Julia Norman

There are many things we need to simultaneously be doing to strengthen public education and the associations that support our profession. When elected as your NEA Director, representing in both the NEA and MTA Board room, I vow the listen to your stories and fight those battles with you.

Specifically, I believe we need to:

1. Fully fund PreK-16 Public Schools - Massachusetts voters led the way in our nation when they passed the Fair Share Amendment. However, our fight isn't over until we meet the needs of all our students. This includes more mental health supports, increasing transportation costs, making investments in technology and infrastructure, and increased funding to rural school districts. 

2. Fair Pay and Benefits - Recent local actions have been the catalyst for bargaining priorities that include paid family and medical leave. In addition, we must ensure that all educators, especially ESP members, are earning a living wage. One job should be enough! I have stood by in solidarity with our MTA locals who voted to strike to demand the respect our profession deserves. I am entering negotiations in my own local this spring and do so armed with the victories those trailblazing locals who have won big for all educators across the Commonwealth.

3. Dignified Retirement - Our retirees have dedicated their lives to the profession and we must continue the fight so they can live out their retirement years in comfort, without financial stressors. After decades of advocacy, the US government finally repealed the GPO/WEP but we must continue our advocacy. I am a strong supporter of the MTRS RetirementPlus bill that will allow those of us an additional opportunity to opt-in to Retirement Plus after the debacle rollout of the program in 2001. Join me at the statehouse on February 18 to advocate for this fix!

4. High Stakes Testing - MTA members should be proud of the work they did to pass the ballot question to replace the MCAS graduation requirement. Just because we have removed the high stakes from the students, doesn't mean that they don't still exist for our members. We need to eliminate state receivership based on MCAS scores and fully fund those districts. We need to change the narrative from one of punitive measures to support. It is evident to educators that the only thing MCAS consistently and accurately measures is a student's zip code. We also need to work to make Mass Core mandatory and look for alternatives to a test that has proven, over and over, to be unfair and biased.