Teachers Union Fails to Encourage Diversity in Lakeland
Opinion Advocates for ideas and draws conclusions based on the author/producer’s interpretation of facts and data.
By Mike Morey
The Lakeland Central School District, which educates roughly 5,500 students and employs approximately 480 classroom teachers, is a public school system that draws its student population from the Towns of Yorktown, Cortlandt, and Somers in Westchester County and Carmel, Phillipstown, and Putnam Valley in Putnam County. It encompasses two high schools, one middle school, and five elementary schools. It is represented by a nine-person school board who run for election in staggered terms. It has a highly diverse student body for the region it encompasses: fully 41% are students of color. But that’s where the diversity ends. Its faculty is 95% white, its elected school board is 100% white, and every principal, assistant principal, and central school district administrator -with the exception of one – is white.
While much of this situation can be laid at the doorstep of the central administration of the school district –and its unwillingness to examine how its hiring practices contribute to this disparity –they alone don’t bear responsibility.
The Lakeland Federation of Teachers (LFT) is the local chapter of the New York State Union of Teachers (NYSUT) that represents faculty in the district. The LFT is a powerful organization. Any local parent, teacher, or school board member can tell you, if you get the endorsement of the LFT for school board, you can bet the house on winning a seat.
I’m the son of a retired Lakeland teacher who was a member of the LFT. The LFT helped put food on my table. I am a strong supporter of the teachers’ union and organized labor. But these facts don’t absolve the LFT from examining its own contribution to the chasm that exists between the demographic composition of the student body and that of the faculty, administrators, and school board.
The LFT has been very public about the fact that it will only endorse incumbents and incumbent-chosen running mates for school board. In other words: challengers of the status quo need not apply. Unlike the way teachers’ unions in neighboring school districts conduct their endorsement process, there is no questionnaire to fill out. There is no interview process. There is no committee of teachers from throughout the district examining the records and resumes of candidates. There is no public forum sponsored by the union for rank-and-file teachers to learn about the candidates. The leadership of the LFT simply endorses incumbents and whoever the incumbents choose to run with them for school board. That’s their endorsement policy.
Over the course of the last three elections, a total of four candidates of color have run for school board in the Lakeland schools. Included among them, this last election, was a special education teacher with 32 years experience in public education. None has ever been endorsed by the LFT. How could they? They weren’t incumbents and the current members of the school board didn’t choose them as their running mates. The LFT’s endorsement policy ensures that the nine-member Lakeland School Board is entirely white.
Institutional racism is defined as “policies and practices that exist in organizations that result in and support a continued unfair advantage to some people and unfair or harmful treatment of others based on race.” Consciously or not, that’s exactly what is happening as a result of the LFT’s endorsement policy.
Why does this matter? The status quo in the Lakeland Schools has contributed to hiring practices that have resulted in 95% of the teaching staff being white, despite a student body where 41% of enrolled children are of color. There has been no effort on the part of the central administration to examine its hiring practices, despite a near constant refrain from parents who served on the district’s “Equity for All” committee urging it to do so. And in the absence of a central administration taking its own initiative to address the matter, it’s the elected school board who has the ability to set policy and compel it. But there is no chance of that happening when the political behemoth that is the LFT, as a matter of policy, will only endorse incumbent candidates for school board and their chosen running mates.
I graduated from Lakeland schools. I was raised by a teacher in the Lakeland schools. My son attends the Lakeland schools. My grandfather was an administrator in the Lakeland schools. The friends I grew up with now teach in the Lakeland schools. My appreciation for the teachers and the education that the Lakeland school provided me –and the economic security the LFT gave my family while growing up –is profound. But my disappointment with the practices and contribution of the LFT’s leadership to this diversity chasm are just as profound.
It’s time for the leadership of the LFT to look inward and recognize their role in contributing to the unacceptably wide demographic chasm that exists between the student body and those charged with educating them. And in the absence of LFT leadership making some changes, rank and file union members in Lakeland need consider whether it’s time for them to make changes to their leadership.
Mike Morey is a former member of the Lakeland School District’s Equity for All Committee, current parent within the district, and graduate of Walter Panas High School, Class of 1995.
This piece only reflects the opinion of the author and, the opinions expressed within the content are solely the author’s and do not reflect the opinions and beliefs of the website, news organizations or affiliates, or any organizations or individuals mentioned in this piece.
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