Who

A no-nonsense negotiator and a canny politician, Randi Weingarten is president of the United Federation of Teachers, which represents 74,000 teachers in New York City and 20,000 other school employees. She's also the recently-elected president of the UFT's national parent union, the American Federation of Teachers.

Backstory

Brooklyn-born Weingarten first joined a picket line in the 11th grade when her teacher mother went on strike, and headed off to Cornell before enrolling in law school at Cardozo. A stint at corporate law firm Stroock & Stroock didn't last long: Weingarten soon quit to pursue non-profit work. After spending several years as a lawyer for then-UFT president Sandra Feldman, Weingarten gave up the legal profession altogether to become a teacher, spending six years teaching history at Clara Barton High School in Crown Heights. In 1985, she was elected the union's assistant secretary; two years later, she became the UFT's treasurer. In 1998, she took over as UFT president when Feldman left to head up the American Federation of Teachers. Weingarten's held on to the job ever since and has also taken on the role of chairwoman of the Municipal Labor Committee, which coordinates bargaining for all unions in the city.

Of note

The UFT has long been a potent political force in the city, but Weingarten has become an especially influential powerbroker in recent years. Her union's endorsement is something all local politicians covet and lawmakers regularly pay their respects by stopping off at her office on lower Broadway. Not that the UFT's endorsement necessarily means very much: In 2001, Weingarten's UFT supported Alan Hevesi in the primary (he lost), then backed Fernando Ferrer in a run-off against Mark Green (loss No. 2), and then got behind Green in the general election against Michael Bloomberg (loss No. 3).

Since Bloomberg took office, there's been no shortage of contention between the UFT and City Hall. (Of course, Weingarten's relationship with Rudy Giuliani wasn't exactly warm and fuzzy either.) In 2002, Weingarten went along with a controversial plan to cede more control over the school system to Mayor Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein. But the two sides have battled over everything: the citywide curriculum, pay increases, charter schools, social promotion, the city's new public school grading system—even whether students should be permitted to carry cell phones in school. Weingarten has had to face detractors in her own camp, too. Union members occasionally grumble about her in-class credentials (they say that she rarely worked a full schedule when she taught) and suggest she's more interested in raising her public profile than actually fixing problems.

Weingarten stepped into the limelight even more in July 2008 when she ran unopposed for become president of the the UFT's national parent union, the American Federation of Teachers. She now says she'll make fighting President Bush's No Child Left Behind law a priority as president of the 1.4-million-teacher-strong AFT. She'll juggle her new job atop the AFT along with her existing job as UFT president.

Personal

Although local politicos were already aware of Weingarten's sexual orientation, she officially "came out" at an Empire State Pride Agenda dinner in October 2007. She's single and splits her time between Brooklyn and Washington, where the AFT is headquartered.

True story

In 2006, radio host Brian Lehrer embarrassed Weingarten by asking her to add 1/3 and 1/4. (Adding fractions with different denominators is sixth-grade work according to New York State standards these days.) Weingarten said she'd need a pen and paper to answer the question.