Ei-iE

Education union representatives and development cooperation (DC) partners explored successful initiatives from around the world, highlighting the importance of effective communication, and the integration of modern technology to grow and mobilize union membership and increase the union bargaining power. This was during the latest Education International (EI) DC Café on innovative membership engagement.

Indonesia: Understanding the importance of having a digital union

The Teachers' Association of the Republic of Indonesia (PGRI), supported by the Australian Education Union (AEU), the Japan Teachers' Union (JTU – NIKKYOSO), the Union of Education Norway (UEN), the Swedish Teachers' Union (STU – Former Lärarförbundet) and the Education International Asia-Pacific (EIAP) region, has developed a digital membership information system. This system includes a digital membership card, payment system integration, and various services for members.

Robert Gustafson of STU shared his insights: "PGRI is a very strong, capable, determined union and they have been working for at least probably 10 years to develop their own digital system."

He stressed that Indonesia is “a huge country with about 17,000 islands, and very diverse Internet coverage, so PGRI needs to work both online and offline, with around 2.5 million members. They have been grappling with these technical challenges."

This union “has this comprehensive system because the leadership had the vision of the importance of a digital union,” he said. “They wanted to be in the frontline. It is not STU who has been the driving force. It is their vision, their commitment, their know-how that has built this tool.”

He also explained that the data is managed centrally by a committee. “You must have somebody in charge centrally, but all the four levels have access to the data from province and district and local levels so they feel the ownership and can be involved and work with that.”

Gustafson went on to note that, in the new training menu, The PGRI system offers both free and paid training options. “To allow members across the country, on both regional and central level, to participate in training sessions either online or offline, these training sessions may be organized by local branches or the central office. Each training course will provide a digital certificate which can be downloaded under terms and conditions, and they are offering even AI training.”

Uganda: Services that fit your membership categories

The Uganda National Teachers' Union (UNATU), supported by the Dutch Algemene Onderwijsbond (AOb), is in the early stages of developing a digital membership information system. This system aims to address challenges related to payment systems and communication with members.

UNATU General Secretary Filbert Baguma also explained the importance of this initiative: "In Africa now we have a very big challenge where the labor unions are being fought left and right by the political governments and creating so many other unions getting your members and putting them on another union squad.”

He added: “If you don't have your own information about your members, it becomes very difficult for you to stand and defend the members whom you don't know who they are, where they are, and to maintain and sustain your membership. Once you have them in your database it becomes very easy for you to plan strategically, to see how best you can identify the services that fit your membership categories."

He also stressed that “we have a very big dream as an institution, and we hope we shall slowly but gradually reach the destination."

A key challenge for the union is a financial one, receiving membership dues, the UNATU leader observed. “We have a challenge with the payment systems by the government. We use the check-off system, and when public authorities are migrating from one system to another, in some instances, we lose all the membership dues in a local government. And sometimes we can go for even a year without any dues being collected. We want to see how best we can use technology for members to pay without necessarily waiting for the membership dues to come through the government system. Because that is very risky, they can wake up one day and say, ‘Don't deduct’.”

He was also confident that “once we have our database up and running, we shall be able to use it for advocacy".

For instance, Baguma said, UNATU will be “able to caution the government and say, ‘Look, so many teachers are going to retire within three years, and we are not seeing deliberate efforts on how to replace them, and the number of learners is increasing,’ so the government will get a wakeup call and plan better. This database will help us with advocacy by looking at what is ahead of us using our members’ database."

He concluded: “We are still on the journey. We have now compiled our data for membership. We encourage the system developers to make it vibrant, and make sure it can cater for all the needs we have as an institution, because we really want to fix most of the risk areas using the system. Because technology has come, we cannot dodge it. We must go for it."

Trudy Kerperien from the AOb highlighted that this project is just under construction, and “the request came to us in a not so usual way, through our Confederation, after coming back from a leadership training that they had organized with the Ugandan Confederation. Participating unions had heard that union branches in Tanzania had implemented a management information system that was developed there, and that they had seen a growth of membership, that they had a lot more clarity on who their members were, that there were a lot of time gains in organizing, in collecting membership fees and that their communication had improved. And they wanted to find opportunities to have such a system too."

As “we want to contribute to stronger unions and to a stronger worldwide union movement,” and because “UNATU has been a partner for a long time, we know that it is a trustworthy union that does good work and that they could serve as a resource for others later if this worked, we started the project,” she said.

India: Union Connect program

The All-India Primary Teachers’ Federation (AIPTF), supported by STU and EIAP, has launched a groundbreaking program called Union Connect. This initiative aims to transition from paper-based management to cloud-based management, enhancing transparency and democracy within the union.

The project involves several steps, including needs assessment, legal consultation, data collection, and extensive training for branch and district leaders on managing the platform. The latter includes a membership database, communication tools, consultation tools, and integration with other platforms like surveys and forums. It also features a web-based application and an Android application.

During the virtual event, EIAP Director Anand Singh emphasized the significance of this project:

"This program called Union Connect is developed through a project supported by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) because there was an exceptional funding window, and it emerged from the recommendations of our Union Renewal research, which we launched in 2021."

He also mentioned that Union Connect was developed with the AIPTF branch in Jharkhand and got the support of a young team of IT professionals based in India. “They provided us with a high-quality state-of-the-art tech solution. As part of the package, we also developed a website for the union for external communication and social media platforms as well.”

These initiatives demonstrate the power of innovative membership engagement strategies in strengthening unions and improving the working conditions of educators. By leveraging modern technology, unions can better serve their members and advocate for quality education worldwide.