Teachers Union Pushing Politics
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Teachers Union Pushing Politics
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Teachers are leaving their unions over overt political pushes. As teachers unions promote the left’s agenda, we must pray.
From The Epoch Times. Imagine part of your paycheck is removed each month and sent to a rich, powerful nonprofit that advances culture-changing causes in conflict with your values, such as anti-gun legislation, promoting racism, and teaching children to how to alter their gender.
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That is the reality for many teachers union members.
Some Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) members were troubled in 2021 when the union presented a 10-hour workshop, “Nice White Parents: A Look at How Parent Groups Have Systemically Impacted the Education System.”
A workshop flyer promised to discuss the “key driver blocking educational integration and equity: the actions of white families.”
PSEA is a 178,000-member union for Pennsylvania educators, administrators, higher education professionals, and pupil services professionals. It is affiliated with the National Education Association (NEA), which is the largest labor union in the United States, showing 2.9 million members in 2021. NEA membership has declined about 5 percent since 2017 when it had 3 million members.
NEA Union Dues at Work
Most of the NEA’s revenue is from member dues. The union’s 990 tax exempt form for 2019, the most recent available, shows it received $375 million in membership dues and $6.5 million from investment income. Including other listed income streams such as advertising and rental income, the NEA’s total 2019 revenue was $389 million.
The NEA’s 2021 Form LM-2 Labor Organization Annual Report shows the union with $443 million in total assets. …
The NEA spent $66 million dollars on political activities and lobbying in 2021 compared to $32 million dollars spent on representation activities for members.
Out of Teachers’ Pockets
School districts remove union dues from each member’s pay and send it to the local union, where it is split. A large percentage is sent to the regional and national arms of the union. Dues vary but are roughly $1,000 a year. …
NEA Political Agenda
After its July Representative Assembly, the NEA published a list revealing the union’s agenda, including proposed amendments to its constitution, bylaws, and about 85 new rules awaiting debate by its membership. The Epoch Times asked the NEA which rules have been adopted since then. The NEA did not respond.
“Only NEA delegates are allowed to see what was approved, so they are hiding it from the general public,” Majewski said, adding that the public pays taxes for teachers salaries and funds the money given to the union which influences what children are taught.
The following are some of the proposed rules:
- NEA will inform states and local unions of what it calls “LGBTQIA+ inclusive language” that may appear in contracts, including “parental leave” instead of “maternity leave,” “parent” instead of “mother or father,” “birthing parent” instead of “mother,” and “non-birthing parent” instead of “father.”
- NEA will ensure recruitment of diverse school board candidates, including “queer and people of color,” in “the wake of right-wing attacks on diversity, inclusion, and equity reform.”
- “NEA shall acknowledge the existence in our country of institutional homophobia and transphobia.”
- NEA “will encourage members and others to wear orange every Tuesday during September and October to show support for common-sense gun safety laws.” …
- “NEA will publicly stand in defense of abortion and reproductive rights and encourage members to participate in activities including rallies and demonstrations, lobbying and political campaigns, educational events, and other actions to support the right to abortion, contraception, and a person’s decision about their health.” …
- NEA will issue a press release calling on the Biden administration to increase the number of Supreme Court justices.
- NEA will work toward a national policy of mandatory masking and COVID-19 vaccines in schools.
- “NEA will demonstrate its support for the right to asylum for migrants from Venezuela and Central America now arriving at the U.S. southern border.”
- “NEA will educate members and the public about the history, culture, and struggles of Palestinians, including the detention, abuse, and displacement of children in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the publication said. Sources should include, but not be limited to, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and B’Tselem–Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories.” …
Easy to Join, Tough to Leave
Union membership was mandatory for many public school employees until the 2018 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the case of Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. …
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2018 that it was unconstitutional under the First Amendment to compel public employees to subsidize union advocacy and political speech that the employees disagreed with. …
But there is pressure to stay in the union, and some employees believe they can’t leave. …
Many employees sign onto the union believing it is required. “The rule of thumb is that unions are trying to make it as difficult as possible for people to resign,” [Max Nelsen, director of labor policy at Freedom Foundation] said.
COVID Policies Ended Union Loyalty
Carolyn Powers, an educator at a school district in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, said the NEA is overtly political.
“I was getting very upset with how political it was. They were putting things in our mailbox telling us who to vote for and I just didn’t feel that politics and school should ever be meshed,” Powers told The Epoch Times. “I taught fifth grade for most of my career and the kids in my class never knew my political affiliation, because my job as a teacher is to teach them how to think, not what to think.” …
Allison Crognale, a Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Spanish teacher and student council adviser, left the NEA and also joined KEYTA.
During the COVID-19 shutdown, Crognale became disenchanted with the NEA and PSEA when she saw the union pushing mandatory vaccine mandates for teachers. And there was also the politics.
“No matter how many times I spoke to my building representatives, they told me that they did not give any money to politics in any way shape or form,” Crognale told The Epoch Times. “Yet, constant, beautiful flyers were being sent to my house, endorsing candidates that go against everything in my being.” …
“It was all politics, politics, politics. And then it became all masking and vaccines, and I just thought, I’m paying these people a lot of money and they don’t represent me,” Crognale said. …
“I know a lot of people in my district alone, let alone other districts, are leaving or considering leaving because of the political affiliation,” Powers said. “And it’s not because of Republicans or Democrats. It’s because they don’t think politics and education should be interwoven together.”
How are you praying against the politicization of teachers unions? Share this article to keep people informed.
(Excerpt from The Epoch Times. Photo Credit: Canva)
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Father, We thank You for people standing for truth and righteousness . We thank You that You are setting the prisoners free from these union prisons. We thank You that You are opening bigger and better opportunities for Your people. Give the teachers and staff courage and wisdom to continue to stand against this satanic attack on our children’s education. Discipline these evil doers with Your righteous right hand. Dry up their funding. Show these lost people Your glory Father so that they will repent and surrender to You completely.. In Jesus name. Amen
My husband was a teaching in Long Island NY and quit the union after the supreme court decision in 2018 for these exact reasons. He was basically threatened by his administration that he would be ostracized by his peers and called a free-loader. He faced back-lash but wouldn’t let his money go to these anti-christ organizations! He ended up being fired this year for refusing to wear a mask any longer and force the kids to wear them. We believe that if he was a union member the administration would not have turned against him. We are considering a wrongful termination lawsuit.
People. Home school or put your children in Christian schools.
If enough parents would do this then these teacher’s wouldn’t have jobs .
They need to learn that they are there to teach what most of us grew up learning.
Keeps politics and your liberal and sexual views out of the public schools and universities.
I know that Christian schools used to have so many scholarships for parents who couldn’t afford to pay. At least where we lived.
Lord, please help our good educators to wake up and see the deception, lies and even destruction of the precious little hearts and even bodies that they are helping to pay for through their dues. Bring them together in unity to understand, to walk in truth and in solidarity leave in droves. In the precious name of Jesus!
unions in general are good and necessary to keep the balance between management and labor and prevent employer abuses, However, the union’s role should end at seeing that the rights of workers are protected. Today, unions have far overstepped their bounds and union abuses are equally rampant as employer abuses once were. Furthermore unions as a whole have no business in politics. Individual members have the absolute right to be as politically active as they choose, but the union as an organization should not be involved.
I am now retired but when I was working in my school district as a school nurse, I was not “required” to join the teacher’s union which I would have been a part of, but even if I didn’t join, the union would take 90% of the dues that members paid from my paycheck. The excuse was that I benefitted from what the union negotiated even if I was not a member. For example, if a union member paid $1000 per year in dues, I was required to pay $900 which came directly out of my paycheck. I was also told that dues that only a small portion was used politically yet my mailbox was normally full of political mail paid for by the NEA during every election. They were always for candidates I could not support. I live in Wisconsin and this policy did change under Gov. Walker.
The NEA has been one of the biggest contributors to the DNP for decades. Back in the 1990’s, you could not even APPLY for teaching jobs unless you were a member of a teacher’s union. And colleges and universities took it for granted that all those graduating with degrees in education would automatically sign up with a union when the options were briefly presented with no real details offered in what was involved in membership. So never mind being trapped in a union, you were trapped with an almost useless degree if you didn’t join- otherwise you could not get hired in the majority of school districts.
So true, our job as educators is to teach students “how to think, not what to think.” The fact that they make membership mandatory, is a red flag – and then they don’t represent the very people they force to pay dues. Teachers who wish to leave the union so as not to support candidates and causes that go against their personal beliefs, should be allowed to do so. And if there were a very significant decline in membership, resulting in a decline of finances, it would also result in a decline in power of this oppressive NEA. That would be the best way to “defund” them and lessen their influence nationally and locally. Teachers should not have their union telling them what to teach, what causes to support and who to vote for. I saw one of their proposed rules was for mandatory masking and covid-19 vaccines in schools – both of these falsehoods have already been debunked I would think, as neither stopped the spread and the vaccines actually do harm, which we are witnessing daily as more people die “of unknown causes” and heart attacks and blood clots. And studies are out about the harm masks do to young children and their language and social development. The power of the NEA to make decisions for teachers and schools needs to be taken away and given back to the teachers and their individual schools and the parents of the students. Parents are now speaking up and getting involved – parents, not the NEA, are the voices that should be heard. And actually, as the taxpayers, the parents are paying the NEA’s salary. Praying for truth and transparency to lead to change and that teachers that want to leave the union will have the courage to and be able to do so. http://www.mtothe5th.wordpress.com
In my lifetime I have belonged to 2 labor unions. The first one was when I worked for The Bell Companies. I belonged to Communication Workers of America, by choice. It was before paying dues was mandatory. They represented us workers and had a wonderful relationship with us and the management. The other union was the NEA, OEA (Ohio), and the local MTA as a teacher! For 23 years I received zero representation! Whatever the administration said was what happened! I received a flyer telling me how happy they were to support Hillary Clinton and I called and said it is not your money; and I don’t support her! Who are you to support anyone without teacher input? From that day I tried to stop paying dues. I eventually took a part time job and I didn’t have to pay dues! It is so anti-American to force teachers to support any organization they disagree with! FATHER GOD please shut down every union that does not represent the people in JESUS NAME! Amen!