Likely a closer look will show that union leadership and political leadership are more tightly intertwined in Costa Rica than what the media will acknowledge.

I too say this, as a left leaning educator, who has background and has worked from each of these perspectives. Education is and should be about kids first.

In Costa Rica (and elsewhere) too often it is simply about leadership corruption. In this case, I believe neither the teachers nor the politicians are putting kids first. They each are looking out for their own self-interests first. And that is just plain wrong!

So Ken, in summary, I believe that much can be fixed by changing leadership positions. Firing everyone is not a reasonable possibility. And most people are just sheep anyways….

Teachers, like other workers, have every right to strike when they have specific, legitimate and correctable grievances that can’t be satisfactorily resolved through negotiations. However, when they strike against a nebulous political-economic creed, they provide the administration with no way to meet their demands. This kind of strike isn’t even a strike, but an acting out by immature employees.

Worse, teachers have no right to strike against or in support of any political-economic ideology. As citizens and on their own time, they are of course free to oppose or support any ideologies they choose. As classroom teachers, especially in the social studies, they are also fully entitled and even encouraged to responsibly criticize any and all
political-economic ideologies. However, as teachers their calling is
the higher and nobler one of remaining above the fray and guiding
students in the critical assessment of all political-economic creeds, not promoting one or the other.

The day teachers take a collective stance on general political and economic issues is the day they are no longer fulfilling the duties of their calling and deserve to be fired.

And I say this as an opponent of neo-liberalism too. I’m glad that many teachers agree with me. Even so, it is a grave abdication of their professional responsibilities to strike against any ideology, including this one.

Meanwhile, the dirty little secret is that teachers in Costa Rica are part of the problem. Beginning teachers are arguably underpaid, and all teachers deserve better working conditions, but the pay increases that automatically accrue with seniority have resulted in bloated salaries followed by bloated pensions for a lot of medicore teachers who are just going through the motions.

At the same time, there is actually a glut of college graduates with teaching licenses who can’t get jobs. It may smack too much of neo-liberalism to mention something as harsh as supply and demand, but the fact is that there is an ample supply of qualified and eager potential teachers who can’t get jobs because the positions are locked up by unionized deadwood.

And I don’t give a flip if the teachers and their supporters say that I don’t understand a culture in which these kinds of nonsensical strikes are acceptable. My rejoinder is that the culture needs to change. Unprincipled slackness and bratty acting out on the part of teachers, who should know better and if they don’t need to learn for the sake of the students for whom they are role models, is a recipe for a long term Third World future.

I therefore say fire them all and start hiring on Friday morning.