In attendance:

Anneta Argyres ()
Helena Worthen ()
Deborah Rosenstein ()
John Kretzchman ()
Barb Kucera ()
Joe Berry (">)
John Revitte ()
Rob Linne ()

Not present, but still interested:

Linda Deloach ()
Fred Glass
Mary-Alice Heretick
Brennan Sweeney (), contact w teachers unions in Toronto/Ontario

Introductions

Helena Worthen: want to see labor education (workers' perspective) become academic partner of vocational education

Joe Berry: did labor content as a K-12 teacher; labor ed in comm colleges; worked with CA labor in schools committee

John Kretzschmar (Nebraska): Soc Studies standards being revised this year gives opportunity to build a frame to unite labor in education = teach high school kids about the humanization of the employment relationship

Deborah Rosenstein (UFCW): no directive within UFCW to work on labor ed in schools; have interest from past work in Minn including inventory of labor ed curricula/materials

Anneta Argyres (UMassBoston): parent activist and some elementary school field trips; want to build K-12 efforts into new job

Barb Kucera (Minn): developing curriculum for teachers to use in classrooms, now working on workers who built state capitol; interest in exploring how to align materials with school requirements, marketing, getting teachers to use it.

John Revitte (Michigan SU): back to teaching LS in college; in past did Detroit labor history tours and videos, including providing videos/books for public schools

Rob Linne (Adelphi University, NY): teach preparing HS & middle school teachers; trying to reach out to unions, but they're busy; ran conferences in NY and Los Angeles on teaching labor (education and labor collaborative)

History

Working group started meeting unofficially to build on AFT work in Los Angeles and nationally -- tried to be an organization that would have relationships with AFL-CIO, AFT, NEA to push plan forward for labor in schools. But, we couldn't overcome barriers -- political, personal, and other priorities.

What do we want to do as a UALE Working Group (WG)?

(Helena) Change name of WG to "labor education in job training and public education" in order to push agenda to have labor education be an essential part of voc ed;

- (John R) How big would the tent be -- apprenticeship programs? undergraduate ed?

(Joe) Put resources on website page; organize list serve exchange, including school teachers/apprenticeship directors interested in doing this

- how to organize to overcome teachers' fear in tackling this material? can WG take that on in some way?

- circulate a piece/start a discussion of politics of injecting labor into k-12 education

(Deborah) We could put together resource sheet (print and on-line) of educational links, and ask AFT/NEA/AFL-CIO to post to affiliates; we could even track this with the unions

(John K) Don't see any fear of labor topic within apprenticeship programs, but do see that teachers don't buy into union agenda

(Rob) Do workshop for local teachers/educators at each UALE conference about doing labor education; may need to do as a side workshop

- (Deborah) At Minn UALE conference, brought in Winnipeg teachers to do workshop for local teachers -- nobody showed; so would need to do better outreach

- (Helena) UALE in Toronto next year, then Oakland CA.

Decisions

ROB will lead effort to do session at Toronto UALE about labor in schools; JOE will work on this too.

DEBORAH & BARB will work on getting AFL-CIO/MTA/NEA to post online & mail K-12 labor education resources to members; ROB will work on this too

HELENA & ANNETA will co-chair WG

NEW TITLE FOR GROUP:   "Labor Education in K-14 Education and Job Training