Giving our nation’s teachers the support they need should be a priority, but unfortunately, federal, state and local governments often do not prioritize giving teachers much-needed support.

A tried and true method to ensure the needs of workers in an organization is through just that: organization.

The best way for teachers to organize is through unions, but in many states, South Carolina included, establishing unions is much more difficult because of right-to-work laws and policies. As a matter of fact, some teachers and other laborers don’t actually support organizations in the workplace.

Contrary to popular belief, unions are actually greatly beneficial to teachers and other laborers.

Unions can assist in providing better educational opportunities for our nation’s children in a multitude of ways.

One way is by giving our teachers a voice in the creation and reformation of educational policies.

Many teachers in non-unionized states have strong opinions on educational policy but never get the chance to express them to an audience capable of hearing and taking their opinions into account.

If we can allow teachers to have a voice in deciding how our schools are run and what students are being taught, then we will provide students with a much higher quality education because teachers can much better curate curriculum and policy to benefit students because they are actually in the classroom with the students.

Another significant benefit of organizing in the workplace is job security. Unions usually enforce a policy known as due process, which makes it where an employer cannot fire/lay off employees on a whim.

Due process is often used as a counterargument for unionizing in the workplace because the idea is that it will protect bad workers, and when it comes to education, many have no sympathy for bad teachers and have a strong call to action against them, which in turn makes discussion of organization difficult.

While this assumption is not absurd, it’s unlikely that with sufficient evidence, termination of a bad teacher who is harming student learning will be made difficult by due process.

Teachers unions often welcome parents as well as students in voicing their concerns and opinions.

While unionization has its benefits, it can sometimes have negative qualities that are important to note.

Unions ask and often require members to pay dues every month, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing because after all, it exists only to protect their best interests.

The issue comes into play when, for example, the union helps workers receive better pay, but the increased cost of dues offset the benefits of the extra pay.

Fortunately, this is an issue that can be easily prevented by establishing clear communication with representatives and leaders of the union.

It’s unlikely that a teachers union, or any union for that matter, will get any support in Southern, right-to-work states like South Carolina, but what we can learn from them is clear: We should provide teachers with the voice and the security they need in order to do their jobs successfully.