Fort Hill educators have officially unionized.
Reminder Publishing submitted photo
NORTHAMPTON — The early childhood educators at Smith College Center for Early Childhood have officially unionized, joining five other groups of Smith College workers that have unionized over the past 10 months.
The teachers at the school, commonly known as Fort Hill, won their National Labor Relations Board election, voting unanimously in favor of unionizing with UAW Local 322, which is one of the “largest and most progressive unions in Western Mass.,” according to its website.
Fort Hill encompasses infant, toddler and preschool classrooms.
“We work in a field that is undervalued and undercompensated,” said Fort Hill supervisor teacher Rachel Connally, regarding why the teachers unionized. “This is a school that is full of experienced, dedicated educators who put their heart and soul into the work that they do, their time, their compassion, their care, their energy.”
In a letter sent to Fort Hill families prior to the Sept. 25 union election, Fort Hill educators delineated the many reasons for unionizing, including more equitable pay, adequate sick time and better workplace transparency.
“We envision a Fort Hill in which teachers are granted fairer compensation and improved workplace supports that would allow us to continue the work we love long term,” the letter read, dated Sept. 12.
Connally, a graduate of Smith College who has been working at Fort Hill full time since 2019, was part of a push for unionization at Fort Hill in 2022, when a group of teachers got together to talk about some of the same issues the educators are experiencing now.
At the time, Connally said the teachers wrote a salary proposal that was presented to the college, but the proposal was pushed to the side and not much came out of it.
“We also learned that since we went public as a union, that there were also talks about unionizing, maybe about 20 years ago,” Connally said. “So, this has been a long time coming.”
The early childhood educators argue that the lack of equitable pay is causing a higher rate of teacher turnover at the school. According to the letter sent to families, 30 teachers have left Fort Hill in a span of five years.
“Early education is based in relationships between children and teachers and teachers and families,” Connally said. “The work that we do is founded on those relationships of trust and security and attachment. And when teachers have to leave, it disrupts those attachments, and both children and families suffer for it.”
According to the letter sent to families, many teachers at the school have had to make personal sacrifices to continue to work in a field that they love.
Kaila Goldstein, a new teacher who has been at Fort Hill for a year now, said the early childhood educators at Fort Hill took an informal poll and found that 25% of the educators would have considered leaving this year if not for the unionization efforts.
“This is really underfunded and underpaid work, and yet, it’s the foundation of society,” Goldstein said. “Everybody was a baby and a toddler, and most people cannot have their kids home with them and need childcare. [Early childhood education] shapes people for the rest of their lives and shapes the world we live in.”
Goldstein added that this is a highly skilled profession that features labor historically performed by women and people of color, but it is a field that is perpetually undervalued by institutions.
According to a 2020 study from the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment, “early care and education fails to generate sufficient wages that would allow early educators to meet their basic needs.”
Child care workers in particular continue to be one of the lowest paid occupations nationwide, according to a 2019 chart, which showed those workers make an average of a little over $11 an hour.
“When I say this work is undervalued, I mean financially and in policy, and I also mean in cultural value, which has an inseparable, both-chicken-and-egg relationship with the way resources are put toward so many other things before they are put toward care,” Goldstein said.
Early childhood education has also been a difficult field to unionize. According to a statistic from the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment, the field of early childhood education is only a 4.8% unionized field in the U.S., as of 2018.
By unionizing, the Smith early childhood educators hope to set an example for the rest of the field.
“What we’re saying with this is that we’re making a commitment and an invitation to all of our colleagues everywhere in early childhood education that we deserve better, and we can have better, and we’re going to fight for each other, not just with our colleagues we work with every day, but with our colleagues at different schools and for the families who rely on us and the future of the work,” Goldstein said. “And we hope that people in other, other early childhood educators will be able to build on the momentum.”
The next steps for the union, according to Connally, is to elect a bargaining committee to enter negotiations with Smith in the coming months. With newfound momentum, and a plethora of support statements from Fort Hill families, the educators’ hope to make some headway soon.
“It’s got to take institutions like Smith going against the crane in such an undervalued field to say this work matters,” Goldstein said. “And demonstrating that materially, financially with money, and with real support, and listening to the people who know this work, which is the teachers.”
Smith Labor United forms
The educators at Fort Hill joined a recent wave of worker power on campus, which includes Resident Life student workers, who voted to unionize in December 2023; student dining workers, who unionized in February; and library workers, who voted to unionize in April.
Smith-employed therapists also recently unionized with the Massachusetts Nurses Association, and facilities management workers recently ratified a new contract a few weeks ago.
Meanwhile, dining and housekeeping staff, which is the oldest union on campus, are soon entering into negotiations for a new contract that takes effect next summer.
In celebration of officially unionizing, the preschool teachers joined forces with other unionized Smith College employees and supporters for a Solidarity Fair on Sept. 27 with all of the unions. The fair marked the establishment of Smith Labor United, a collection of all six unions at Smith.
According to the release, this is the largest display of inter-union solidarity in the history of the college.
“We’re not separate entities like they want us to think we are — we are the workers of this campus and now Smith has to see that,” said Amelia Wesley, a member of the United Smith Student Workers.
Smith College did not respond to a request for comment by press time.
