NUT draws on experience of Chicago teachers

The rapid growth in Academy schools has led the NUT from having to deal with 153 employers in England (local authorities) to something approaching 4,000, where, on average, each NUT division (branch) has to deal with 26 separate employers. UNISON has much to learn from the NUT’s organising strategy outlined by General Secretary Christine Bower in a series of Morning Star articles coinciding with the union’s Easter conference. It is clear the at the NUT is taking some inspiration from the example of the 2012 campaign of the Chicago Teachers Union which engaged with broad sections of its membership and reached out to communities outside the union's ranks to challenge the free market school reform agenda.