LOS ANGELES – The United Teachers Los Angeles union recently filed unfair labor complaints with the state, alleging the school district removed or transferred several school employees due to their efforts to promote union activity and their willingness to challenge district officials.

Union officials held a press conference to tell the world they’re supporting a dozen teachers who were not rehired at a local high school, and a union representative at another school, all of whom they claim were transferred as punishment for trying to give their schools “better educational environments,” the LA Times reports.

UTLA filed two complaints with the California Public Employee Relations Board Thursday. The first alleges a dozen teachers at Crenshaw High in Leimert Park were not rehired when the school transitioned to a magnet campus. The union is alleging those teachers were transferred due to their union activities and efforts to improve the school.

MORE NEWS: Know These Before Moving From Cyprus To The UK

“Teachers should feel free every day to do what is in the heart and soul of a teacher’s job: to advocate for the students and the community the live in,” union President Warren Fletcher told the Times.

The district has not commented on the complaint, but Superintendent John Deasy “in the past has cited persistently low academic performance at Crenshaw as creating an imperative for dramatic change,” the Times reports.

We suspect what needed to change the most was teachers’ attitudes. Everyone knows teachers unions justify their existence through constant labor strife and often use employees to stir animosity against school leadership. That’s why we believe there’s far more to this story than the union is letting on.

It may be illegal in California to punish a teacher or other public employee explicitly for their union involvement, but if that involvement results in a disruptive or unproductive learning environment there should be an exception.

All schools – especially those struggling with chronically low academic performance – need to take a team approach to educating students. If certain employees undermine that kind of cooperation, then we believe school officials should have the authority to terminate their employment without delay.

The second UTLA complaint centers on Jeff Pott, a union official and teacher who is known for repeatedly butting heads with his principal at City of Angels alternative school, the LA Times reports.

MORE NEWS: How to prepare for face-to-face classes

The irony is that all of the teachers in the complaints are still employed by the school district. They’re just working in different schools in different capacities.

They want their old jobs back, and they’re using their transfers to take a few potshots at district officials. Perhaps they’re angling for union leadership positions.

Regardless, if school officials didn’t think these teachers were a good fit for their schools, they should have every right to move them into positions where they will be more useful.

The fact that these teachers are using this situation to lob accusations at school officials only illustrates why their supervisors likely made the right decision to let them go.