According to a press release, the Chelsea Education Association will be encouraging their members to accept student teachers from Eastern Michigan University.
Chelsea, and all of the school districts within the Washtenaw County Education Association (WCEA), had recommended that teachers in their districts not take on EMU student teachers, as part of its larger efforts to get EMU to exit its partnership with the Education Achievement Authority (EAA).
The EAA was a joint venture between EMU and the Detroit Public Schools – run at the time by a state-appointed Emergency Manager – at the request of Gov. Rick Snyder. It was to have revolutionized education for underperforming schools, but ended up a controversial and disappointing experiment.
The EMU Board of Regents voted to cut ties with the EAA in February, after WCEA leaders officially announced the student teacher boycott this fall.
“Our largest group of alumni in Chelsea is from Eastern,” said Rick Catherman, president of the CEA, in a press release. “It was really difficult for our teachers to cut off the program that had trained them. They want to give back to EMU and help mold the next generation of teachers.”
The WCEA’s boycott recommendation didn’t require that teachers said no, but “union members are good at sticking together, even if it’s difficult, as long as they can see that it is necessary to get a correct, desired outcome,” Catherman said in a press release.
“There’s a certain amount of relief, now that this process has reached its end,” he said in a press release.
