House candidate Scott Metcalf, a DFLer from Kenyon, seemed to say all the right things this summer when he interviewed with a panel of educators that included a high school band director, a counselor and a first-grade teacher.

He was seeking endorsement from Education Minnesota, but when his telephone conference call ended, the committee picked him apart.

Although the panel liked his commitment to education, one member disliked Metcalf's grammar. Another was turned off because Metcalf didn't appear in person. Others said that embracing the well-intentioned Metcalf would only threaten the union's good relationship with his powerful opponent, House Speaker Steve Sviggum, R-Kenyon.

"You have to look at the political realities," said panel member Barb Bauer, a first-grade teacher at Zumbrota-Mazeppa Elementary School.

The meticulous screenings play out throughout the state in every election year, an example of how the teachers union tries to exert its influence on the political process. The union screens candidates in virtually every state race, and the coveted endorsements sometimes come with expensive mailings on a candidate's behalf.

The machinery makes a difference, and Education Minnesota President Judy Schaubach is proud of it. In her opinion, no other special interest group in the state is more powerful.

"We have power because our sphere of influence is so broad," she said. "It's not dollars, per se, it's people. We reach into every legislative district in the state."

This election year is an important test. If the wrong legislators are left to address whopping state budget deficits, Schaubach said, education funding could suffer greatly in the next two years. That could mean overcrowded classrooms and job cuts affecting 7,000 or more teachers, she said.

"We're all seeing there's a lot at stake based on who is elected," she said.

In an unprecedented move, the union's board approved plans this year for 30 percent of staff time to be spent on elections, including local levy referendums.

DFL candidates will receive the most attention. Fewer than 20 Republicans running for state office carry a recommendation from the union. Sviggum is one of them. More than 150 DFLers have the union's endorsement.

Schaubach acknowledges that the split is more lopsided than in previous years. She blames the partisanship on "the more extreme factions in the Republican Party," such as those who promote the Taxpayers League of Minnesota, which supports private school vouchers and less government spending.

But Rep. Harry Mares, R-White Bear Lake, outgoing chairman of the House Education Policy Committee, said the union has invited scorn at the Capitol by bucking efforts to improve education and not crediting Republicans for the good they do.

Mares believes the textbook criticism about Education Minnesota -- that it's all about money for teachers, not about the kids.

"I question where their concerns really lie," he said.

Schaubach says too many of the union's opponents view education funding as a roadblock to what they really want -- tax breaks for the wealthy and big business. "They have the money," she said. "If you're rich, you can send your kid to any school. We're about making sure all kids have high quality education and we're about making sure that all schools have high quality people working in them, which means you have to pay people. "

Some legislators are turned off by the notion that the same union leaders who cry poor at the Capitol for teachers are earning more than $110,000 a year.

Schaubach is the big cigar, with annual pay of $128,648, 7 percent more than the governor. Executive Director Larry Wicks makes nearly the same, and the next three top officers average $114,232.

The union also pays Cadillac benefits: dental coverage and 100 percent health care coverage, a matching 401(k) plan and separate pension. And under a company car program that Wicks describes as money-saving, more than 50 officers, managers and high-mileage staff members drive a union-purchased sedan. The top officers ride in Buick LeSabres. Staff members who drive more than 10,000 miles a year for work get a Ford Taurus. The in-between car is a Chevy Impala.

Schaubach said teachers believe in compensating people for what they are worth. The compensation is in line with the market, she added.

"They put their money where their mouth is," she said.

Wicks said he has never heard legislators complain about the union's executive salaries. The pay is justified by huge responsibilities and long hours, he said.

"Scope and scale is enormous here," Wicks said.

Education Minnesota has 70,000 members, 78 registered lobbyists, a $9.4 million staff payroll, 144 full-time workers and field offices from Bemidji to Windom. It is the only teachers union in the country with members in every public school district, and it reaches them with a newspaper delivered 20 times a year at an annual cost of $438,000.

A study of political action committee reports from 1995 through 2001 shows that the teachers' PAC ranked No. 1, with $2.49 million in total expenditures. By comparison, the No. 2 PAC during that period, the Coalition of Minnesota Businesses, spent $465,034.

At the end of last year, Education Minnesota's PAC fund contained more leftover cash ($129,340) than most other state PACs raised in 2001. For example, entire contributions totaled $48,031 in 2001 for the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce Leadership Fund. Entire contributions for the National Rifle Association's Political Victory Fund totaled $79,171 last year.

Beyond PAC dollars, which go directly and indirectly to candidates and parties to influence elections, Education Minnesota spends big bucks on legislative lobbying. From July 1995 through June 2001, the union reported $1.39 million in lobbying expenses, ranking third in the state behind the Minnesota Twins ($1.99 million) and Xcel Energy ($1.69 million).

The union's pockets go even deeper in ways not tracked by campaign finance reports.

Take the $1.12 million Education Minnesota spent on TV and radio ads in the past two years. The money came from a union cubbyhole: interest income from a $10 million "crisis fund."

One series of ads was to bolster the image of Education Minnesota; the other asked citizens to call state legislators and voice their support for "full education funding." It prompted 22,000 calls, one for every $25 spent on those ads.

Friends and foes

Teachers themselves are sometimes surprised by their union's clout.

"I had no idea they lobbied as much as they do, but it makes so much sense," said Kellie Threinen, a Chaska High School social studies teacher.

She attended a two-day seminar this summer in Rochester to immerse herself in union politics. The union-funded Political Academy was a members-only road show held in locations around the state to stoke grass-roots activism.

Jan Alswager, Education Minnesota's chief lobbyist, began the seminars with a slide show that pulled no punches in describing the union's friends and foes.

In one slide, she branded the Taxpayers League as a growing menace to education funding. "We say up, they say down. We say left, they say right," she said.

In another, she ridiculed Gov. Jesse Ventura as an education-hostile, sword-swinging budget cutter.

Threinen, 23, was impressed. She left with the intention of rallying fellow teachers in Chaska to get involved in this year's elections.

"It kind of blew me away to see how well-connected they are. . . . that they're interacting with politicians on a constant basis," she said.

Education Minnesota collects $330 a year from each member. The assessment includes two refundable amounts: $10 for the PAC and $10 for the "crisis fund," a savings account for strikes and other union emergencies.

Only about 4 percent of members seek the refunds, Wicks said. The dues fund a $22 million annual operating budget and add $700,000 a year, each, to the PAC and the "crisis fund."

"They have a real advantage -- an endless flow of money," said critic Randy Wanke, who runs the Minnesota Education League, a close ally of the Taxpayers League. "They wield incredible power in Minnesota."

Wanke said it's his job to debunk the myth that Education Minnesota is the voice of education and the face of state teachers. The truth, he said, is that the union is trying to make life easier for its members.

Both Ventura and his predecessor, Gov. Arne Carlson, grew to view the union as an insatiable carnivore of the state general fund.

Carlson took on teachers and the public school system. He was overjoyed to sign a bill providing for education tax credits for private school tuition. The union hated the idea. Carlson said the "yes" vote by legislators was a backlash "against a feeling that teachers were too much in control."

"I think it was one of the most dramatic moments, certainly, in my political life," Carlson said recently. "From that point on, I would have to assume that their power was substantially diminished."

'A wake-up call'

Schaubach said Carlson is flat wrong. She said teachers strengthened their clout in September 1998 in a merger that created Education Minnesota. Recent tough sledding with Republicans has been "a wake-up call," she said, not a failure.

But even some longtimers in the organization have their doubts, saying the post-merger structure is too staff-driven and "top-down." They ask why Minnesota teachers are paid $1,000 to $2,000 less than the national average. They want to know why the state ranks 17th nationally in per-pupil funding. And they question why Education Minnesota's early backing of State Auditor Judi Dutcher for governor failed to win her the DFL Party's endorsement.

"I'm not sure how effective we are as a lobby anymore," said Jim Lindstrom, chief negotiator for the Forest Lake Education Association, a local unit of Education Minnesota. "Our influence doesn't go beyond our money."

Schaubach said volunteerism within the union has improved since the merger, with 8,000 to 10,000 members active in election campaigns and other causes, including local union leadership.

"Part of lobbying and legislation is building a case for something and getting it done over time," she said.

She said teachers remain influential in their communities, and Rep. Nora Slawik, DFL-Maplewood, is among many legislators who will vouch for that.

Two years ago, Slawik was in a close race with GOP incumbent Jim Seifert when Education Minnesota spent $18,790 on six campaign mailings for her. She won by fewer than 100 votes and credits the glossy brochures for making a difference. "In the suburbs, education is the issue, and when a group as credible as Education Minnesota supports you, obviously it helps a lot," Slawik said.