The 2020 MTA Annual Meeting of Delegates will be held on Saturday, May 2 — and it will be presented as a virtual meeting for the first time.
The Board of Directors met remotely on March 21 and voted to scale back the meeting from two days to one after discussing health and safety concerns amid the coronavirus pandemic. The Board’s vote was followed two days later by Governor Charlie Baker’s order limiting in-person gatherings to groups of no more than 10 people.
Essential pieces of MTA business will be taken up at the Annual Meeting, including voting on the association’s proposed budget for fiscal 2020-2021 and holding leadership elections.
The meeting will also feature reports by MTA President Merrie Najimy, Vice President Max Page and Executive Director-Treasurer Lisa Gallatin; presentation of an Issues Forum on the MTA All In Blueprint Project; and recognition of outstanding educators, student activists and education allies.
The meeting will be called to order at 9 a.m. on Saturday, May 2, and is expected to end around noon. Delegates will vote for candidates for MTA President, Vice President, and the association’s Board of Directors and Executive Committee. In addition, four Retired Members Committee seats will be filled, with delegates representing the Statewide Retired District taking part in that election.
The Blueprint Project Issues Forum grew out of the work of member and staff committees that began meeting last fall to examine whether the MTA is well positioned to address the challenges and the opportunities ahead in a post-Janus world.
The member group, called the All In Member Blueprint Work Group, surveyed local leaders and held focus groups to develop recommendations for the MTA’s strategic priorities going forward. Those priorities, approved by the MTA Board on March 21, will be the subject of the forum.
Virtual session to focus on elections and MTA budget
At a special meeting on April 7, the Board voted to defer consideration of amendments to Bylaws, Resolutions and Standing Rules to the 2021 Annual Meeting of Delegates.
The Board also adopted special rules for 2020 to address MTA Bylaw Article 7, Section 2.B.(2), regarding the alternative nomination process for MTA President and Vice President at the Annual Meeting. Further information on the process can be found on Page 25 of this edition of MTA Today.
Two MTA members — Takeru Nagayoshi, the 2020 Massachusetts Teacher of the Year and a member of the New Bedford Educators Association, and Sonia Fortin, the 2020 MTA Education Support Professional of the Year and a member of the Sudbury Education Association — will be among the educators honored.
Nagayoshi, an Advanced Placement English teacher at New Bedford High School, is the son of Japanese immigrants and a gay person of color who brings his own life experiences to the fight for equity. Outside of the classroom, he has written op-eds on education issues, he coaches developing teachers in high-need districts, and he lends his voice to panels, committees and task forces that focus on education equity for urban districts.
Fortin was surprised with the MTA ESP of the Year award at a recent meeting of the Sudbury Education Association. Fortin is the sole academic tutor in the Ephraim Curtis Middle School Bridges Program, which provides short-term intensive assistance to students, and the driving force behind the school’s Gay Straight Alliance and the Safe Space Initiative, which provides students with a space in which to gather, talk to friends, and feel safe from judgment.
At a special meeting on April 7, the Board voted to defer consideration of amendments to Bylaws, Resolutions and Standing Rules to the 2021 Annual Meeting of Delegates.
This year’s Friend of Labor Award will be presented to Sara Nelson, international president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO, since 2014. Nelson first became a union member in 1996, when she was hired as a flight attendant at United Airlines. Today she represents 50,000 of aviation’s first responders at 20 airlines.
Nelson made headlines during a 35-day federal government shutdown in 2018-19 when she took to social media and cable TV to warn of the dangers of not paying airport workers — and she called for a general strike to end the shutdown.
This year’s Friend of Education Award will be presented to four players for the New England Patriots — Devin McCourty, Jason McCourty, Duron Harmon and Matthew Slater. The four are members of the Players Coalition, which played a strong advocacy role in the campaign for passage of the Student Opportunity Act. The act, signed into law last November, is set to provide more than $2 billion per year in funding for public schools in Massachusetts once it is fully phased in.
The President’s Award will recognize two young activists, Audrey Lin and Amalia Hochman, who represent the determination and commitment of today’s youth-led environmental movement.
Lin, of Watertown, and Hochman, of Somerville, co-organized the Youth Climate Strike, which drew thousands of people to downtown Boston last September for speeches, a rally and a march to the State House. They will accept the award on behalf of Youth Climate Strike US, the Sunrise Movement and other student-led environmental organizations.
The proposed MTA operating budget of $48,486,926 for fiscal 2020-2021 will be presented and voted on. The Advisory Budget Committee, the Executive Committee and the Board of Directors have proposed annual dues of $480 for full-time active members, which represents a $3 increase from the current year. Under the proposed budget, dues for secretaries, clerks and custodians would rise to $288; dues for aides, food service personnel and other Education Support Professionals would remain at $144.
In addition, the proposed Public Relations/Organizing Campaign budget will be considered. The recommended general dues assessment for the PR/Organizing budget is $20. For secretaries, clerks and custodians, the assessment would be $12; aides, food service personnel and other education support professionals would be assessed $6.
Further information about the Annual Meeting can be found at massteacher.org/annualmeeting
