Protect Our Schools

By Brenda Ortega MEA Voice Editor Voucher schemes and the resulting cuts to public education funding have an outsized impact on rural regions where public schools are typically the center of their communities. (Adobe Stock Images) The nation’s first federal school voucher scheme was tucked inside the tax cuts and spending plan that Republicans in Congress passed and President Donald…

UPDATE - July 25: Nearly a month late, the Trump administration abruptly unfroze billions in education funding withheld from states by the U.S. Department of Education. Pushes for the funding, due to school districts by July 1, came from constituent calls to Congress and a lawsuit filed by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel and 21 other states. It’s a good…

This week, the U.S. Senate narrowly passed (thanks to Vice President Vance’s tie-breaking vote) a dangerous budget reconciliation bill that provides tax breaks for billionaires at the expense of health care, food assistance and education programs for working families. The bill now returns to the U.S. House, where your representative’s vote will help determine the ultimate outcome. Among the major…

Check out this opinion piece from the Lansing State Journal by MEA Senior Executive Director Erik Edoff and Peter Spadafore, executive director of the Michigan Alliance for Student Opportunity: In a time of deep political division, it’s rare for management and labor to speak with one, united voice. But this moment calls for exactly that. Michigan’s congressional delegation must protect…

Congress is considering a dangerous budget proposal that includes a $20 billion federal school voucher scheme, which would drain critical resources from neighborhood public schools and funnel taxpayer dollars to for-profit private schools elsewhere. To add insult to injury, the budget proposal would make huge cuts to Medicaid for families and children across Michigan, causing further harm to low-income students,…

Educators across Michigan wore Red for Ed and held events to recognize May Day on Thursday, known as International Workers Day, as part of national actions continuing this weekend to stand for dignity, justice, and public investment in our careers, schools, and students’ lives. Numerous #MayDayStrong events are planned for Saturday. Find one near you! Local actions were part of…

This Thursday, May 1, is International Workers Day – and this year it will be marked with a May Day Strong National Day of Action that NEA is participating in across the country. Educators will join workers, parents, students, and community members to stand for dignity, justice, and public investment in our careers, our schools, and our students’ lives. Here in Michigan, we’re asking all MEA members to Wear Red…

By Brenda Ortega MEA Voice Editor An image out of Dr. Seuss: Educators and their families — including the littlest ones — were joined by friends and community members in a Day of Action along Woodward Avenue in Oakland County last Thursday. In Horton Hears a Who by Dr. Seuss, only the kindly elephant with his enormous ears can hear…

Over a long career—first in the U.S. Army and now as a teacher in the career and technical education (CTE) field—MEA member Mike Cook has always used education and training to reinvent himself and build a resume of marketable skills. This year Cook began creating a new CTE program in Redford Union Schools, a western suburb of Detroit, to teach…

By Brenda Ortega MEA Voice Editor (L-R) NEA Secretary-Treasurer Noel Candelaria, NCHE President Alec Thomson, MEA Vice President Brett Smith, NCHE Vice President Marcia Mackey Nearly 30 years from the start of his labor activism as a graduate student organizer, MEA member Alec Thomson returned to his union origins on the campus of Wayne State University on Tuesday to protest…