Class-size mandatory bargaining bill returns without offering anything new

TThis short session we will see, yet again, another bill to make class size a mandatory subject of bargaining, as has been the case in seven of the last nine regular legislative sessions.

House Bill 4011 doesn't improve on any of those failed attempts. A mandatory bargaining requirement would likely raise school costs and increase the likelihood of disruptive strikes without lowering class sizes in an educationally meaningful way.

It helps to understand what is really being sought and how we got here.

Oregon is one of the most labor-friendly states, particularly when it comes to our education workforce. Of 33 states that require collective bargaining with teacher unions, Oregon is one of just 13 to allow teachers to strike.

Oregon first allowed public employees to collectively bargain in 1963. The Oregon Legislature adopted the landmark Public Employee Collective Bargaining Act (PECBA) in 1973. The law covers the state, counties, cities, school districts, transportation districts and other local governments as well as private employers who do not fall under the jurisdiction of the National Labor Relations Board.

Bargaining topics fall into one of three categories:

• Prohibited - Subjects that may not be bargained.
• Permissive - Subjects that may be bargained but management is not required to negotiate these proposals, and employees may not strike over permissive subjects.
• Mandatory - Subjects that are required to be bargained if there is a request, and employees can strike over mandatory subjects.

The issue in question then is whether class size should be a mandatory or permissive subject of bargaining. That is a discussion that is nearly as old as PECBA itself, due to the original language being rather broad, which left much up to interpretation by the Employment Relations Board and the courts.

Early Oregon Employment Relations Board rulings held that class size was a permissive subject of bargaining, falling under the prerogative of management, but the impacts of class size on workload were mandatory subjects. In the early 1990s, the ERB changed course and ruled that class size was a mandatory subject of bargaining, which was challenged via the courts to mixed success.

In 1995, the Legislature provided clarity via Senate Bil 750. The new law included a provision specific to school districts:

"For school district bargaining, 'employment relations' shall expressly exclude class size, the school or educational calendar, standards of performance or criteria for evaluation of teachers, the school curriculum, reasonable dress, grooming and at-work personal conduct requirements respecting smoking, gum chewing and similar matters of personal conduct, the standards and procedures for student discipline, the time between student classes, the selection, agendas and decisions of 21st Century Schools Councils established under ORS 329.704, and any other subject proposed that is permissive under [other sections of the legislation]."

School districts operated under that definition until 2021, when the Legislature made class size and caseload limits a mandatory subject of bargaining only in Title I schools, which receive federal funds because they serve a high percentage of students experiencing poverty. That limitation represented a compromise between management and labor in recognition of research indicating that the impact of smaller classes can be greater for low-income students.

The Oregon Education Association wants to go further than that 2021 agreement with HB 4011, which would make class size and caseloads a mandatory subject of bargaining - and therefore strikable - for all schools.

Intuitively, smaller class sizes sound good. I work with high school students, and I know that personal connections matter. However, the research shows that the impact of class size reductions on student learning is nuanced.

It makes more of a difference in some grades and classes than others and makes less of a difference for affluent students. The extent of the class-size reduction also influences the degree to which it matters.

Reducing class size is costly because it requires hiring more teachers. That increases costs now and also into the future as it would impact future Public Employees Retirement System costs. Without more money from the Legislature to pay for new teachers, districts will have to make cuts elsewhere to add teachers. Districts already spend more than 80% of their budgets on staff costs. Large cuts to district budgets most often translate into cutting staff, eliminating programs designed to help students or reducing the number of days in class.

"When school finances are limited (as they always are), the cost-benefit test any educational policy must pass is not 'Does this policy have any positive effect?' but rather 'Is this policy the most productive use of these educational dollars?'" Matthew Chingos wrote in an article for the Brookings Institution.

According to "The False Promise of Class-Size Reduction," even assuming the largest class-size effects, class size reductions still fail the "most productive use" test due to the incredibly high cost.

In other words, reducing class sizes by a few students a room has far less educational impact than other ways districts could use that staffing money.

Proponents of the bill might say the legislation would only require districts to bargain over class size, not prescribe what the outcome of that bargaining needs to be.

That is true. In fact, some districts that already have class size language in their collective bargaining agreements simply have goals or processes for staff to raise an issue if they feel their class size/caseload is unreasonable. Some districts make overage payments to teachers when class sizes exceed a certain threshold. All of that is already allowed under current bargaining laws.

HB 4011 would raise the stakes by making class size in any setting something that local bargaining units could strike over. It would force district leaders to bargain over class size, regardless of district resources and without any guardrails to keep the conversation focused on students who would be most impacted.

Collective bargaining is a process designed to balance the needs and the power of workers and management. When it comes to school districts, management and our locally elected school boards also have obligations to students and to the taxpayers whose dollars fund our local schools. HB 4011 would weigh the scales in favor of local bargaining units, making it harder for local district leaders to contain costs and target spending where it will be most effective.

Districts across the state are already facing budget shortfalls with more funding reductions on the horizon (See Stacy Michaelson's article). Our students need every dollar we can give to schools, and they need us to spend them carefully and wisely. They can't afford for us to lose sight of the whole picture when deciding where scarce dollars will be spent.

- Adrienne Anderson
OSBA government relations counsel