New Business Items
Last Updated: July 05, 2011 - 11:25 p.m.
New Business Item A
ADOPTED
NEA's Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Campaign is tasked not only with seeking positive changes in the ESEA reauthorization through a legislative advocacy plan, but also with running a parallel administrative advocacy plan urging the U.S. Department of Education to provide schools with immediate regulatory relief from the negative consequences of No Child Left Behind (NCLB), without adding more layers of different rules. Schools today labor under several layers of mandates that in some cases hamper efforts to help students. As a result, NEA sent a letter to the US Department of Education seeking regulatory changes on May 27, 2011, that seeks the following changes:
- Revise current regulations and guidance to clarify that supplemental educational service (SES) providers are, in fact, recipients of federal funds for purposes of determining applicability of laws.
- Increase flexibility around Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) and the allowance of multiple measures of accountability.
- Provide additional common-sense flexibility for assessing and counting test scores of students with disabilities and ELL students.
- Modify SES/choice regulations to allow (a) targeted SES/choice to certain student populations in need; (b) local input into SES certification; (c) SES providers to be on the SEAs 'approved list' only if they are able to provide instruction to all eligible student populations; and (d) more flexibility in implementing SES/choice.
- Align the 'highly qualified' requirements to account for the workforce and staffing realities faced by rural/small school districts.
- Revise regulations to allow all Title I School Improvement Grants (SIG) schools to reset their NCLB timeline, not just turnaround and restart schools; to give flexibility around the 'Rule of 9' with respect to the transformation model; and to allow the use of other intervention models and strategies.
The Campaign now will garner additional support for positive changes in the ESEA reauthorization and immediate regulatory relief by taking the following action:
- Engage members and affiliates by providing them with opportunities during the Representative Assembly (RA) to take action and to share their solution-oriented ideas for changing ESEA and education regulations for the better.
- Proposed New Business Items or amendments to the Legislative Program that concern ESEA and New Business Items that concern proposals for potential changes to federal education regulations shall be held and debated in sequence at a time certain after the report of the ESEA Advisory Committee is heard by the Representative Assembly.
- New Business Items and Legislative Amendments that are adopted regarding ESEA and New Business Items that are adopted regarding potential education regulatory changes will be referred to the ESEA Advisory Committee to be incorporated into NEA's campaign.
- Following the RA, the campaign also will be adjusted to:
a. Engage members and affiliates in an effort to put public pressure on the US Department of Education to make regulatory changes designed to support students and schools.
b. Engage external partners to support the call for immediate regulatory relief that will help schools and provide needed opportunity for innovation. - NEA will provide regular updates through appropriate communications vehicles.
Activities contemplated in this NBI can be accomplished within the framework of the proposed modified Strategic Plan and Budget at no additional cost.
New Business Item B
ADOPTED
The NEA Representative Assembly will encourage all members to participate in the Save our Schools Rally and March in Washington, DC, at noon on Saturday, July 30, 2011, in the Ellipse Park, and associated regional and state events. The rally and march is being organized by a group of outstanding educators to bring attention to the needs of our schools and the educators who work in them.
Cost Implications
Activities contemplated in this NBI can be accomplished within the framework of the proposed modified Strategic Plan and Budget at no additional cost.
New Business Item C
ADOPTED AS AMENDED
The NEA Representative Assembly directs the NEA President to communicate aggressively, forcefully, and immediately to President Barack Obama and US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan that NEA is appalled with Secretary Duncan's practice of:
- Weighing in on local hiring decisions of school and school district personnel.
- Supporting local decisions to fire all school staff indiscriminately, such as his comments regarding the planned firings in Central Falls, RI.
- Supporting inappropriate use of high-stakes standardized test scores for both student achievement and teacher evaluation, all while acknowledging that the currently available tests are not good.
- Failing to recognize the shortcomings of offering to support struggling schools or states, but only in exchange for unsustainable state 'reform' policy.
- Focusing too heavily on competitive grants that by design leave most students behind—particularly those in poor neighborhoods, rural areas, and struggling schools—instead of foundational formula funding designed to help all the students who need the most support.
- Not adequately addressing the unrealistic Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) requirements that brand thriving or improving schools as failures.
- Forcing local school districts to choose from a pre-determined menu of school improvement models that are unproven and have been shown to be ineffective and bear little resemblance to the actual needs of the school that is struggling.
- Focusing so heavily on charter schools that viable and proven innovative school models (such as magnet schools) have been overlooked, and simultaneously failing to highlight with the same enthusiasm the innovation in our non-charter public schools.
- Failing to recognize both the danger inherent in overreliance on a single measurement and the need for multiple indicators when addressing and analyzing student achievement and educators' evaluations.
- Failing to recognize the need for systemic change that helps ALL students and relies on shared responsibility by all stakeholders, rather than competitive grant programs that spur bad, inappropriate, and short-sighted state policy.
- Failing to recognize the complexities of school districts that do not have the resources to compete for funding, particularly in rural America, and failing to provide targeted and effective support for those schools and school districts.
- Failing to respect and honor the professionalism of educators across this country, including but not limited to holding public education roundtables and meetings without inviting state and local representatives of the teachers, education support professionals, and faculty and staff; promoting programs that lower the standards for entry into the profession; focusing so singularly on teachers in the schools that the other critical staff members and higher education faculty and staff have been overlooked in the plans for improving student learning throughout their educational careers.
- Perpetuating the myth that there are proven, top-down prescribed 'silver bullet' solutions and models that actually will address the real problems that face public education today, rather than recognizing that what schools need is a visionary Secretary of Education that sets broad goals and tasks states, local schools districts, schools, educators, and communities with meeting those goals.
Further, the NEA Representative Assembly directs the NEA Executive Committee to develop and implement an aggressive action plan in collaboration with state and local leaders that will address the issues above.
Starting November 2011, the NEA President will provide regular updates to the delegates on the progress of this plan throughout the year.
Cost Implications
Activities to fulfill the requirements of this NBI can be undertaken within the proposed Modified 2011-2012 Strategic Plan and Budget at no additional cost.
New Business Item 1
Defeated
New Business Item 2
As Modified
That NEA work with state affiliates to initiate changes in their state's education code to professionalize substitute teaching which includes having professional rights, professional training, professional pay and permanent status.
New Business Item 3
Defeated
New Business Item 4
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
That an electronic running total of monies expended on NBIs during the current RA be shown on a lower corner of the RA TV screens.
New Business Item 5
Defeated
New Business Item 6
Adopted As Amended
That NEA will analyze current response to the increasing public attention and clamor for performance based and "value-added" teacher assessment.
New Business Item 7
Adopted As Modified
I move that NEA leadership shall work to create a clear and concise definition of "high-performing" which does not include high-stakes standardized test scores as one of the criteria that determines whether or not a high priority school is effectively serving its students.
New Business Item 8
Defeated
New Business Item 9
Referred to the Executive Committee
NEA shall publish, through NEA Today and other appropriate vehicles, information about the debated health risks of soy and soy-based products, for breast cancer survivors.
New Business Item 10
Adopted
NEA will define and explain the concept of workplace bullying as it relates to school employees, both classroom teachers and education support professionals. This definition will provide our members the information needed to cope with and address this ever increasing workplace phenomenon. By providing our members this information NEA will be able to develop a flyer or pamphlet that members, or local and state affiliates could request to educate their members to this issue and the potential resources to deal with this problem could be identified in a poster. This information will be highlighted by NEA media.
New Business Item 11
Adopted
Consistent with relevant NEA documents, the NEA will continue to support the passage of the Dream Act or any similar federal legislation that provides a pathway for undocumented college students to obtain a Green Card and eventual citizenship. The NEA will, through its regular communications vehicles, keep its state affiliates and members informed of developments and actions they may take to assist in passage of the Dream Act or similar legislation.
New Business Item 12
Defeated
New Business Item 13
Adopted
National Education Association will produce and make available through its publications a report of national and regional employment data that gives percentage of job types (e.g., service, skilled, trade, entertainment, college level, etc) and examples of quality educational programs that can have student certified/licensed upon high school graduation.
New Business Item 14
Adopted As Amended
NEA's anti-bullying campaign will include a strand on creating safe work environments to include: 1) support plans within the organization for members bullied, harassed, or exposed to hate language by students and staff; 2) student discipline plans that stop bullying, harassment, and use of hate language; 3) contract language that secures safe work environments for all our members.
New Business Item 15
Adopted
NEA members be informed of the recent position taken by The American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) on social security through NEA publications and website.
New Business Item 16
Adopted
Using existing communication vehicles, the NEA will publish several articles on the outsourcing and private contracting in public schools of health and human service professionals which includes nurses, psychologists, counselors, speech therapists, occupational therapists, physical therapists and other related services which have been rapidly outsourced in recent years.
New Business Item 17
Defeated
New Business Item 18
Defeated
New Business Item 19
Adopted As Modified
NEA will join with other unions in the Labor Campaign for Single-Payer Healthcare to amplify our advocacy for universal single payer health care.
New Business Item 20
Referred to the Executive Committee
NEA boycott Koch industries and Georgia Pacific paper products and use current means of communication to encourage affiliates to support NEA nationwide boycott.
New Business Item 21
Adopted
Using existing publications, systems of communications and data, NEA must initiate a campaign to educate and energize our members to tell America the truth about corporate America's hostile takeover of the middle class and devastating impact on working men and women, seniors, the less fortunate and young Americans.
New Business Item 22
Defeated
New Business Item 23
Adopted
The NEA shall increase the focus on privatization (in all forms) by utilizing existing communications vehicles to regularly educate and update all members about privatization and the resources available to fight it.
New Business Item 24
Referred to the Executive Committee
That within current resources and not to exceed $1000 of current staff time a common reimbursement policy for these NEA committees: The Executive Committee, the Board of Directors, and the Standing Committees of the Representative Assembly (Constitution, Bylaws, and Rules; Program and Budget; Credentials; Elections; and Resolutions).
The Executive Committee shall request input at the inception of the establishment of these policies at each major step in the process. The input shall be at least from the Chairs of each of the affected Committees who in turn shall request input from the Committee members. Updates to these policies shall follow these procedures. The original of this policy and any updates shall be approved by the RA.
The Executive Committee shall establish a process for the direct communication of new versions of these policies to the Chairs of the affected Committees on a regular basis and shall be incorporated into the appropriate online document.
The established policies shall, to the extend possible, comply with the minimum accounting requirements of the IRS and shall be written to be reasonably specific and to permit staff to be as ministerial as possible in the reimbursement implementation.
NEA forms shall be specifically designed for member reimbursement use, shall be designed so as to be "green" to minimize "treeware" (paper), and maximize online two-way (download and upload) submission as well as a paper form designed for both download and "snailmail" (post office mail). This item is requested to be returned to the Executive Committee.
New Business Item 25
Defeated
New Business Item 26
Ruled Out of Order
NEA shall support the protection of its members from being bullied, harassed, and mobbed by administrators.
New Business Item 27
Defeated
New Business Item 28
Adopted
NEA shall publish, through NEA Today and other appropriate vehicles in the month of June, every year a(n) Articles(s) to celebrate the contributions of GLBT (gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transgender) teachers and GLBT friends of education and to highlight issues concerning GLBT members including but not limited to bullying of GLBT students and educators and legislation that would affect our GLBT membership.
New Business Item 29
Defeated
New Business Item 30
Object to Consideration
That NEA organize a demonstration during the NEA RA 2012 on the Capitol Mall in Washington, DC to show support for public education and the importance of protecting public employees' right to bargain.
New Business Item 31
Defeated
New Business Item 32
Withdrawn
New Business Item 33
Adopted As Modified
NEA will establish and articulate a position against the privatization of the American public school system.
New Business Item 34
Defeated
New Business Item 35
Submitted as an Admendment to the Legislative Program
I move that the NEA make clear-thorough public statements, joining coalitions, etc.-that it favors amending the U.S. Constitution to establish that: (1) money is not speech; (2) corporations are not natural persons under the law and are not entitled to constitutional rights; and (3) regulations passed by Congress or state legislation limiting political expenditure by any corporation, limited liability entity, or other corporate entity shall not be an infringement of the 1st Amendment.
New Business Item 36
Adopted
During the 2011-2012 membership year, the NEA will work with state affiliates to develop systems and/or procedures to effectively identify potential NEA-Retired members.
New Business Item 37
Adopted As Modified
NEA will investigate and inform its members about the anti public education agenda behind the ill-informed intrusion of billionaires on education.
New Business Item 38
Adopted
During the 2011-2012 membership year, the NEA will work with state affiliates to identify NEA-Retired members who retain governance rights in the state from which they retired but are legal residents in another state. This information will be provided to state affiliates for assistance in identifying pro-education voters in the 2012 elections.
New Business Item 39
Adopted
NEA shall conduct a survey on service delivery models and students with special needs, utilizing Education Votes or other social media properties.
New Business Item 40
Defeated
New Business Item 41
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
The NEA will require future convention locations to provide sufficient internet bandwidth to allow attendees to access the internet.
New Business Item 42
Defeated
New Business Item 43
Referred to the NEA President
NEA reads the Declaration of Independence Chicago 2011. This film by NEA-MTA member Bill Coleman featuring NEA members reading the words of our Declaration of Independence. We request that this short film be played at this RA on July 4, 2011 during our lunch break.
New Business Item 44
Adopted As Modified
The NEA request that all State Education Officials (e.g. State Superintendents) encourage every school district to issue an annual report on its federal funding gap for special education. We want to call attention to this problem by sharing these annual reports with the President and Congress. The reports are intended to remind them of the promise it made to students with special education needs when it passed the Individuals With Disabilities Act in 1975. These efforts are to be taken as part of larger action to gain passage of congressional legislation fully funding the 40% federal share of special education costs promised as part of the original IDEA.
New Business Item 45
Adopted As Modified
The NEA Health Information Network will provide links to mental health screenings and resources that are confidential along with developing alliances with the National Alliance on Mental Illness and other appropriate mental health resources tailored to the needs of educators and their families.
New Business Item 46
Adopted As Modified
The NEA President will send a letter to all U.S. Senators and U.S. Members of Congress as well as members of the 50 State Legislatures asking for the introduction of a U.S. Constitutional Amendment to protect and grant the right to organize a union and collectively bargain with their employer regardless of the public or private sector status of the employer. Further, the NEA supports such an amendment.
New Business Item 47
Adopted As Amended
We request the NEA to recognize the 75th Anniversary of the Future Teachers of America Chapters created by NEA in 1937. We ask that the recognition occur during the 2012 calendar year using existing communication vehicles.
New Business Item 48
Defeated
New Business Item 49
Defeated
New Business Item 50
Defeated
New Business Item 51
Referred to the Executive Committee As Modified
Move that the NEA sponsor a national art competition to increase awareness of the labor movement, its historical importance and necessity for the future. The competition would have two categories: one for NEA members and one for students of NEA members. Entries may be an individual piece or a group classroom project. Artwork will be submitted electronically, along with a summary statement of its historical significance. Member awardees will receive $500-1st place, $300-2nd place, $100-3rd place, and 10 $50 honorable mentions as an honorarium to be used for their classrooms. Student awards $500-1st place, $300-2nd place, $100-3rd place and 10 $50 honorable mentions.
The competition will be judge by active NEA classroom teachers and NEA Fine Arts caucus members. NEA will utilize volunteer assistance to the maximum extent possible in conducting and processing this competition. Judging of the art will not require travel.
All entries become the property of the NEA, can be viewed on the NEA website, and featured in the NEA Today.
The artistic talents of our creative educators and students will be graphically expressed in this "fabric of unionism" content that celebrates our proud labor history.
New Business Item 52
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
NEA will provide shuttle service from state caucus hotels to the convention center and back to facilitate dropping off at Camp NEA. This should be done by the most economical means available and in time for caucus start at 7am.
New Business Item 53
Adopted
NEA will work to inform federal and state policy makers, using existing means of communication, about the nationally recognized Parent Teacher Home Visit Project (PTHVP). This voluntary but compensated program has spread from California to Colorado, Massachusetts and other states with values supported by NEA.
New Business Item 54
Adopted As Amended
That NEA will support NEA members who are classified as "non-classroom educators," such as library media specialists, school counselors, school psychologists, school social workers, speech pathologists, and other personnel whose positions are being eliminated but are essential to the academic success of students. The NEA will use existing media communication information on the benefits of the services that these professionals provide from existing sources that support the needs for these services, and the impact and the loss of these educational jobs.
New Business Item 55
Adopted As Modified
Using existing means of communication, NEA will educate its members about the procedures for planning and positive impacts of participating in actions that promote public education on the local, state, and national level.
New Business Item 56
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
That NEA leadership work with the local and state affiliates to promote and plan ONE powerful, positive, public action for the NEA RA delegates to participate in at some point during the 2012 RA.
New Business Item 57
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
NEA shall support participation at NEA/RA by rural and small school associations/chapters by: 1) making (2) $1,000 scholarships available to each state, 2) informing all states through their Executive Committee of scholarships by September 30, 3) allowing states to determine the criteria for awarding them to representative members from locals for 1 or fewer delegate representation, 4) requiring states submit the names of recipients no later than January 30, 5) notifying recipients of awarded scholarships on or before March 10 in tandem with the states, 6) recommending that the Annual Meeting Review Committee determine how these scholarships can be made permanent.
New Business Item 58
Defeated
New Business Item 59
Adopted and referred to Annual Meeting Review Committee
During any and all NEA functions, inclusive of the Representative Assembly, NEA will contract with businesses with unionized employees for services provided to NEA members. In the event unionized services are not available, NEA will ensure that services contracted will be paid the prevailing wage, inclusive of overtime.
New Business Item 60
Referred to the Executive Committee
The NEA will join and publicly endorse the principles of the Campaign for New Priorities.
New Business Item 61
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
We strongly urge that the NEA return to its past tradition of recognizing the women's suffrage movement as critical to the American Civil Rights story by including a tribute to the suffragettes at the 2012 RA during the 4th of July celebration.
New Business Item 62
Withdrawn
New Business Item 63
Defeated
New Business Item 64
Withdrawn
New Business Item 65
Defeated
New Business Item 66
Defeated
New Business Item 67
Defeated
New Business Item 68
Referred to the NEA President As Modified
President Van Roekel will send a letter to the president of the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) supporting the demands of the primarily Latino parents and students currently sitting in at the Whittier Elementary School playground field house, also known as "La Casita." This letter will request that La Casita be converted into a Whittier School library.
New Business Item 69
Adopted As Amended
A piece will be published in the NEA Today about National Board Certification. The pieces will provide basic information about the process and its inherent benefits for teachers, students, parents, and communities.
New Business Item 70
Referred to the Executive Committee
The NEA Executive Committee, or other appropriate committee, will create a study to be presented to the NEA Board of Directors for the consideration of moving the filing deadline for NEA Officers and Executive Committee positions from the present April 15th date to the earliest date possible of the same year. The study and presentation should be completed in a timely manner that would allow the NEA Board of Directors, if they deem appropriate, to submit the necessary bylaw change for the 2012 Representative Assembly for consideration by the delegates.
New Business Item 71
Adopted
NEA will publish in NEA Today an article about successful media campaigns defending public education.
New Business Item 72
Withdrawn
New Business Item 73
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
Prior to selecting specific hotels for future conventions, NEA shall give preference to hotels owned by our retirement systems when all other criteria are considered equal.
New Business Item 74
Defeated
New Business Item 75
Adopted As Amended
Education for All
NEA should urge the Obama campaign, as it develops its campaign priorities for 2012 to make global education a focus via a concrete proposal that elevates education as a development priority.
New Business Item 76
Adopted
NEA will facilitate access to empirical research and reviewed and/or valid studies, for member use, on the NEA website to assist members in combating the concerted attacks on public education and public educators.
New Business Item 77
Refer to Task Force for For-Profit Colleges and Universities
I move that NEA alert members, state associations, and unions to the impact on teaching and teachers posed by the growth of online courses offered by for-profit entities.
New Business Item 78
Adopted As Amended
That NEA explore partnerships with unionized education throughout the world sharing successful practices from their non-political agendas to achieve educational goals with hard to reach students.
New Business Item 79
Adopted As Modified
I move that NEA, through its programs, positions, publications and affiliates, make known the inadequacy of limited health plans in both the private and public sphere.
New Business Item 80
Adopted As Amended
The NEA Representative Assembly directs the NEA President to denounce blatant age discrimination occurring across the United States, as veteran educators are targeted for dismissal by school superintendents and administrators who, under the guise of "improvement plans", often subject these educators to harassment-style management. The President may point out that all school employees over the age of 40 are protected under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, and stress the countless contributions made to public education by veteran teachers.
New Business Item 81
Ruled Out of Order
New Business Item 82
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
The NEA will provide larger monitors and/or more monitors in the Physically Challenged area of the annual NEA Representative Assembly.
New Business Item 83
Defeated
New Business Item 84
Referred to the Executive Committee
I move that NEA through its programs, policy, publications and affiliates make the strong case for a healthy and adequate lunch for the nation's school children. Especially students currently eligible for free/reduced lunch also be eligible for free/reduced breakfast.
New Business Item 85
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
NEA will increase the availability of more healthy food choices at the RA. A greater variety of plant-based meal options from a greater number of vendors is needed.
New Business Item 86
Withdrawn
New Business Item 87
Adopted
Using existing resources, I move that NEA continues to develop and activate an on-going network of members and leaders who are trained to engage the minority community in NEA targeted states, inclusive of but not limited to: Priority Schools, Campaigns and Elections and State Comprehensive Plans around the MCO work.
New Business Item 88
Adopted
That NEA promote through existing media the importance of including world languages in our pre-K-12 schools' curricula and the importance of having live teachers provide this instruction to our students.
New Business Item 89
Withdrawn
New Business Item 90
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
Before any outside speaker disrupts the normal action of the Representative Assembly, plans for admitting delegates through security will be revised so no delegate waits an unreasonable amount of time, i.e. one hour or more.
New Business Item 91
Referred to the Executive Committee
Through existing media, NEA will support, publicize, and encourage members to participate in the 'Rebuild the Dream' movement launched by Van Jones, moveon.org and others.
New Business Item 92
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
The NEA will provide phone and computer recharging stations during the RA.
New Business Item 93
Adopted As Modified
NEA will publicly oppose Teach for America (TFA) contracts when they are used in Districts where there is no teacher shortage or when Districts use TFA agreements to reduce teacher costs, silence union voices, or as a vehicle to bust unions.
New Business Item 94
Adopted
The National Education Association (NEA) will develop and implement a proactive, cross-unit plan for the NEA's Fiscal Year 2012 targeted at alleviating budget pressures on local school systems caused by unfunded mandates, in particular the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The plan will focus on developing coordinated lobbying activities to be conducted by the NEA Directors, the NEA Executive Committee, the Executive Officers, NEA Staff and the NEA membership to increase the additional statutory funding of IDEA to the 40 percent level as stated in the original legislation. This action plan will focus on informing, influencing, and mobilizing Congressional members of the Appropriations Committees as well as key Congressional leaders of both houses, the Department of Education, the Secretary of Education, and the President of the United States, with specific regard to the impact on general education, which has resulted from years of under-funding IDEA and the need for the implementation of an appropriations schedule, beginning this year, that achieves "Full Funding" for IDEA as soon as possible. This effort should intensify and expand NEA's efforts beyond lobbying to insure that all future IDEA appropriations meet the objective of the original federal legislation "Congress may fund up to 40%" of the excess cost above the national average per pupil expenditure (APPE), which is generally referred to as fully funding IDEA.
New Business Item 95
Adopted As Modified
NEA will ensure that outreach to and engagement of the civil rights and ethnic minority communities is a major priority for the organization. NEA will assure that minority community outreach (MCO) is fully funded, centrally directed, and thoroughly integrated throughout the organization.
New Business Item 96
Defeated
New Business Item 97
Referred to the Annual Meeting Review Committee
NEA will look into the feasibility of coordinating voting hours that will not be during the time that RA conducts official business such as Constitutional Amendments, Bylaws and New Business Items that should be considered by the entire body whenever possible.
