On the eve of Independence Day, NEA’s 2025 Friend of Education Josh Cowen said in his address to the NEA Representative Assembly that he has been thinking about the words of Thomas Jefferson: “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
“Each of us has probably seen that phrase a thousand times in our lives,” he told the nearly 7,000 delegates gathered in Portland, Oregon, on July 3. “But I want to use this opportunity to talk about what it means for me and what I think it means for all of us moving forward.”
Cowen, a professor of education policy at Michigan State University, a proud NEA member, and a researcher who has extensively studied and written about school vouchers, is one of the foremost critics of the school voucher movement. It is for this work that he is being recognized with the Friend of Education award, NEA's highest honor, recognizing individuals, organizations, or groups who have significantly improved American education on a national level.
“As we’ve seen, threats to public education, and to public investments in all of our futures—from health care, to jobs, to retirement security, and even basic, affordable costs of living—this is all very much breaking news,” he said.
“Breaking” as in urgent, he explained, but also “breaking” as in a forceful, threatening undoing.
“Because that’s what’s at stake here. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for everyone,” Cowen said.
Cowen is well-known for fighting Betsy DeVos’s school voucher schemes in Michigan and around the country, but he told the delegates that vouchers are only one part of a vast political agenda supported by billionaires that would harm students and their families.
As Cowen highlighted his leadership in supporting students, educators and public schools, Michigan Republicans had just voted in Congress to take resources away from the 90% of students who attend public schools to pay for tax cuts for billionaires—including DeVos.
“And we know not just the DeVos's, but other Republicans are gearing up to make 2026 in Michigan the ‘education election’ for their priorities like more standardized testing, cuts to public school funding, and yes, school vouchers.”
He said he is committed to continuing to fight that agenda. He acknowledged that it’s going to get harder, and it just got a lot harder after the passage of the Trump bill earlier today. But he encouraged delegates to visit JoshCowenMI.com next week for more news on how he will continue to fight.
“I’m going to need some help in the work to defend public schools. And Medicaid, Social Security, jobs, and so much more.”
That, he explained, is why he has been thinking about the Declaration of Independence, and its promise of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—and reminding all of us that what is at stake is our democracy.
“A democracy that works for everyone is an economy that works for everyone,” Cowan said. “And an economy that works for everyone is a democracy that works for everyone.”
Read Cowen’s full remarks to the NEA 2025 Representative Assembly.
