Connecticut Education Association - Accomplishments

Accomplishments

CEA is a state affiliate of the National Education Association and has made teachers a powerful force in the legislative process. CEA’s legislative successes include some of the following achievements:

• Campaigned for and sponsored a bill that ultimately led to the creation of the State Teachers’ Retirement System in 1917.
• Lobbied for legislation to require boards of education to provide written notices for teacher contract non-renewals, and adoption of an equal pay law.
• Made Connecticut one of the first states in the nation to require boards of education to collectively bargain with teachers.
• Enacted a fair dismissal law.
• Helped prevent loss of school days to teacher strikes with passage of a binding arbitration law.
• Initiated a change to teacher retirement law providing teachers with a contractual right to their pension benefits.
• Championed a bill to implement indoor air quality programs in public schools.

CEA continues to press legislators for increased state aid for local schools and to fund the teacher pension fund adequately while lobbying against proposals that would drain money from public schools or weaken the rights of teachers.