Randi Weingarten elected AFT president |
On Board Online • Around the State • July 21, 2008
By Marc Humbert
Senior Writer
Randi Weingarten, who has led the New York City-based United Federation of Teachers union for 10 years, was elected July 14 to be president of the 1.4 million-member American Federation of Teachers (AFT).
Weingarten’s fellow New Yorker, Antonia Cortese, a former first vice president of the 600,000-member New York State United Teachers union, was elected AFT’s secretary-treasurer. For the past four years, Cortese has been executive vice president of the AFT, the nation’s second-largest teachers’ union.
In an address to the AFT’s convention in Chicago, Weingarten called for the expansion of community schools in which students and their families would have access to a wide range of educational opportunities and social and health services.
“Imagine schools that are open all day, and offer after-school and evening recreational activities and homework assistance; high schools that allow students to sign up for morning, afternoon or evening classes,” she told the delegates. “And suppose the schools included child care and dental, medical and other services the community needs.”
Weingarten also used her speech to argue that the federal No Child Left Behind law wasn’t working.
“We need to prepare students for 21st Century jobs. Employers say that they are looking for workers who can devise new solutions,” she said. “But how will kids who have spent 12 years learning to keep their pencil marks inside the bubbles ever be able to think outside the box?”
Weingarten has created some waves within the teacher unions with her support for several union-run charter schools in New York City and her agreement with Mayor Michael Bloomberg on a merit pay, pilot program that rewards some teachers.
The election of Weingarten, who plans to remain as UFT president in New York, came one day after the national union endorsed Democratic Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential candidacy.
The nation’s largest teachers’ union, the National Education Association, had earlier endorsed Obama.