The Power of Us
The 2000 NEA Representative Assembly

At NEA's annual convention, held this year in Chicago, delegates pledge to protect kids and public schools.

William Wagner won't be competing in the Olympics this September. But for a week this past July, as a delegate to the annual NEA Representative Assembly, this high school biology teacher from Forty Fort, Pennsylvania, felt just like an Olympian.

At an NEA RA, Wagner smiles, "you start out running, swim through a sea of people, and rely on the endurance of an Olympic athlete to make it to the end."

Wagner and nearly 10,000 other NEA members displayed that endurance this July in Chicago, this year's RA site, through four full days of discussion and debate that typically started at 7 a.m., in state caucus meetings, and didn't end until 6 p.m., the close of each day's convention business sessions.

Over the course of those long days, Wagner and his fellow delegates--all elected to represent their colleagues back home--took on just about every tough issue facing NEA members, everything from compensation and high-stakes testing to vouchers and the upcoming November elections.

This year's RA debates were often stormy, particularly on alternate approaches to compensation, but delegates left Chicago united and committed to protecting all children's right to a quality public education.

To back up that commitment, delegates voted, by a two-to-one margin, to raise dues by $5 to counter attacks on public education--and better promote the good things happening in today's public schools.

Sixty percent of the funds raised by this increase will go to help NEA state affiliates fight back against proposals to enact private school tuition vouchers and other attacks on public schools.

The rest of the funding will finance new media campaigns to help create a better image for public education and the men and women who work in America's public schools.

NEA state affiliates, Oregon Education Association President James Sager told delegates, desperately need this support.

"Next year, 26 states will fight vouchers at the ballot box and in the legislature," noted Sager, adding that, in Oregon alone, NEA members will confront 11 hostile inititatives, including measures that would cut school funding up to 30 percent and tie teacher salaries to student test scores.

Salaries and compensation proved to be the RA's hottest debate topic. Delegates spoke out repeatedly about the need to increase pay for teachers and other school staff. And they reiterated NEA's commitment to a single salary schedule that rewards experience and knowledge--proven factors that help boost student achievement.

But delegates didn't agree over the value of alternate approaches to compensation that go beyond the single salary schedule, such as pay plans that award group bonuses to staff at schools that meet certain achievement goals. After two hours of debate, delegates rejected a proposal that would have established NEA criteria for alternative compensation programs.

Considerably less contentious were the elections for NEA officers. Delegates re-elected NEA Secretary-Treasurer Dennis Van Roekel, a high school math teacher from Arizona, and NEA Executive Committee members Iona Holloway, a classroom aide from Louisiana, and Dan Sakota, a junior high school math teacher from Idaho.

By a nine-to-one margin, in secret-ballot voting, delegates also voted to recommend the Presidential candidacy of Al Gore. On the RA's last morning, Vice President Gore came to Chicago's McCormick Place Convention Center to thank delegates for that resounding show of support.

"I will never, ever support private school vouchers," Gore told the Assembly.

Added the Vice President: "Are you ready to fight--and win--for public education?"

The delegates answered with cheers.

Also cheered heartily, with a long standing ovation, was NEA Executive Director Don Cameron, the former junior high teacher from Birmingham, Michigan, who's held NEA's top staff slot since 1983. Cameron will be retiring later this year, and, in his last RA address as executive director, he asked delegates to help "launch education into the 21st century."

"Job number one for NEA," said Cameron, "is to improve student achievement and to secure for our members the skills, knowledge, and resources they need to accomplish this task."

Where We Stand

The delegates to the 2000 NEA RA debated and adopted NEA policy on a host of issues that impact education.

Each year, the NEA members elected as delegates to the NEA Representative Assembly adopt Resolutions that spell out exactly where our Association stands on the many different issues that impact education and educators.

The complete text of this year's Resolutions appears on the Internet at www.nea.org/resolutions.

At this Web site, you can search the Resolutions by keywords to easily locate the specific Resolutions on the topics that most interest you.

If you don't have Web access and would like to have a printed copy of the Resolutions, please mail your request to NEA Today. A printed copy will be mailed to you.

The Resolutions are organized around 10 basic goals set out in the Preamble to the NEA Constitution. Working within these categories, delegates to the 2000 Representative Assembly revised a number of NEA Resolutions and added several others.

You'll find, starting below, the complete text of all the Resolutions that have been either been added or significantly revised since last year.