Albert Shanker
| Albert Shanker | |
|---|---|
in 1965
|
|
| Born |
September 14, 1928 New York City, United States |
| Died | February 22, 1997 (aged 68) New York City, United States |
| Cause of death | Bladder cancer |
| Occupation | Labor Leader, AFT & UFT President |
| Spouse(s) | Edith Shanker |
| Children | Carl Sabath Adam Shanker Michael Shanker Jennie Shanker |
Albert Shanker (September 14, 1928 – February 22, 1997) was president of the United Federation of Teachers from 1964 to 1985 and president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) from 1974 to 1997.
Shanker was born on Manhattan’s Lower East Side (New York City) to a Russian Jewish immigrant family. As a toddler, his family moved to Long Island City, in Queens.
His father, Morris, delivered newspapers and his mother, Mamie, worked in a knitting factory. The experience of watching his mother work 70-hour weeks made Shanker aware from an early age that there was a need for societal changes.
Shanker read several newspapers daily as a young boy, with an interest in philosophy. His idols were Franklin D. Roosevelt, Clarence Darrow, civil-rights leader Bayard Rustin, and American philosopher Sydney Hook.
In 1946, Shanker graduated from Stuyvesant High School, where he was the head of the debate team, and went to the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana. He joined the Congress of Racial Equality. Shanker picketed segregated movie theaters and restaurants and was a member of the Young People's Socialist League and chairperson of the Socialist Study Club. In 1949, he graduated with honors and enrolled in Columbia University. In order to earn money while writing his dissertation, Shanker became a substitute teacher at Public School 179 on Manhattan's upper West Side.
Shanker took a year off after graduating from college and taught mathematics at an East Harlem school from 1952 to 1959. He began his tenure as a union organizer in 1959 to help organize the Teacher's Guild, a New York City affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers that was founded by John Dewey in 1917. Eventually, the Teacher's Guild merged with New York City's High School Teacher's Association to form the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) in 1960. During the 1960s, Shanker received national attention and considerable criticism for his aggressive union leadership and skillful negotiation of salary increases for New York City teachers. He left his teaching job to become a full-time union organizer. He felt that a teachers' union would be more effective if it were united with a common set of goals. In 1964, Shanker succeeded Charles Cogen as the UFT president, a position he held until 1985. In 1967 and again in 1968, he served jail sentences for leading illegal teachers' strikes. The New York City teacher's strike of 1968 closed down almost all New York City schools for 36 days.
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