MTA Union News: Let’s keep the momentum going in 2023

From MTA President Max Page
and Vice President Deb McCarthy

Happy New Year, MTA Members!

We hope you had a restful and joyful break.

Although 2022 is in the rearview mirror, take a moment to enjoy a 30-second ‘year in review’ reel of MTA member actions over the past 12 months.

On Jan. 1, we kicked off 2023 with the implementation of the Fair Share Amendment, the new tax on taxable income over $1 million a year, with the proceeds going to public education and transportation.

We hope you’ll never forget the central role you and our union played in this historic victory. Without the MTA and its members, the sixth effort to win progressive taxes in Massachusetts would have failed. Tell your children and grandchildren!

Now, we need to ensure a fair share of those funds go to public education. We should also be proud that our union helped advance the minimum wage, which went up to $15 an hour on Jan. 1. Although we are still fighting for the minimum wage to apply to municipal workers, moving from $7 to $11 to $15 an hour has lifted thousands of our students' families out of poverty, and will ultimately help us win higher wages for all, including our ESP members.

It's going to be quite the year, and we’re committed to doing everything we can to ensure that all Massachusetts families have access to a good education. We are ready to fight for fair raises for higher education faculty and staff; debt-free public higher education for our state’s families; and continued living wage advances for ESPs. We’ll also be pushing for more counselors, nurses, and librarians in our schools, and an end to the high-stakes testing regime.

MTA Events and Solidarity Actions

An Ongoing List of Solidarity Actions

Check out this list to view upcoming actions! Please add your own with this form. The more we show up for one another, the more power we generate for local and statewide campaigns.

Winning Our Statewide Campaigns

In a series of workshops for member activists, we will introduce our statewide campaigns to our membership. These regional Constituent Power Building Workshops will train members on our initiatives, as well as how to be effective advocates. The series will follow this schedule:

• January 17: Worcester, at 4 p.m.

• January 19: Holyoke, at 4 p.m.

• January 24: Lynnfield, at 4 p.m.

• January 31: Raynham, at 4 p.m.

• February 4: Boston, at 9 a.m. (at the MTA Winter Union Skills Conference)

All workshops are in partnership with Act On Massachusetts.

Student Loan Forgiveness Updates

You might have heard that the pause on federal student loan payments has once again been extended, but the date on which they will resume has not yet been determined. There has also been a new payment adjustment opportunity added to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program that provides a one-time opportunity to have payment counts increased. To learn more about these updates and sign up for a webinar, click here.

MTA Events

The MTA will be offering another installment of Licensure Workshops this month. The Basics for Provisional and Initial Licensure is scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 12 and will cover the first steps toward licensure, making it appropriate for aspiring educators, ESPs, and early career educators. Acquiring and Renewing Your Professional License is scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 26 and will focus on moving from an initial to a professional license and the Professional License renewal process. This workshop is meant for educators with three-plus years of employment. Both workshops will run from 4 to 5:30 p.m. Please register here.

Please join us for MTA’s Union Skills Winter Conference in Boston on Feb. 4. The conference will include a variety of 75-minute workshops related to the core activities of local unions. Offerings center on the MTA’s NEW Bargaining Certificate Program, grievance handling, organizing against MCAS, communications, leadership development, contract campaigns and more. There will also be an opportunity to learn about the MTA’s legislative goals and how members can get involved to support the Higher Ed for All campaign, an end to MCAS, and the right to strike. Space is limited, click here to register.

Delegate Nomination Deadlines Approach

The nomination period for several delegate positions is now open and will conclude on Friday, Jan. 13.

MTA Annual Meeting of Delegates (April 28-29, 2023, in Springfield)

Retired Delegates to Annual Meeting
Regional or Retired Ethnic Minority Delegates to Annual Meeting

NEA-Representative Assembly (July 2-6, 2023, in Orlando, Florida)

MTA Regional Delegate to NEA-RA
MTA Statewide Delegate to NEA-RA
MTA Retired Delegate to NEA-RA

The online nomination forms for all of the previous delegate seats are due no later than 5 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 13. Details on these and other elections that will take place in 2023, as well as information on Bylaws, Standing Rules, and Resolutions submissions, can be found here.

Local Delegate Seats: If interested in serving as a local delegate to the MTA Annual Meeting or the NEA-RA, please speak to your local president or election chair about timing and your local’s nomination/election process. In most cases, nominations and elections for these local seats take place each year from February through March or early April.

Regional and Retired Ethnic Minority Delegates to the 2023 Annual Meeting

MTA affirms its commitment to the goal of maximizing ethnic minority participation in all levels of organizational governance. One way that is fulfilled is through the allocation of ethnic minority delegate seats to the Annual Meeting. This delegate allocation is equal to the number of district directors from each MTA electoral region, plus two such delegate seats for the retired membership. An election will be held to fill the seats among the nominations received. We encourage ethnic minority members to self-nominate to fill these positions. The nomination deadline is 5 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 13, and the online nomination form is available here.

All Presidents Meeting – Saturday, Jan. 21, 1 to 5 p.m.

At our fall meeting, we focused on winning the Fair Share Amendment – and we did it! Now, local presidents will gather on Sat, Jan. 21 from 1 to 5 p.m., to make sure these funds are being appropriated the way they should in our schools. We will also kick off our campaigns against high stakes testing; continue to build the power of our locals and statewide union; and hear from our colleagues who executed impressive contract campaigns in 2022. Please ask your local president to invite you to the meeting.

Political Education

The good news is that unions are more respected than they have been for half a century. The bad news is that our laws, including in Massachusetts, are stacked against workers and our unions.

A thank you to Noah Berger, director of the MTA’s Center for Education Policy and Practice, for sharing this video of Bobby Kennedy. This is a good reminder that we shouldn’t be evaluating the success of our nation solely on how much wealth the richest among us have.

If you have books or articles that will advance our learning as union members, please email them to MTAgovernance@massteacher.org.

In Solidarity,

Max and Deb

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