The NEA Strike (2024): Issues, Context, & Impact

What happens when America’s largest education union faces off against its own staff? How can a labor organization known for protecting workers’ rights end up in a bitter dispute with its employees?

The National Education Association (NEA) strike in 2024 marked an historic moment in American education, as the NEA locked horns with its staff over wages, healthcare, and alleged unfair practices. This unprecedented conflict led to canceled events, political ripples, and a complex web of accusations.

Keep reading to discover how this internal battle exposed deep contradictions within one of the nation’s most influential labor organizations and its lasting impact on the education sector.

The NEA Strike (2024)

The National Education Association (NEA), America’s largest education union representing three million educators, finds itself in an unprecedented labor dispute with its own staff over wages, health care, and alleged unfair labor practices. The NEA strike in 2024 is the first in 50 years, forcing the NEA to cancel its annual assembly and prompting criticism from other labor organizations. As negotiations remain strained, both sides have turned to a mediator for resolution, while the ongoing dispute has resulted in a lockout and exposed deep rifts within the organization.

The Details

Staff members of the National Education Association (NEA) went on strike in June 2024 for the first time in a half century. They picketed for three days outside their employer’s Washington, D.C., headquarters and subsequently were locked out.

This unusual scenario pits America’s largest education union against its own employees. Roughly 350 of these staff members belong to the National Education Association Staff Organization (NEASO), which was founded in 1952 to represent NEA employees in labor negotiations. NEASO has historically negotiated three-year agreements with the NEA, which itself represents three million educators, retired educators, and soon-to-be-educators.

The walkout followed the expiration of NEASO’s contract on May 31, 2024. Negotiations had reached an impasse over issues including wages, health coverage, worker safety, and disciplinary procedures. The NEA claims it repeatedly offered to extend the previous contract during negotiations, an assertion NEASO leadership strongly refutes. While NEASO voted several times in recent years to authorize strikes, this is the first time since 1971 that they stopped work after such a vote.

The Issues

Experts say that, along with unresolved issues surrounding health coverage, worker safety, and disciplinary procedures, several key disputes lie at the heart of the conflict between NEASO and the NEA:

• Wage dispute. The NEA says it’s offered staff competitive compensation, raising average salaries from $124,000 to $133,000, but NEASO argues this represents less than a 2% annual increase for most members following years of stagnant wages.
• NLRB complaints. NEASO has filed complaints with the NLRB. NEA leadership has denied wrongdoing, stating their commitment to fair bargaining and insinuating that NEASO has spread disinformation. The complaints allege that:
  • The NEA made unilateral changes to working conditions without proper negotiation, including retracting holiday overtime pay.
  • An NEA manager assaulted and then retaliated against a staff member who reported the incident.
• Outsourcing concerns. NEASO members have criticized the NEA for using member dues to pay contractors hundreds of millions of dollars for work that could have been performed by members themselves—and then refusing to share details about it.
• Spending controversy. NEASO accuses NEA leadership of misusing member dues for personal expenditures, including racking up an $8,500 bill for hairstyling services for the organization’s president over a three-day period.

The Context

The strike by NEASO members had immediate and far-reaching consequences for the NEA’s operations, halting the NEA’s July 4 Representative Assembly—a crucial annual event where delegates vote on the union’s budget and priorities. President Joe Biden subsequently canceled his scheduled speech at the convention in solidarity with striking workers.

NEA officials, who said that ending the convention early cost the organization $12 million, responded by canceling striking workers’ hotel rooms and returning flights and revoking their access to work emails and phones. The situation deteriorated on July 7, 2024, when NEA management imposed a lockout, barring staff from working and withholding their pay until an agreement has been reached.

On August 1, the NEA further escalated tensions by threatening to terminate striking workers’ health benefits, contradicting the union’s stance on worker protections. Following backlash from labor advocates, the NEA reversed course, agreeing to maintain health coverage throughout the dispute.

The Impact

The conflict between the NEA and NEASO has reverberated beyond the immediate parties involved, impacting both the broader labor movement and political arena:

• Union backlash. The NEA’s actions have drawn criticism from across the labor movement, with other unions and labor leaders condemning what they view as union-busting tactics.
  • Various unions joined NEASO members at an impromptu July 7 rally outside NEA headquarters in a show of solidarity.
  • NewsGuild President Jon Schleuss accused NEA leadership of “actively harming the labor movement.”
• Political ramifications. The strike disrupted the NEA’s plans to rally members’ support for President Biden in the key state of Pennsylvania.

(Shortform note: The 2024 US presidential election in Pennsylvania occurred on November 5, 2024, with Donald Trump winning the state with 50.4% of the vote against Kamala Harris’s 48.7%, marking the largest margin of victory for a Republican candidate and the first time a Republican won over 50% of the state vote since 1988. The state was considered crucial in the election, with the winner of Pennsylvania often seen as likely to win the presidency. Leading up to the election, various polls conducted in September 2024 showed close percentages between the candidates, with some polls indicating a tie or a slight lead for one candidate over the other, prompting organizations like the Cook Political Report to classify the Pennsylvania election as a tossup before the voting took place.)

The Future

NEA and NEASO have turned to a third-party facilitator to resolve the lockout. However, the process has been complicated by accusations of confidentiality breaches, with NEASO leadership criticizing NEA’s public comments about the negotiations. The duration of the lockout and path to resolution remain uncertain, with NEASO calling for good-faith bargaining from NEA leadership.

(Shortform note: President-elect Donald Trump’s education agenda centers on a dramatic restructuring of federal involvement in schooling, including a proposed elimination of the Department of Education and shift of control to individual states. His platform advocates for nationwide universal school choice, which would allow public education funds to be used for private schools and homeschooling options. Additionally, Trump’s Agenda47 calls for the elimination of teacher tenure and implementation of merit-based pay systems, a change that some studies suggest could improve student performance.)

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