Teacher Unionization and Student Academic Performance: Looking beyond Collective Bargaining

This paper investigates the relationship between teachers unions and students’ academic performance. We examine nationally representative data and use a more comprehensive measure of teacher unionization by identifying both districts with collective bargaining contracts and districts with meet-and-confer agreements. We find that teachers unions raise student test scores via both channels. This positive relationship is stronger for black students than for white students and for lower grade than upper grade levels.