Welcome back to a new school year! We hope that your summer has been one of rest and reflection even if it was all-too-short! As the summer wound down, FEA was coordinating school visits through the county. In my visits, I had the privilege of visiting members and saw first-hand the hard work to get ready for opening week. The energy and enthusiasm and dedication I see everywhere makes me proud to be a teacher and even prouder to be your President. Thank you for your ideas, your concerns, and your feedback!
This coming year will present many challenges – some new, but many all-to-familiar. We are hard at work lobbying elected officials and the school system for fair compensation and improved working/teaching conditions for all our members and we are not about to let the “ball drop” on the Working Conditions Survey we all took last spring.
On top of this, we have a huge election only weeks away. Your association is not about “telling people how to vote” but we are doing all we can to urge educators to register to vote (deadline Monday, October 6), to stay informed about the candidates and the issues and to vote for education-endorsed candidates on election day.
In the meantime, please come out to our first Representative Assembly on September 17, 2008 at the Ernst Community Center on the NOVA Campus (in Annandale). It will start at 4:45 and is open to all members. We hope to see you there. In the meantime, have a pleasant opening week and remember that FEA is proud to be your professional partner throughout the year!
