Giving Compass' Take:

• Matt Barnum unpacks two studies that paint different pictures of teachers unions and explains why it is impossible to definitively characterize teachers unions as good or bad. 

• How can funders help to identify and measure the key impacts of teachers unions? Which unions are most effective? 

• Learn how teachers unions will be impacted by a supreme court decision. 

Two new studies paint a divergent picture of whether teachers unions contribute to better schools.

One finds that states with stronger unions saw more of the money earmarked for education actually reach classrooms, which in turn helps student learning.

Another shows that weakening unions in Wisconsin led to increases in the share of college students training to be teachers, potentially reducing teacher shortages.

Together, they’re a glimpse into the debate about the effects of teachers unions on schools, one where research offers few definitive conclusions. And they come at a moment when teacher groups are ascendant politically — flexing their political muscle in the form of strikes and walkouts across the country and drawing support from Democratic candidates for president.

“Unions — it’s complicated, because they’re not just the oppositional force that a lot of people want to paint them but they’re not only the champions of education and learning that they might portray themselves to be,” said Matt Kraft, an education researcher at Brown University.

Between 1990 and 2011, dozens of states reworked their formulas for funding schools. In many cases, the goal was to send more money to schools in high-poverty districts that had historically been shortchanged.

But extra dollars don’t reach schools automatically. Some localities receiving more money from the state decided simply to replace some of their local spending with the new state money.

A new study shows that didn’t happen much in states with strong unions. There, all or most of the state money earmarked for schools got spent on schools. In places with weak unions, many of the extra dollars for schools were used to cut local property taxes instead.

Meanwhile, a Wisconsin study looked at the impact of a law that decimated teachers unions, and found that it didn’t stop college students from wanting to go into education.

Read the full article about teachers unions by Matt Barnum at Chalkbeat.