One classic example is the "Michigan Education Association," the title of the state's largest teachers union. Or, to be more case specific, the Wayne-Westland Education Association, a subgroup of the state association. That carefully selected moniker has a reassuring ring to it. Anyone who cares about kids would get a warm, fuzzy feeling to believe there's a group working throughout the state to improve public education.

That's exactly the strategy of the teachers union - to fool taxpayers into believing that instructional quality and student advancement are the group's primary goals. It's pure deception.

Recent headlines tell us that the Wayne-Westland teachers union is preparing for a strike that could potentially delay the start of the school year. The union defends its pending action by screaming that its members haven't had a raise in several years. It also claims that negotiations with the school board remain hopelessly stalled, and only the threat of an illegal work stoppage might produce progress.

Thus it becomes clear that educational improvement is clearly not at the top of the union's priority list - unless it's somehow related to the union's ability to maintain outrageously expensive insurance coverage at a time when the district can least afford it.

The leadership of the teachers union understands well that public education is in big trouble. The financial pie has continuously been devoting a bigger piece to benefits, forcing school boards to make increasingly difficult decisions about the smartest and fairest way to carve it up.

Sensible people would agree that responsible school boards will save as much of the pie as possible for classroom activities and materials that directly benefit children. Perhaps we need to remind ourselves that children are the only reason that public education exists.

But in the Wayne-Westland district, like so many others around the state, the teachers union is intent on securing a bigger piece of the pie for itself. It's not like the school board hasn't tried to satisfy the union, within the context of its financial constraints. The board's latest contract proposal offers most teachers in the district salary increases ranging between 4 and 6 percent.

Not a bad offer for employees in a zero-growth industry, where costs continue to skyrocket while the checks from the state cannot keep up. There are lots of employees in the state's manufacturing sector who would love that type of raise, but have the good sense to realize that it might prove to be the final nail in their companies' coffin. Yet the WWEA presses on with its demands, threatening to form a picket line in front of the schoolhouse door just as the kids are trying on their new school clothes.

The main sticking point seems to be health insurance for teachers, an issue that's been forcing a wedge between unions and school boards throughout the state. The union appears desperate to preserve its lucrative insurance coverage provided by MESSA, owned and controlled by the teachers union itself. Taxpayers should know that MESSA pumps millions of dollars into the MEA's coffers every year, which likely are used to strong-arm school boards at the bargaining table.

But the simple fact is that the Wayne-Westland district can no longer afford lucrative MESSA coverage for its staff. The statistics speak for themselves. Under current financial conditions, the school district is projecting a $13.3 million budget deficit by 2010. Yet last year, the district spent $14.3 million on health insurance for its employees. That represents 12.2 percent of the money the district received to educate students.

The idea is not to cut the quality of insurance coverage. It's to provide more affordable coverage. The Legislature recognized the stranglehold that MESSA has on Michigan school districts and tried to address the problem. As part of last fall's state budget package, districts were legally required to seek bids for employee insurance, in hopes of giving school boards a way to escape the MESSA dollar drain.

But the law has yet to make much of a difference, as the union continues to pick taxpayer pockets by forcing its own insurance carrier down our throats. Its strategy is understandable. If MESSA is sent packing in one district, the trend is sure to spread, and the MEA will lose one of its most lucrative moneymaking machines.

So now it's up to the teachers of the Wayne-Westland district. Do they continue to squeeze the district for every penny they can get in salary and benefits, until the well runs dry, or do they live up to the noble name of their union, work in partnership with the school board, and come up with sensible settlement that allows kids into the classrooms when the bell rings in a matter of days?

Let's hope the answer to that question is not found in the words of Albert Shanker, the president of the American Federation of Teachers: "When schoolchildren start paying dues, that's when I'll start representing the interests of schoolchildren."