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24 - Teacher Activism and Ethical Speech

Strikes, Labor Actions, and Ethical Responsibility

from Part II - Ethics and Education in Practice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 March 2024

By
Pamela J. Konkol  and
Isabel Nuñez
Edited by
Sheron Fraser-Burgess ,
Jessica Heybach  and
Dini Metro-Roland
Sheron Fraser-Burgess
Affiliation:
Ball State University, Indiana
Jessica Heybach
Affiliation:
Florida International University
Dini Metro-Roland
Affiliation:
Western Michigan University
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Summary

The ethical foundations of educator activism have always been in flux. Teacher activism takes many forms, and addresses both educational issues and larger societal structures. Here, we are most interested in teachers’ activism as workers, including but not limited to strikes, labor actions, and labor-related protest in the United States and around the world. Such activism is particularly conflicted since most educators are public-sector employees with what is arguably an ethical imperative to teach the young people in their care. In this chapter, the authors consider the following: Do educators have an ethical imperative to act in ways that benefit the communities in which they teach? And if so and by extension, do educators have an ethical imperative to strike?

Keywords

teacher activismstrikeslabor actionspublic sector laborteachers’ unions
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Ethics and Education , pp. 509 - 528
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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