Effort mounts to stop teacher strikes

From the Intelligencer

Effort mounts to stop teacher strikes

By RICH PIETRAS, The Intelligencer

Jill Basile is determined to get teacher strikes struck down. And it appears she has found a brother in arms for her battle, and perhaps a small army.

Basile, a 42-year-old resident of Harleysville, hosted a town hall meeting Monday night for more than two hours at the Indian Crest Public Library in Telford to discuss teacher strikes, and teachers unions — a hot topic considering current labor unrest in the Souderton Area School District.

“I suffered through a school strike when I was at Neshaminy (High School) that lasted two-and-half months when I was a freshman,” Basile said. “I swore after that, I would never let my children go through something like that ... it was horrible.”

And she seems to be sticking to her promise, because Basile has a first-grade daughter in the Souderton Area School District who was forced out of school early in September. And although the strike ended after 13 days, it appears the determined mother of two is just getting started.

The guest speaker for the event was Simon Campbell, a grass roots activist opposed to teachers' right to strike in Pennsylvania.

He is also the president of StopTeacherStrikes Inc., whose Web site provides information on everything from how many school districts are at immediate risk of a strike, to the commonwealth's constitution, which Simon believes makes teacher strikes illegal.

Expecting only 30 people to show up, Basile was surprised to see 60 people fill the meeting room of the library. She was also thrilled to have Campbell come on board. Campbell, 41, who hails from England, settled in Pennsylvania in 2004 and has three children in the Pennsbury School District. It was Simon's exposure to a teachers strike there in the fall of 2005 that inspired him to form StopTeacherStrikes in March 2006. The unpaid volunteer has championed the cause of strike-free education and voluntary unionism ever since.

“I'd never even heard of a teachers strike until I moved to the states,” Simon said in front of a mixed crowd of parents and students as well as a couple of school board members. “I couldn't believe such a thing was allowed.”

A big part of the evening was devoted to the discussion of the Strike Free Education Act, House Bill 1369, which Simon and Basile wholeheartedly support.

Although the bill will not be signed into law this year, Simon, who turned the meeting into a mini civics lesson, urged the audience to do whatever it could to ensure the bill will pass and add Pennsylvania to the other 37 states that ban teacher strikes.

Basile said she believes that every side has been heard in the Souderton dispute but the residents.

“Where are the children's rights?” Basile asked. “The unions are running our education system, not us.”

Ernie Rosato, 46, Upper Salford, who has a child attending Souderton Area High School, also felt empowered after the meeting and hoped others felt the same way.

“We have a choice as a community to make a stand,” Rosato said. “It's time the community takes back what's really ours by telling the school board that strike should not be allowed and ask them to put their thoughts together on House Bill 1369.”