NEA Moves Even Further from Mainstream at Annual Convention

Rank-and-file teachers are becoming increasingly fed up with the far-left policies the National Association of Education (NEA) adopted at its annual convention in Philadelphia in early July--so fed up that some of them are planning to become delegates themselves in order to change the union's makeup.

Sissy Jochmann, a second-grade teacher in Pittsburgh, took issue with non-educational recommendations adopted by the NEA Board of Directors--such as incorporating sexual orientation and gender identity in teacher education standards; enhancing gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (GLBT) partnerships; expanding the union's GLBT Web page; and supporting federal hate crimes legislation.

During the meeting of the Committee on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identification, Jochmann--an NEA convention delegate since 2001 and chair of the NEA Conservative Educators Caucus--said all the research presented and the discussion that followed were "one-sided from a gay-affirming viewpoint," because the committee was "not interested in hearing research contrary to their viewpoint."

The Board of Directors subsequently adopted the GLBT policies in a closed session, literally behind closed doors.

Conservative teachers must not "sit idly back and pay dues," Jochmann said. "It's unconscionable," she continued, for state members to do nothing while the NEA continues to "adopt non-education policies regarding social issues like abortion and homosexuality."

NEA spokesperson Will Potter repeatedly declined comment for this article.

Need for Accountability

According to the organization's Web site, approximately one-third of the NEA's three million teacher members are conservatives.

NEA delegates should more closely represent members' views and be more accountable to members for the policies they adopt, said Judy Bruns, an Ohio delegate and middle-school teacher. The NEA should institute policies to "ensure annual meeting delegates invite members' input before attending the meeting and then to report back to members after the meeting," but her recommendation was defeated, she said.

The NEA is making an effort to reach out to its conservative base, said Diane Lenning, former chair of the NEA Republican Educators Caucus and a retired Orange County, California high school teacher. A delegate to the annual meeting each year between 2000 and 2006, this year she was one of 80 teachers attending the NEA's first Republican Leaders Conference in Minneapolis August 2-5.

An NEA news release said the conference was "part of NEA's commitment to bipartisanship in its political and legislative advocacy" and its "initiative to increase its presence in [the] Republican Party."

Calls for Vouchers

Lenning said she hopes NEA leaders will work to arrive at "common-ground positions" regarding some "historically adversarial issues such as school choice and reauthorization of No Child Left Behind, curriculum content, school safety, improving the high school graduation rate, reducing the dropout rate, and teaching each generation about the processes of democracy.

"When education and political leaders are adversarial and indecisive, the kids suffer," Lenning added. "We want our students across the nation to succeed with an accessible, quality education."

Reflecting increasing public dissatisfaction with the NEA's growing disdain for mainstream American values, some social conservative groups, which historically have been silent on the issue of school choice, are beginning to take up the banner. One of these is the American Family Association (AFA), based in Mississippi, which asked in a July 31 e-mail alert to its 3.3 million constituents, "is it time for school vouchers?"

"The NEA has consistently passed very leftist resolutions and held very liberal political positions over the years," so AFA decided to "promote public policies that support a parent's right to choose their child's school and to work to raise the profile of politicians who support such policy," AFA President Tim Wildmon explained. "The vast majority of people who take surveys on our Web site favor vouchers."

Connie Sadowski (connie@ceoaustin.org) directs the Education Options Resource Center at the Austin CEO Foundation.

For more information ...

NEA Representative Assembly and Annual Meeting committee recommendations and board implementations, speeches, and slideshow: http://www.nea.org/annualmeeting/index.html