Creativity + Activism = New Members

Volunteer action teams give an Idaho local more strength at the table and greater visibility in the community.

Photo by Kim Hughes

NEA local affiliate:
Meridian (Idaho) Education Association (MEA).

The numbers:
In past school years, MEA signed up barely half of the eligible teachers in Meridian, Idaho's largest and fastest growing district. But this year, the local's ranks have grown by 13 percent to 60 percent of potential. "We must keep growing," says MEA President Jerry Helgeson. "We can't let up until we reach 100 percent."

How they got there:

With assistance from the Idaho Education Association (IEA), which targeted 20 local affiliates for growth, MEA formed a volunteer Membership Team that created a detailed plan to recruit new folks at the middle school level, where membership was weak. Team members and local building reps then fanned out to sign up non-members the old-fashioned way: one-on-one contact.

Another organizing stimulus: Meridian teachers began this school year without a new contract, "which gave us an opportunity to educate potential members about the importance of bargaining with high membership," says IEA staffer Terry Gilbert.

MEA and administrators may not agree on everything, "but we are partners in the education of children," says Helgeson, a 40-year high school math teacher on Association leave. "We work a lot on an equal basis and there's great mutual respect."

That relationship, plus a growing MEA membership, helped keep things moving at the bargaining table. After a one-day mediation session, the parties signed a new one-year agreement in October.

The Best 'Organizers' of All:

For all of the Membership Team's work, nobody has spurred MEA membership like state legislators in neighboring Boise. This session, Idaho's ultraconservative legislative majority approved a new Idaho Standards Achievement Test (ISAT)—a statewide, multiple-choice high school exit exam—coming on top of standardized "level tests" that Meridian students must now take to advance in subject areas. ISAT testing, already underway, has tied up some Meridian school libraries and computer labs for up to 12 weeks.

Pile on federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) mandates and school "progress" labels, and "you've got some teachers near the breaking point," says the MEA president. "They need us to help them get through this. It's made the Association more visible and more responsive to their needs."

Putting Members to Work:

MEA taps the energy of members who volunteer to work in one of four MEA "vision" areas—respect, professional development, pay, or publicity and pride—described on a "Stay in Touch" card each spring. Their time commitment has fed the growth of some highly creative grassroots action teams.

Last year, the Time Stress and Teacher Renewal Team hired a massage therapist to "power-massage" the taut muscles of members in nine elementary, middle, and high schools who racked up high MEA "stress quiz" scores for factors such as workload, class size, and "time in which to teach." This year, the Public Relations Team is generating teacher letters to newspapers and creating an electronic slide presentation for the community on the history of the 384-square-mile school system and the importance of public education to democracy.

Two other teams are surveying teachers on the viability of current and past education reforms (a useful lobbying tool) and working overtime to educate politicians and the public on the need to fully fund ESEA and give it greater flexibility. Meanwhile, the Negotiations Support Team, made up of members who completed a for-credit negotiations workshop, is assisting MEA bargainers by visiting school sites to survey members and research issues.

Bring in New Blood:

One young support team member, Christie Maywhoor, showed such promise in the workshop's bargaining role-play session that the local appointed her as "trainee" on its negotiations committee. MEA has also placed four newer teachers—elementary teachers Tami Bromley and Kevin Spenner, middle school teacher Sally Mitchell, and high school teacher Jack Brown—into "at-large" slots on its executive board. "They're so energetic and they provide so much input," says Helgeson. "They've been a tremendous blessing to us."

—Dave Winans

For more, contact Jerry Helgeson.