StopTeacherStrikes, Inc. today announced Thursday that they are publishing the individual names, salaries and job-related information of over 120,000 classroom teachers in Pennsylvania.
The online database created by the New Jersey-based Asbury Park Press newspaper can be accessed by taxpayers to review the 2006-2007 salaries of teachers working in all 501 public school districts in Pennsylvania.
Scott Campbell, the president of Stop Teacher Strikes, said that he is tired of unions using strikes to receive additional money, while taking children out of school. "Ejecting innocent children from school for personal financial gain is totally unacceptable," said Campbell, who is also a public school teacher. "Every candidate for federal, state and local office must be held accountable for this abuse of children."
The decision for StopTeacherStrikes, Inc. to post teachers' financial information was sparked by the decision by Pittsburgh teacher union president John Tarka to authorize a strike in Pittsburgh. A strike in the Pittsburgh school district would become the biggest teacher strike in Pennsylvania in over 15 years, as it affects 28,000 students and 2,600 teachers.
Campbell also said that unions utilize the notion that teachers are underpaid in order to force unnecessary strikes. "Freedom of information has combined with freedom of the press to shatter the union-promoted myth of the underpaid teacher in Pennsylvania," said Campbell.
"From 2000 to 2007, 82 (60%) of the nation's 137 teacher strikes occurred in Pennsylvania with 162,000 innocent children affected over the last five school years," said Campbell. "Pennsylvania retains the dubious distinction of being the teacher-strike capital of the United States, while thirty-seven (37) other states prohibit teacher strikes."
The website for Stop Teacher Strikes is www.stopteacherstrikes.org
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