“A thoroughly researched, deeply contextualized, analytically sophisticated, and clearly narrated history of teacher unionism and education politics in New York, Uncivil Rights makes a major contribution to our understanding of the often fraught relationship between (mostly white) teachers and (mostly non-white) students in the nation’s largest school system. Skillfully framed around changing conceptions of teachers’ and students’ ‘rights’ in public schools, this book explains—better than any other—how teachers in New York City first won and then lost recognition of their status as ‘professionals’ in the classrooms and communities where they work.”

Adam Nelson, University of Wisconsin–Madison

“Uncivil Rights offers a highly original, bold analysis of one of the most complex tensions in the history of urban education: teachers’ struggles for professional agency and black parents’ pursuit of civil rights through quality education. Perrillo shows many ways that New York City teachers and teachers unions worked for educational equity, but argues that battles, especially over the hot-button issue of teacher transfers, ultimately led to outside intervention that focuses on testing rather than teaching. A must-read for anyone concerned with school reform, Uncivil Rights points to how teachers, parents, and unions can forge new, mutually-beneficial relationships to pave the way for more meaningful, collaborative change in American education.”

Barbara Beatty, Wellesley College

“How have the interests of urban educators grown more distant from the increasingly minority communities they serve? Why did the rights-based politics of teacher unionists and black activists collide so forcefully into one another? Perrillo wisely answers these questions by tracing the parallel development of these twin movements in New York City, from Depression-era efforts for equity, to the 1960s strikes over community control, to the dual disempowerment of today’s ‘No Child Left Behind’ reform policies.”

Jack Dougherty, Trinity College

“Perrillo effectively and convincingly charts the growing distance between teachers and the communities of color they serve. By highlighting the competition between teachers’ professional rights and parents’ demands for power in decision-making, her work illuminates persistent issues of equity, status, control, and conceptions of democracy that touch all American schools.”

Joy Williamson-Lott, University of Washington