Now that a document highlighting lobbying machinations at an AFT affliate in Connecticut has stoked another conversation about teacher unionism and parent empowerment, redefinED wanted to reach into its archives and pull out a memo from the public policy director at the Florida Education Association that also reflects on a singular concern among teachers unions: lost membership.
RedefinED host Doug Tuthill reported on the memo last fall after FEA policy director Jeff Wright urged members to head to the polls and keep Rick Scott out of Florida’s governor’s mansion. Why? Wright said that Scott would enhance merit-pay practices and expand school choice, specifically pointing to enhanced voucher, charter and virtual school policies along with “merit pay in its worst form” that would “obliterate FEA’s and our local unions’ influence.”
“If we are no longer strong due to reduction in the number of people served by public schools,” Wright continued, “then they can do what they want with the education budgets of today.”
