When kids first learn to cross the street, we tell them to stop, look both ways and assess the traffic before they proceed. Similarly, when it comes to decisions affecting the education of millions of our nation's public school students, we should exercise the same common sense.

Iron Man 3 just opened this past weekend, followed soon by more would-be blockbusters. I'm sure a lot of these movies will be entertaining, but none will be more important or relevant than a half-hour documentary I recently watched: The United States of ALEC.

This film, featuring...

In 1946 more than 1,100 St. Paul teachers staged a five-week walkout for better pay and working conditions. It was the nation's first teacher strike. Over the next six decades, the sight of striking teachers walking a picket line became the indelible image symbolizing teacher might. Now a new face...

Despite the flurry of campaign attack ads claiming candidates are either job killers or job creators, one thing remains clear: If the United States is to hold a competitive edge in a rapidly changing global workforce, bolstering the nation's science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) workforce is essential. It's also...

If you Google "Mitt Romney out of touch," search results include headlines on workers, Latinos and women. Given his rhetoric, it's only a matter of time before we can add "educators" to the list.

In May, Romney introduced his plan for overhauling education with a speech where...

"Start every day with a good breakfast." How many of us heard this as kids in school?

Many of us don't eat breakfast, content to fuel up later in the day. But what if you're a child that missed breakfast because your family simply doesn't have the food or...

The NEA convention always inspires me, and the meeting this year was no exception. Everyone in attendance could sense our members' passion for public education, and our willingness to take charge of our professions in order to help students achieve.

After all, that's why...

I talked to a first-grade teacher some time back who told me she was retiring, and when I asked her what made her decide that it was time to leave the classroom, she said, "When they handed me the script." In light of recent news developments, I began...

For as long as we have had struggling schools in America's cities, there have been efforts to turn them around. Those of us committed to equal opportunity have always believed that education gives students a foothold on the ladder to success. Yet recent studies show the role of education as...

Over the past week, an almost unthinkable series of events unfolded in the Chester Upland School District near Philadelphia.

District leaders told educators that there wouldn't be enough money to pay them. Despite this disturbing and surprising news, educators voted to continue working as long as they were personally able...

NEA's Three-Point Plan to Strengthen Teaching, Improve Student Learning

The status quo in public education isn't working. Not for students -- and not for educators. Now, more than ever, our schools need a highly skilled and effective teaching force to guide students in meeting the challenges of the 21st century.

This piece comes to us courtesy of Education Nation’s The Learning Curve blog. Dennis Van Roekel, president of the National Education Association, writes.

This summer, the National Education Association took a historic vote and adopted a new policy statement. It put us on the...

When we see the face of a child, we think of the future. We think of their dreams about what they might become, and what they might accomplish. But today, there are 72 million children in the world who have had at least part of their futures stolen from them....

"Our society will not be great until every young mind is set free to scan the farthest reaches of thought and imagination."--Lyndon Johnson

In 1965, President Johnson laid out his vision for an America that would see an "an end to poverty and racial injustice" and where every child would...

Few people who saw Slumdog Millionaire were surprised when it swept the Academy Awards, winning eight Oscars including Best Picture. The inspiring and profitable rags-to-riches tale is now a bonafide phenomenon, one of the few independent movies to zoom past the $200 million mark at the worldwide box office.

The...