8. Recommendations

Guided by our analysis of the current situation and our proposed model for education renewal, we make the following recommendations. In addition to continuing to strive to be more inclusive and effective as organisations, we suggest: 1. That teachers’ unions take the opportunity to reflect on, and clearly articulate, their purpose and identity as 21st century organisations. This task should be undertaken in ways that provide members with an opportunity, and encouragement, to participate in a structured process of reflection. This discussion could be facilitated at the school level and through social media, and should focus on: a. What members perceive to be the union’s identity and purpose at the current time and what would they like it to be; but also b. What specific policy issues – in terms of professional, industrial, and social justice issues – they would like their union to focus more closely on. 2. Having gone through this exercise, teachers’ unions could then: a. Formulate a clear narrative about their identity and purpose; and b. Rank the specific policy issues that members have identified in terms of their potential impact on social policy and teachers’ industrial and professional well-being, the feasibility of effecting change, and what success would look like. 3. Taking care to undertake further consultation with members, officials could then select one policy issue that is both important and able to be addressed. The results of this process can be used to develop a targeted and time-bound campaign with clearly identified target outcomes, either at a whole-of-union level or in a particularly active branch or branches. Depending on the issue, this campaign could involve a diverse range of tactics including engagement with government and the community, but also member- and school-focused initiatives. 4. Participating unions use this campaign as a laboratory for identifying aspects of union structure and process that need honing (for example, channels for member engagement, embedded capacity and leadership development, and resourcing) but also new ways to engage with external interlocutors. 5. Participating unions apply these insights across the dayto-day work of the union, and repeat the process, either to ramp up the gains made in regard to the issue targeted in the first campaign, or to identify another target issue.

A key mechanism for the achievement of these goals is through the development of various EIAP-supported virtual communities. These communities could provide a forum for sharing participants’ experiences and generating a sense of shared purpose and community. They could also be used to engage with experienced campaigners from teachers’ unions in other countries; help structure dataseeking exercises, as participating unions reach out to their membership; and provide a sounding board on selection of issues, campaign strategies, etc; also as a brains trust for problem-solving over the course of the campaign. These groups could be formed around defined campaign domains after individual unions have had an opportunity to determine their internal priorities. It would be important to restrict the number of participants in each to 4–6 individuals (perhaps drawn from 2–3 unions) to ensure that they function effectively as a locus of exchange.