News:
Heroes & Zeroes

Missouri NEA members lost a true champion of public education when Governor Mel Carnahan died in an October plane crash. His legacy includes reduced class sizes in lower grades, safer classrooms, and funding for full-day kindergarten and summer school programs. Missouri voters agree that Carnahan was pretty special, electing him posthumously to the U.S. Senate in November. Carnahan's widow, Jean, will fill that seat.

Illinois's Triad District school board recently bargained a contract with the 50-member Triad ESP Association without ever mentioning what was, apparently, the board's follow-up goal: scrapping a 20-year policy permitting termination only for "just cause." Now the district faces an unfair labor practice charge and some very disappointed secretaries and paras. "If a goal of education is to teach fair treatment," says para Ellen Schoenen-berg, "the same standard should apply to treatment of our district employees."

Sue Priest, president of the Scio (Oregon) Classroom Teachers Association is most definitely a hero to Scio High School counselor Vivian Weglin. Priest, a middle school teacher, "is always right there when any member needs support," Weglin says. "She invests enormous amounts of time in helping us, keeps us on top of the information we need to know, and stands beside us all the way when any of us has difficulties with the administration or school board. She's an excellent advocate!"