You powered the #RedForEd movement
Well over 400,000 educators and other public school supporters have participated in the #RedForEd walk-outs, protests, and rallies that are moving the needle on education funding and educator compensation. These actions resulted in significant boosts for education funding, especially in Oklahoma, where lawmakers increased formula funding per student by 19 percent, adjusting for inflation.
Arizona, North Carolina, and West Virginia also saw gains, ranging from 3 to 9 percent per student. That’s progress. However, school funding in those four states remains below pre-recession levels. The work of the #RedForEd movement is not done.
You Elected More Pro-Public Education Leaders
Historic educator activism helped create a more pro-public education environment in the U.S. House of Representatives and in statehouses across the country. Nearly 220,000 NEA members and education families canvassed neighborhoods and made phone calls in support of pro-education candidates at the local, state, and national level. That’s a 165 percent increase over 2016!
Now the majority of U.S. residents live in a state with a pro-public education governor. Seven anti-public school governors got the boot. Pro-public school candidates flipped more than 290 state legislative seats, and seven state chambers now have pro-public education majorities. More than 1,800 current or former educators ran for state legislative seats in 2018, according to an NEA estimate, and more than 1,000 won their elections! An additional 100 educators ran for top state or federal seats, with many more running for seats on school boards and other local bodies.
ISSUES AND IMPACT
You made Washington listen...and act
Remember how your election activism made the U.S. House more public-school friendly? They’ve already passed:
- The NEA-supported the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019 (H.R. 8), which requires a background check for every gun sold as well as most transfers.
- The Recognizing Inspiring School Employees (RISE) Award Program for education support professionals.
- Two more NEA-supported bills passed out of the Education and Labor Committee:
- The Rebuild America’s Schools Act (H.R. 865), which would invest $100 billion to modernize schools, and the Paycheck Fairness Act (H.R. 7), to help ensure equal pay for equal work.
Education activists had nearly 1,000,000 contacts with members of Congress through NEA’s Legislative Action Center and EducationVotes.org!
Your advocacy is getting results. Here are some examples:
- You protected student nutrition. With strong bipartisan support, Congress passed a Farm Bill without provisions that would have affected nutrition benefits for millions of families, and undermined student access to free school meals.
- You helped stymie Betsy DeVos’ privatization push. The Washington Post wrote in September that a major reason DeVos’ $20 billion voucher program never got off the ground was that “teachers unions had so bludgeoned her that lawmakers saw ‘no great benefit and a great deal of pain’ with being associated with her chief cause.” That’s a compliment!
- You helped protect bargaining rights for federal educators. In the face of your activism, the Trump administration pulled the plug on a yearlong effort to strip educators represented by the Federal Employee Association, an NEA affiliate, of their bargaining rights.
What's Next?
Education activists had nearly 1,000,000 contacts with Public education is already a major topic in the upcoming presidential election. That’s because of your activism.
Keep talking about issues like education funding, educator pay, and school safety to help push candidates for office at every level to address those issues.
