Are Teacher Unions doing their jobs?

Yeah, they are. In Florida alone they have stopped illegal laws governing teacher evaluations. Now, they are breaking the wall down for Florida to take responsibility for teaching supplies.

...bobman15: (click here) I hear a lot of people slamming teachers unions because of how easy it is to get tenure and how hard it is to fire bad teachers. Are they correct or not and why?

Teacher unions represent teachers. And it’s management (e.g. principals, school boards, superintendents) who hire and evaluate teachers and grant tenure – not teachers unions…Tenure should be about fairness and not an excuse for managers not to manage or an inadvertent cloak of incompetence....

Scott didn't take this point of view without a strong nudge from the Teacher Unions.

...Gov. Rick Scott wants all Florida teachers (click here) to get state-funded debit cards they can use to purchase school supplies many now pay for with their own money.

The debit card proposal -- with no specifics on how much each teacher might have to spend -- is one of several Scott officially announced this morning in a speech in Fort Myers. He used the speech to explain the education part of his agenda for the upcoming 2013 legislative session.

Scott said in a statement that he will be pushing lawmakers to maintain current spending on public education and "also working to increase our investment in education," if the economy allows....