Beverly Teachers Form 'Political Education' Committee Following Strike
BEVERLY, MA — While it appears a proposed ballot recall of Beverly Mayor Michael Cahill and School Committee members initiated during the recent teachers’ strike will not proceed, the Beverly Teachers Association is seeking to have a voice in future elections through the creation of a Committee on Political Education designed to establish a candidate review and endorsement process.
BTA members and their supporters marched thousands of signatures to City Hall during the heated moments of last month’s strike as they called for the removal from office of Cahill and School Committee members Rachael Abell and Jeffrey Silva.
City Clerk Lisa Kent told Patch on Wednesday that the signatures did not meet the requirements set forth in the city charter to initiate the recall and the petition cannot be “found to be valid.”
Find out what's happening in Beverlywith free, real-time updates from Patch.
BTA co-President Andrea Sherman said the move was spurred by frustration with the stalled negotiations and a rank-and-file membership push to “get the process moving.”
“It certainly was not our plan from the beginning, but we needed to call out the ineffective leadership that was responsible for dragging out a strike that should have been an easy fix,” Sherman told Patch on Wednesday. “If the right people had been at the table from the beginning of bargaining, we would not have been driven to strike.”
Find out what's happening in Beverlywith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Sherman said that the strike and its aftermath have highlighted the need for improved communication with elected officials and that the union will work to elect leaders it feels are conducive to that in the future.
“We need to ensure accountability for school policy choices as well as advocate for policies that strengthen our schools,” she said. “This (Committee on Political Education) group will be able to make recommendations on what our next steps should be regarding the recall and upcoming elections.
“We’d like to provide public-facing informational opportunities, similar to our August community forum, so that we can keep important conversations going with stakeholders — that is, elected officials and the community members they serve.
“Our strike was the wake-up call that the city needs to seriously reconsider the way it funds and supports education.”
Beverly classrooms were closed for 12 days before a deal was struck to bring students back to school the day before Thanksgiving.
BTA co-President Julia Brotherton said the eventual deal acknowledged that there “needs to be serious changes in Beverly Public Schools and that starts tonight” and that the contract will bring about “the wave of change we need to see in Beverly.”
Beverly students will be required to attend classes for five Saturdays — one each in January, February, March, April and May — as part of a plan to make up the 12 school days lost.
“When the BTA took our strike vote, we had every reason to believe that the School Committee could settle the contract quickly,” Sherman said. “At most, we thought we might be out a day or two.
“When it became clear that the School Committee intended to drag out the strike to break the union, members had to get creative to create pressure in order to get an actual deal done so we could get back to teaching and students could get back to learning.”
(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at [email protected]. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.
Click Here: stade francais rugby jerseys
