Week in Review and What I Do (Rhymes!)

For my residency, I am required to write reflections every other week.  I may post more often than that, but for now I'll at least put up my reflections.

*I'm trying to be a little vague about where I work and who my supervisors are, so the names are made up.  I feel quite spy-like about all this.  For those who know me, this is good news.

1. Reflect on your first two weeks of work and look back to the opening retreat. What did you learn at the retreat that has been helpful to you in your work so far? What will you being doing over the coming weeks to carry that learning forward?


The past two weeks have been exhausting, but only in part due to work. I feel like I’m constantly running—I started to say my Avodah goodbyes last week, had a final shabbat on Friday, packed Friday night, cleaned with my roommates all day Saturday, and moved out of Avodah/into my new apartment Sunday. All the changes are great and I feel like I’m moving forward (perhaps I would venture to say that I feel slightly more grown-up), but I haven’t had time to settle into my new space at home which is making me feel slightly off balance and more fatigued than I usually would be. That’s not what this post is supposed to reflect on, but I know many folks are moving long(er) distances and I want to give a little room to commiserate.

On to the subject at hand. Organizing. For a bit of context: I am working in the New Organizing division at a Chicago union. They do precisely what the title suggests by organizing new workforces. The union is pretty baller and has taken the responsibility of organizing a lot of folks who work from home or indepepndently and would otherwise not have access to each other or have many resources for building power related to their jobs.

The first two days of work I was thrown to the wolves (albeit friendly and supportive canines) and rode along with Sarah* (my mentor for the internship) and later another organizer on house calls for the union's membership blitz. We had a list of individuals who were either homecare or home childcare workers and we visited 40-60 to talk to them about joining as members. Most people weren’t home which was more exhausting than anything else. The long hours were less tiresome when we intermittantly spoke with people about joining (which happened more the second day). The work was a bit mundane and since each of the conversations were around ten minutes, there wasn’t opportunity to develop a relationship (and clearly that wasn’t the point) beyond the immediate request.

The rest of the week, I followed my supervisor Ann* around to child care centers in the south suburbs of Chicago. There, we talked with workers as well as owners about the need to unionize and build collective power and had steps for them to take to further the process of joining either the Alliance or union. Monday, Ann gave me my own list of centers and this past week I have been making appointments with owners, trying to make appointments with owners, driving about the South side stopping at centers whose owners wouldn’t answer the phone, and finally meeting with a few owners to discuss the Alliance/union with them. Despite being tired and perhaps a little cranky, I’ve really enjoyed being out on my own having organizing conversations with owners and finding out what their struggles are.

This is a haphazard reflection, but since the set-up of my work is non-traditional I think I might take the space to explain the campaign. Sorry I’m a bit all over the place.

The union decided that the best avenue for organizing childcare workers would be through a collective process with the owners. The vast majority of childcare centers in the city are populated by children on subsidy programs (their parents qualify for government assistance in paying for childcare since otherwise it’s hella expensive). Furthermore, many centers use a few different subsidy programs to enroll children (state funding, Chicago Public Schools, Headstart). Some of these programs have minimum requirements for teacher wages, minimum child enrollment, maximum teacher-child ratios and other necessary qualifications that, given the funding provided, make it very difficult for centers to come out ahead. Consequently, owners are not withholding vast quantities of pay or benefits from their staff which is the usual unionizing rationale, but rather owners aren’t receiving enough funding from the gov’t to pay the teachers what they deserve. Or give them health insurance. Lame.

Therefore, the union created a structure where owners can join the Alliance (a collective of center owners) while their employees join the union directly. The Alliance then acts as the bargaining unit for owners and the union for the workers. Through a mediated process, owers and workers met over the course of a few months to establish a Collective Bargaining Agreement (aka Master Contract) which sets wage and paid-vacation minimums as well as a grievance policy for workers. This agreement provides some insurance to workers as well as evidence that center owners are organized and willing to create a cohesive standard that they stand behind. Center owners also benefit from being in the Alliance because they can then share resources across centers (payroll, bulk purchases, training, potentially health insurance plans, etc.).

Finally, the Alliance in conjunction with the union builds MAD POWER through participating bodies. Hurray!

It’s new, it’s revolutionary, and I think it’s a win-win-win situation. There is also talk about getting parents involved because, as we know, sucks to lose your childcare subsidy and suddenly have 3 kids to find inexpensive babysitters for.

Ah, to the reflection prompts…In my conversations with owners, I’ve been employing use of the Active Listening techniques. I am a class-A nodder. I’ll continue to do so. Our conversations follow a pretty rigid organizational flow: Introduction of self-->Drawing Out (asking owner much background information on relationship to owning childcare business—how long they did it, did they do home child care before or taught, what they love about it, how they got into it)-->Issues (what are challenges they face at work, given unlimited funds what would they do)-->Agitation (state budget crisis, loss of funding)-->Polarization (elected officials who don’t know what owners need, not prioritizing the education of our children, systemic inequalities)-->Vision (what would the response be if thousands of childcare owners, workers, and parents rallied together in Springfield, how could care be improved if we won more funding for the program)-->Commitment (sign up for Alliance/Union).

Since the initial conversation is so pivotal, there is an abundance of active listening going on. While watching Ann, I thought that I would never be able to retain all the information (we want to know stats on enrollment, # of teachers, turnover rate, funding sources, etc.) but paying close attention works well. I think having intention on being present is extremely helpful.