When MEA member Amy Rever-Oberle experienced a mishap on a field trip with 150 sixth-grade band students and 30 adult chaperones from Rochester Community Schools, she handled it, got everyone back to school early, and let administration know what happened. Over the next few days, the principal responded to a few parent questions, and life […]
By Glen Young Educators in northern Michigan are utilizing a national grant award to help develop curriculum to address topics of social justice and strengthen reading in local schools. “Building A More Perfect Union” funding is supporting 38 groups nationally in anticipation of the upcoming 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, according […]
As local bargaining teams head to negotiating tables this spring, MEA has new data showing in many places educator compensation has not kept pace with school funding increases, information which could be used to justify significant pay increases. Statewide trends show all school employees’ compensation as a share of total school district expenditures has fallen […]
THE STORY One year ago, a group of Oakland County teachers began negotiating a new contract. They had been underpaid for a long time. Their bargaining unit was not tightly organized. They had little union infrastructure or member involvement. Few members even knew what the contract said. Yet today those educators boast major contract wins […]
By Brenda Ortega MEA Voice Editor Things weren’t going according to plan at a recent meeting of the board of Brandywine Community Schools in Niles, where community opposition is growing as a new board majority has begun to enact an extreme political agenda targeting library books and teaching materials. Missing two of its seven members, […]
By Brenda Ortega MEA Voice Editor Like many other MEA members who are alumni of Michigan State University, Marissa Teslak returned to her beloved alma mater less than a week after the devastating mass shooting that killed three students and critically wounded five others. A behavioral consultant in Warren Consolidated Schools, Teslak and her 11-year-old […]
My first article back in August, titled “A Chance Encounter,” was a tribute to the love I hold for my mother and the teaching profession. This is my last article for the My View series, and upon much reflection I decided to write a love letter to honor all my educator colleagues. Anyone who knows […]
Many people think of collective bargaining for salary, benefits and working conditions as the most essential benefit of union membership, but the solidarity created by belonging to a union family is at least as important. That solidarity was demonstrated recently through the work of both AEM (Aspiring Educators of Michigan) members and MiNE (Michigan New […]
Bryan Schuerman plays two roles that put him in the spotlight: Family Consumer Sciences teacher in Grosse Pointe and weekend meteorologist at WDIV-TV in Detroit. How did you end up pursuing two demanding careers? In about 2012, I was working Monday through Friday nights doing the 7 and 11 p.m. newscast in Hagerstown, Maryland. I […]
In just over three years since she became co-president of her local support staff union in Kalkaska, Jessica Davenport has worked hard to rebuild membership numbers that had dropped low enough to put her unit on the cusp of being disbanded. She faced bigger-than-normal challenges not long after getting started when the global pandemic made […]
