I think that's a fair characterization of my point in your first three paragraphs. There's just not a history of being able to take on the unions and "win", re

I think that's a fair characterization of my point in your first three paragraphs. There's just not a history of being able to take on the unions and "win", regardless of the labor laws. So let's stop trying to fight the unions and characterize them as devil spawn since that isn't going to work. I'd rather focus on the areas where there aren't necessarily entrenched interests so we can focus on experimentation and trying to change the anti-education sentiment[1]. Schools like the KIPP Academies have exceptional outcomes over and over again. We need to find a way to get their techniques wider distribution. I believe that fighting a war of words with the teachers unions is both a waste of time and counterproductive from a policy/results perspective. Public sector unions just aren't going anywhere. Furthermore, we're going to have a shortage of teachers - estimated to be as high as a million teachers [2] - once the Boomer generation retires. Demeaning the remaining teachers (who are generally union-affiliated) strikes me as ridiculously counterproductive. The experiences in NYC and DC are proof that there are ways to make teachers more accountable, reward better teachers, remove crappier teachers, and generally change the culture in our schools without taking tactical nukes to the NEA and AFT. [1] Read Bissinger's Friday Night Lights for the best-written example of what I'm talking about. [2] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/07/education/07teacher.html http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/07/education/07teacher.html