Is It Ethical for Teachers to Refuse to Teach in High-Poverty Schools?

31 TLN 2005 Is It Ethical for Teachers to Refuse to Teach in High-Poverty Schools? The Florida-based Learning Cooperative began as a partnership among the Pinellas County FL school system and the county teacher and school employee unions about 15 years ago. The Cooperative is a joint district-union initiative to work in partnership on school improvement, using the Quality-Continuous Improvement model as a framework. The work has spread to a number of other districts around the US. This article from the LC's February 2005 newsletter addresses an emerging issue in a number of states and school districts -- teaching quality in high-poverty, hard-to-staff schools. As a device to explore the question, "Is It Ethical for Teachers to Refuse to Teach in High-Poverty Schools?", it offers an imaginary debate between a local union president and a superintendent. Whether you teach in a district with, or without, a union contract, you'll likely be intrigued by the issues raised here.  Teacher Leaders Network (2005). TLN conversations: Is it ethical for teachers to refuse to teach in high-poverty schools? Retrieved from the Teacher Leaders Network 16 Apr 2008. Link: http://www.teacherleaders.org/old_site/Conversations/HTS/ethical_HTS.html http://www.teacherleaders.org/old_site/Conversations/HTS/ethical_HTS.html