiations. Secret negotiations create a net disadvantage to communities. Public sector boards and unions need to do all their work in public, including negotiating for contracts.
Trust flourishes in transparent environments. Increased trust increases our engagement with and commitment to schools and all of our public sector institutions.
After Jeff Besos bought the Washington Post, the newspaper adopted an alliterative quote from Judge Damon J. Keith of the US Court of Appeals. Judge Keith’s quote supporting the First Amendment is heavy-handed yet attention-grabbing in today’s information-saturated world. Democracy does die in the dark.
Secret backroom dealing has existed as long as humans have communicated with each other. Schools improve when the public demands greater transparency.
Based in Shanghai, John Heintz is an advisor, writer, teacher and thinker on the education, economic, legal, justice and social issues facing the global community. John Heintz’s experience as an education sector legal advisor and management consultant contributed to the range of issues presented in his most recent writing at Second Rail Education, his resource for school leaders. Follow John here.