Teachers union leaders hinder healing by being sore winners

In their post-strike comments, Newton Teachers Association leaders showed a lack of grace and acknowledgement that now is the time to work together (“Teachers reach agreement in Newton, ending 2-week strike,” Page A1, Feb. 3). Ryan Normandin, a Newton South High School teacher and member of the union’s bargaining team, is reported as saying that the strike was about bigger issues than benefits and working conditions. Well, it shouldn’t have been.

Normandin said, “We taught our students not to be afraid that when those in power try to take away your rights, that they should stand up for themselves.” The NTA took away students’ rights to 11 days of education and made the strike a referendum on union power in the United States. NTA president Mike Zilles gave away the game when he said, “We are education leaders for our nation.”

This was first and foremost an attempt to show that the NTA was a big player, capable of bringing the city to its knees, just as the United Auto Workers did the auto companies.

All they really taught students was that it is OK to break the law when it serves your purpose, that it’s OK to disparage and criticize the motives of those you disagree with rather than confront their arguments, and that exercising raw political power, despite the financial burdens it creates for others, is more important than living within your means.

At least the union leadership could have had the grace to just take the win and not say it out loud. T. EVERETT Newton

All they really taught students was that it is OK to break the law when it serves your purpose.