A Visit With Iowa Congressman Bruce Braley

On Thursday afternoon February 7th following my morning NEA-PAC Council meeting at the NEA headquarters, I was able to join Iowa's two NEA Directors on their appointments with members of Iowa's Congressional delegation. Our NEA Directors on this visit to Washington, D.C. had appointments on Thursday with U.S. Senator Tom Harkin, Congressman Tom Latham, Congressman Leonard Boswell, and Congressman Bruce Braley. Both Directors had a late afternoon meeting back at the NEA building and I was able to represent Iowa in calling upon Congressman Dave Loebsack.

Iowa's two NEA Directors are Jim Young (on far left, below) a 4th grade teacher at Hansen Elementary in Cedar Falls and Kathy Williams (on far right, below) a 7th grade Reading and Language Arts teacher at Wood Middle School in Davenport.

Here we are pictured at the end of our appointment with Iowa's 2nd District Congressman Bruce Braley of Waterloo. Congressman Braley is serving his first term in Congress and is demonstrating he's a real champion for students and public education!

Meeting with U.S.Senator Grassley in Washington, D.C.

NEA state affiliate presidents and NEA Directors have begun to arrive in Washington, D.C. for NEA's "Super Week". Traditionally I arrive on Wednesday in order to participate with other state presidents in a meeting with Team NEA President Reg Weaver on Wednesday evening. This week I arrived on Monday in order to participate in a day-long meeting on Tuesday for "outgoing" state presidents.

In addition, NEA Directors participate in a "Legislative Briefing" on Thursday morning, then have the remainder of the day filled with appointments with their state's Members of Congress.

On Thursday mornings following the Legislative Briefing, state presidents meet as they make up the "NEA-PAC Council". I generally join our two NEA Directors with their appointments following my NEA-PAC Council meeting.

Friday mornings state presidents meet as a group with various NEA staff and the NEA Board of Directors meet all day Friday and Saturday until mid-afternoon.

Iowa's United States Senator Charles Grassley was unable to meet with our NEA Directors on Thursday, so arrangements were made for NEA Director Kathy Williams of Davenport and I to meet with Senator Grassley this afternoon.

It is rare that our NEA Directors actually meet with one of our two U.S.Senators, they usually meet with their education legislative assistants. Today, Kathy and I were in for a treat as we actually met with U.S. Senator Charles Grassley and his education legislative assistant James Rice.

Today we discussed funding for the 2009 education budget to include increases in Title I funding as well as raising the federal commitment to Special Education funding from 17.2% to 20%. The federal government promised 30 years ago that it would fund at the 40% level. We, as you can see, are far from that funding level.

Pictured below are Kathy Williams, United States Senator Charles Grassley and myself.