Teacher unions are the worst

Via John Derbyshire, I saw this great little story:

A school superintendent in Rhode Island is trying to fix an abysmally bad school system.

Her plan calls for teachers at a local high school to work 25 minutes longer per day, each lunch with students once in a while, and help with tutoring. The teachers’ union has refused to accept these apparently onerous demands.

The teachers at the high school make $70,000-$78,000, as compared to a median income in the town of $22,000. … The school superintendent has responded to the union’s stubbornness by firing every teacher and administrator at the school.

But wait! It gets better! From an email from someone who seems to know the district:

Teacher salaries at the high school average $72-78k. Apparently 50% of the students at the school are failing all of their classes, and the graduation rate is also under 50%. In an effort to turn the school around, the superintendent requested some changes be made whereby the school day would be slightly extended, teachers would perform some extra tutoring, etc.

Look, I hate to see anyone get fired in this tough economic climate, but when you’re pulling down that kind of money — in Rhode Island, not NYC — and you can’t be bothered to do your job a little better and work slightly longer hours, you get what you deserve. This was just idiocy on the union’s part. What in the hell were they thinking?