Policy | News

National Education Association, Teach Plus Launch 'Future of the Profession' Fellowship

• By Joshua Bolkan
• 10/15/13

The National Education Association (NEA) and Teach Plus have selected 53 teachers to become Future of the Profession Fellows.

Offering year-long fellowships, the new program will offer fellows, most of whom are in their first decade of teaching, "a foundation in education policy, research, and best practices from around the nation," according to a news release. "Together, they will advise the leadership of the NEA on policies that they believe will better serve students and retain excellent teachers."

This year's fellows come from 14 states and will meet for monthly virtual working sessions and three meetings in Washington, D.C. throughout the year.

"We are excited to partner with Teach Plus to help build the next generation of teacher leaders," said Dennis Van Roekel, president of NEA, in a prepared statement. "Teachers must take the lead to ensure that every student has a qualified, caring, and effective educator in their classroom. The identified fellows will be instrumental in furthering NEA's goal of providing great public schools for every student."

"For the NEA, the partnership represents a move to engage more intensively with union members who are in the first decade of their careers," according to a news release. "At an historical moment when teachers with 10 or fewer years' experience are a new majority of the teaching profession, the fellowship will allow the NEA to invest in these earlier career teachers and ensure that their voices and perspectives are represented. Future of the Profession Fellows have proven their commitment to working with their union rather than apart from it, while also challenging it to evolve."

"The NEA is proving that they recognize that teachers are not a monolith, and that they value the voices of teachers who want to see their profession evolve," said Celine Coggins, Teach Plus founder and CEO, in a prepared statement. "By joining together to elevate the voices of these solutions-oriented teachers, we are moving toward a profession that looks to its own practitioners to be the change they seek."