While students in Lawrence were in class, students in Chicago enjoyed an unexpected break.

Teachers went on strike, picketing school grounds. Most students might wish for a seven-day break, but the implications of a strike can be serious.

Depending on the state, unions have varying powers of negotiations. In Chicago, where the school district is run by the mayor, Rahm Emanuel, the teachers union felt that it did not have enough power to get demands of teachers met.

“Rahm Emanuel didn’t seem to respect the teachers or the union and just wanted to ram his proposals through — good or bad,” said Jay Hundley, an LHS teacher who represents the school for the Lawrence Education Association, the local teachers’ union.

While some in Kansas might have had sympathy for the striking teachers in Chicago, a similar strike wouldn’t be allowed here. It’s forbidden by state law.

The last — and only — time a teacher strike occurred in Kansas was in 1973 in Topeka’s Seaman Unified School District 345. Unlike in Chicago, Seaman teachers went against state law in striking. Teachers lost their jobs in the aftermath of the strike, and many believed it damaged the union more than it benefited it.

Wade Anderson, the negotiation director of the Kansas National Education Association, the main teachers union in the state, said it’s “amazing” that’s the only strike given sometimes contentious negotiations, but the law has a lot to do with that.

“It seems unlikely to me that we’ll have any work stoppages in the future — at least without any change in law in Kansas,” he said. “If it does, it’ll be because circumstances are very extreme.”

Does that mean that teachers in Lawrence have less power than do teachers in Chicago? Not necessarily. The state law that bans teacher strikes was intended to promote a spirit of compromise, not to hinder the powers of teachers, Anderson said.

While striking could provide powerful leverage in negotiations as it did in Chicago, Kansas teachers have greater powers at the negotiating table.

“Teachers in Kansas have the opportunity to negotiate; teachers in Chicago don’t,” said USD 497 school board president Vanessa Sanburn. “Really the only thing the teachers in Chicago can negotiate on are salary and possibly the benefit items, so that’s the only leverage they have along with their ability to strike.”

Even the decision to expand the school day from six to seven classes had to be discussed and accepted by the district’s teachers union.

Hundley said he feels secure even without the power to go on a strike.

“Being here in Lawrence, I think we have enough power that we can negotiate what we need to be teachers,” Hundley said. “Now if you ask any person do they ever get paid enough, do they ever get small enough classes, do they ever get all the supplies? No. There’s always a little bit more that you could get or would help with teaching.”

While unions might seek more, Hundley said it isn’t out of greed.

“I don’t know if any teachers had got into teaching to get rich,” he said. “We are teachers because we love it. The only reason unions are around is to protect our rights.”

In Chicago, the school board was proposing longer school hours, more school days and pay for teachers based on student test results. Meanwhile, teachers complained of oversized classes and funding constraints.

While salary was a negotiable topic for the Chicago teachers, many topics like class sizes were beyond the reach of negotiations. In the end, teachers settled for a smaller than originally requested raise (an average of 17.6 percent over four years) with other demands regarding job security and limiting plans to tie teacher pay to student assessment scores.

In Lawrence, negotiations also went into overtime this year — though no where near the contention in Chicago. Sanburn said the school district was cautious about raises after Gov. Sam Brownback pushed for tax cuts that many worry will force cuts to education spending. If the district committed to paying teachers more, Sanburn said it could later be forced to make tough choices like laying off teachers or increasing class sizes. Teachers will be paid about $200 more than last year, and a $1,000 one-time bonus offered last year will be added into the base pay.

“We got everything we asked for except for the salary,” Hundley said. “We didn’t like that but we also knew that the state legislature is not real friendly and doesn’t look like it’ll be friendly to education for next couple years.”

For both Lawrence and Chicago, concerns about teacher evaluations cross state lines. Unions have traditionally fought plans to tie teacher pay to student test scores.

Kansas will soon have to face the very same question. The state got a waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind legislation that requires teacher evaluation to include student performance. Currently, teacher evaluation is not based on student merit for it is a negotiable item for unions.

“Either it will take legislative action for the state legislature to pass a bill that says local boards no longer have to negotiate on this evaluation tool, in which case it would no longer be in the union’s control at all, or we are going to have to figure out a way to get the teachers to agree to that by offering them something else that they really want,” Sanburn said. “And in a year where I don’t think there’s going to be extra money to spend on raises, it’ll  be interesting to see how that happens.”

As our own school district faces these difficult decisions, it’ll be important for the union and the school board to maintain a cooperative spirit.

“A lot of times that we look like we are enemies but we are actually partners to educate students,” Hundley said. “That’s the way the relationship should be: friendly and professional. We are trying to help each other here.”