Democrat mayors at odds with teachers unions???!!!!

It looks like the situation in some big city public schools is getting so critical that even city mayors from the Democratic Party are breaking away from the teachers unions to challenge “teachers unions in ways that seemed inconceivable just a decade ago.”

That’s the story in the Washington Post, which says Democrat mayors in Los Angeles, Chicago, Cleveland, Newark and Boston are among those breaking new ground in long-standing relationships with the teachers unions.

One target in the mayors’ sights: tenure rules that make it impossible to motivate or discharge teachers who are not doing a good job in the classroom.

It also appears that while the national union leadership is starting to understand the need for changes, union locals are not following national direction and often remain far more militant in their demands to maintain the status quo.

There is also interesting information about a public cooling towards teachers unions. In 2011 nearly half the respondents to a Gallup poll (47 percent) said that teachers unions hurt the quality of education while only 26 percent said the unions helped. The proportion unfavorable to teachers is at an all-time high.

Read more about this amazing development in a long-time Democratic Party tradition here.