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Teacher Unions Do Not Reduce Teacher Firing Rates

Rapid City Journal columnists Jim Shaw and Janette McIntyre have made clear that the preferred response the referral of Governor Daugaard's education reforms will be the ad professionem attack on teacher unions. Assuming Shaw and McIntyre ever stop talking to themselves and look for real evidence to substantiate their wishful thinking, I suspect they and fellow apologists for HB 1234 will be drawing ammunition from anti-labor propaganda outlets like TeachersUnionExposed.com, a project of secretive pro-industry front group Center for Union Facts.

Teachers Union Exposed offers state-by-state information on teachers unions and teacher firing rates. They tout these numbers as showing that unions protect bad teachers. But let's compare TUE's data on the firing rates of experienced teachers with the percentage of teachers belonging to unions in each state:

State Experienced teacher
firing rate
Percentage of
teachers in unions
California 2.03% 87.50%
Alabama 1.61% 16.00%
Alaska 5.17% 97.30%
Arizona 2.00% 39.50%
Arkansas 0.16% 6.10%
Colorado 1.63% 48.20%
Connecticut 1.37% 98.70%
Delaware 0.00% 100.00%
Dist. Columbia 0.09% 100.00%
Florida 0.35% 100.00%
Georgia 1.36% 7.50%
Hawaii 0.00% 100.00%
Idaho 2.74% 88.60%
Illinois 1.19% 83.70%
Indiana 1.78% 98.20%
Iowa 1.34% 98.00%
Kansas 1.53% 94.40%
Kentucky 1.95% 19.10%
Louisiana 2.38% 11.60%
Maine 3.09% 94.50%
Maryland 1.25% 100.00%
Massachusetts 1.57% 99.30%
Michigan 2.58% 99.00%
Minnesota 2.95% 99.30%
Mississippi 0.84% 2.20%
Missouri 1.79% 15.10%
Montana 1.90% 66.60%
Nebraska 2.73% 60.00%
Nevada 0.34% 100.00%
New Hampshire 2.37% 100.00%
New Jersey 1.15% 100.00%
New Mexico 1.86% 36.80%
New York 0.71% 99.50%
North Carolina 0.60% 2.30%
North Dakota 0.43% 79.20%
Ohio 1.91% 97.60%
Oklahoma 2.90% 33.50%
Oregon 0.85% 100.00%
Pennsylvania 0.33% 100.00%
Rhode Island 0.37% 100.00%
South Carolina 1.31% 0.00%
South Dakota 11.37% 74.90%
Tennessee 0.28% 67.00%
Texas 1.29% 1.80%
Utah 0.07% 87.90%
Vermont 0.56% 90.80%
Virginia 0.96% 10.20%
Washington 0.82% 100.00%
West Virginia 2.55% 10.50%
Wisconsin 2.14% 98.20%
Wyoming 1.35% 38.30%

I don't have an explanation for South Dakota's anomalously high firing rate... but if that 11.37% is accurate, it suggests that South Dakota has the least need of laws to make it easier to get rid of teachers.

But let's test TUEs overall conclusion about the relationship between union power and teacher firing rates. Look at Nevada and New Hampshire. Both have total unionization, suggesting more union power to protect teachers from firing. Nevada has one of the lowest firing rates; New Hampshire has one of the highest. South Carolina and Texas have the lowest unionization rates, but their firing rates are lower than those in highly unionized Minnesota and Michigan.

Run the numbers, and you will find the simple mathematical correlation between the two columns above is zero, &ndash0.00868 to be unreasonably exact. In English, that means you cannot conclude, even from data offered by an anti-union agitators, that a strong teachers union means teachers don't get fired at a lower rate than in less-unionized states.

Thanks for your help, TUE.

Related: Table 8 in this "Teacher Attrition and Mobility" report from the National Center for Education Statistics finds that among teachers who left the public school system to work in other industries, 28.2% said they had better job security in teaching than in their current positions. 19.4% said their current positions offered better job security. 52.3% said their job switch brought them neither better nor worse job security.

Hmm... so despite this rumbling I hear from conservatives about "tenure" and "jobs for life," over 70% of the people who've actually done the job in the classroom and now are working in other fields don't feel like their jobs were all that secure in public education.

10 Comments

  1. David Newquist 2012.04.03

    There is problem with the data in that table. TUE cites the "Students and Staffing Survey" as the source of the data. There is no such survey that I have heard of or can find. There is the Department of Education's "Schools and Staffing Survey." The TUE data shows 74 percent of the teachers in South Dakota belong to a union. The DE SASS data shows 54 percent.

    In the TUE map that shows the level of union membership by state, it cites IRS tables as the source. But when one clicks on the link and goes to the IRS index of tables, one is hard put to find any statistics on teachers union membership.

    I cannot find the sources for the data TUE presents. Can anyone?

  2. Bill Dithmer 2012.04.03

    Cory I have no idea how Shaw sleeps at night after writing a collum like the last two. Its nice when you can pick and choose the things you want to put in front of the public and not give the facts to back them up. Or even worse intentionally overlook those facts that dont support your point of view. Shaw is guilty of both.

    Our governor said "his justification for reform was that the number of students in South Dakota declined by 50,000 between 1971 and 2011, but the number of teachers increased by 869, and spending per student more than doubled during the same period."

    Its time for some reality. This came from the Yankton Press&Dakotan. The superintendent of Yankton public schools Dr. Joseph Gertsema "The growth we have had in our staffing has come essentially from federal programing, such as special education and Title I. So if you take all that away, you would see that the ratio of students to teachers has stayed very stable.”

    “When you take a look at special education, the school district budget back in 1971 was really a very small amount compared to today ($38,000),” Gertsema said. “As a result of President Ford signing the special education law in 1974-75, the program became a mandate. At that time, the federal government promised to fund SPED at the 40 percent level. He almost didn’t sign the bill because he was worried the federal government would never live up to that. His prediction was absolutely right: I think they are funding it at 17-18 percent now.”

    Things have changed some since our governor graduated from high school 40 years ago. For the average 18-year-old senior, graduation requirements have changed. For example, credits required for graduation credit have gone from 16 to 22 credits.

    Its tough to nail down the statistics for all those years and heres the reason why. When a Press and Dakotan request was made recently, Daugaard said the statewide breakdown of the numbers was not available.

    Joyce Wentworth, former student services director of YSD, said she agrees with Daugaard that the information is probably not available. State law only requires data to be kept for three years, and during Gov. Bill Janklow’s administration, many state school records were shredded.

    Adding to this mess is the fact that in 71 there were fewer then 2000 adminsistration and support staff in the state, now over 6000. That doesnt add to the cost per student? You tell me.

    Lets take another look at the score card for our education system putting our state against 50 others.

    Ellimentary and secondary finance currently 49th
    High school diploma or higher 29th
    People who have completed a bachelors degree 48th
    People who have completed an advanced degree 51th
    Degrees awarded, bachelors 48th
    Doctors 45th
    Masters 46th
    Remember this is out of 51 representitive numbers.

    Is it any wonder that we have to recruit workers from other states to fill job requirements in South Dakota?

    Now if you go to the states own education site it will tell you what our teachers are doing today. In math and reading from the fourth grade to the eight grade we jump from 12th and 19th respectivly to 3rd and 6th. Somebody is doing something right somewhere! Could it be the low paid teachers? Remember these numbers reflect the total number of public students, including special ed and special needs students.

    Could the state do better, sure. Can it be done with less money? The plan the governor is trying hasnt worked in other places why would it work here?
    Stop trying to blaim our teachers for the ass backwards state they are trying to educate in.

    This has been a long post but some things needed said. I have just one more question. Does Jim Shaw need a wheel barrow to haul those giant balls of his around the city of Rapid or does he just drag them on the street when he walks?

    Im blind not stupid. The Blindman

  3. Bill Dithmer 2012.04.03

    It would take $7.63 in todays dollars to buy what one 1971 dollar could buy. You do the math on the true cost of education in South Dakota.

    In this state the truth will not set you free it will just get you called a liberal.

    The Blindman

  4. grudznick 2012.04.03

    No wonder my teacher friends whine at coffee. Their bretheren are being fired at a staggering rate, more than 5 times as often as any other state. More than 1 of ever 10 teachers in South Dakota are getting canned, every year. what this tells me is that not only do schools NOT need more money, the fat-cat administrators need to give up those cushy parking spots and start doing a better job hiring. I don't understand why there aren't legions of fired teachers on every street corner.

  5. LK 2012.04.03

    grud,

    I'd be careful about admitting that you have coffee with teachers. Folks in my neighborhood have a higher opinion of serial killers than they do of teachers because serial killers work more days during the summer.

  6. caheidelberger Post author | 2012.04.03

    David, I agree that the TUE numbers are questionable. The "Schools and Staffing Survey" from NCES is the closest match I could find, and indeed, SDEA union membership is listed as even lower there. But even we accept TUE numbers for the sake of argument, simple analysis shows that TUE fails to make its argument.

  7. caheidelberger Post author | 2012.04.03

    Bill, you are a wealth of information and a joy to read. Please keep coming back to add value to our conversations.

  8. caheidelberger Post author | 2012.04.03

    Grudz, as David points out, the TUE numbers are hard to verify. I print and analyze them for the sake of argument. But that 11% firing rate is incredible—i.e., not believable. I can't imagine how South Dakota could have such an anomalously high rate (Alaska over 5%, Maine cracking 3%, no one else above 3%) and not have made news for it. That firing rate doesn't fit my experience. I need to dig more, find some confirmation on that 11%.

    And even if TUE's number is correct and South Dakota is this stunning outlier, the number does not tell us whether we really are hiring and thus later having to fire an exceptional number of bad teachers, holding teachers to higher standards than any other state, or losing good teachers to bad administrative decisions. How about you hold off on your worldview-assuaging jump-conclusions until we get some solid data?

  9. grudznick 2012.04.03

    I agree. They are incredible.

    Did you know that behind the scenes, 74% of all SD K12 teachers who received funding from the federal government during the Obama Stimulus Era claim that their union is counter productive and that the fat-cat administrators with the fancy parking spaces are sucking up all the money that would create better test scores?

    That's almost crazy.

  10. caheidelberger Post author | 2012.04.04

    Where do you get that 74%? I'd like to see that survey.

    And "counterproductive"? I could see a majority of teachers saying that SDEA is not productive enough, given the severe legal disadvantages unions face in South Dakota. But "counterproductive"? Again, I need to see the survey and the wording of the question.

Comments are closed.