Florida Education Association - Early History

Early History

The Florida Education Association was established in 1886 as an affiliate of the NEA. It was an association rather than a labor union, and membership was initially limited to white teachers and administrators only. FEA worked to persuade school boards and the public to increase funding for schools, end discrimination against married female schoolteachers, and more.

Local affiliates of the FEA formed in almost every school district. However, membership remained low and varied widely from district to district, even though dues were not high. FEA, like much of the NEA at the time, was dominated by administrators rather than rank-and-file teachers. The administrators' influence often kept FEA from being an effective advocate for classroom teachers. But in larger school districts, the FEA was somewhat successful in obtaining occasional salary increases, improvements to facilities, and curriculum changes. However the FEA in its early years was seen more as a proponent of white teachers specifically. They opposed the efforts of African-American teachers to sue for salary equalization in the 1940s, with their frequent petitions of interventions designed to delay the outcomes of many cases that eventually prevented schools from maintaining separate unequal salary schedule for white and black teachers.