Sandra Feldman
Encyclopedia
Sandra Feldman was an American civil rights activist, educator and labor leader who served as president of the American Federation of Teachers
(AFT) from 1997 to 2004.
in Brooklyn, New York in October 1939, her father was a milkman who played violin until work made his fingers too thick and calloused to play music. Her mother worked part time in a bakery, but was often ill. The Abramowitz family was extremely poor; at first, Sandra and her two siblings grew up in a tenement, although the family eventually moved into public housing as their finances worsened.
Feldman attended James Madison High School in the New York City
public school system. She entered Brooklyn College
(which at the time offered free tuition), where she studied English literature.
She became active in socialist politics and the civil rights movement. When she was 17 years old, she met civil rights activist Bayard Rustin
, who became her mentor and close friend. During her early years in the civil rights movement, Feldman worked to integrate Howard Johnson's
restaurants in Maryland
. She soon became employment committee chairwoman of the Congress of Racial Equality
in Harlem
. She also participated in several Freedom Rides, and was arrested twice.
In 1958, while working for the Brooklyn College literary magazine, she met and married Paul Feldman. Paul Feldman later became editor of the socialist magazine "New America" and a member of the Socialist Party
's national executive committee. The couple divorced in 1975. They had no children. In 1980, she married Arthur H. Barnes, former president of the New York Urban Coalition, who was the father of two children.
. But she realized she did not have adequate training and entered graduate school in 1963.
From 1963 to 1966, Feldman worked to obtain a master's degree
in literature at New York University
. She continued to be active in the civil rights movement, participating in the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom
in 1963.
While in graduate school, Feldman worked as a fourth grade teacher at Public School 34 on the New York City's Lower East Side. She immediately joined the AFT (which had only one other member at the school). When New York City teachers won collective bargaining rights in 1960, she organized the entire school staff within a year. During this time, Feldman became an associate of Albert Shanker
, then an organizer for the United Federation of Teachers
.
After just two years on the UFT staff, Feldman played a crucial role in the Ocean Hill-Brownsville strike. The city of New York had designated the Ocean Hill-Brownsville area of Brooklyn as one of three decentralized school districts in an effort to give the minority community more say in school affairs. Many observers argued that the decentralization experiment was a canard: Little educational advancement for the poverty-stricken students of Ocean Hill-Brownsville could be achieved without additional resources, yet the city provided none.
The crisis began when the Ocean Hill-Brownsville governing board fired 13 teachers for allegedly sabotaging the decentralization experiment. Shanker demanded that specific charges be filed and the teachers given a chance to defend themselves in due process proceedings.
A protracted fight erupted between those in the community who supported the Ocean Hill-Brownsville board and those supported the UFT. A series of illegal strikes occurred between September 9 and November 17, 1968. Many supporters of the local school board resorted to racial invective. Shanker was branded a racist, and many African-Americans accused the UFT of being 'Jewish-dominated'.
Feldman was often at the center of the strike. She had been involved in early negotiations over additional funding for the independent school, and Ocean Hill-Brownsville principal Rhody McCoy alleged that Feldman had not objected to the disciplinary actions at the time they were made. In many respects, Feldman was the UFT's point-person on the ground in Ocean Hill-Brownsville. But she was in a difficult personal position. She was writing newspaper op-eds and giving statements attacking the New York Civil Liberties Union, militant black teachers opposed to the UFT's strikes, and minority parents' groups—people she had worked closely with just a few years before. Feldman was deeply conflicted by her role in the strikes, and hurt by accusations of racial insensitivity.
The UFT emerged from the crisis more powerful than ever, and Feldman's hard work, good political judgment and calm demeanor won her widespread praise within the union.
Shanker was elected president of the AFT in 1974, but retained his post as president of the UFT. In 1986, with UFT members concerned that Shanker was unable to attend to his responsibilities as president of both the AFT and UFT, Shanker retired as UFT president. Feldman was elected president in his stead.
, President of the New York City Board of Education, threatened to resign unless Feldman backed off and he was given a free hand.
She was instrumental in helping David Dinkins
win election as mayor of New York in 1989 by using union members and resources to build a winning electoral coalition of black and white voters. But once mayor, Dinkins stalled on signing a new contract with the teachers' union. Feldman rarely criticized Dinkins publicly for his actions, but she kept the UFT out of Dinkins' 1993 re-election. Dinkins lost in a tight race to Rudy Giuliani
.
While president of the UFT, Feldman was also elected vice president of New York State AFL-CIO and vice president of the New York State United Teachers
(the AFT state affiliate in New York).
Shanker died in February 1997 from brain and lung cancer. The AFT executive council appointed Feldman president in May of that year. She ran for and won election as the AFT's president in July 1998, becoming the union's first female president since 1930. At the UFT, Feldman's long-time counsel Randi Weingarten
was elected president.
In May 1997, Feldman was elected to the AFL-CIO
executive council and appointed to the executive council's executive committee. During her tenure at the head of the AFT, Feldman also served as a vice president of Education International
and was a board member of the International Rescue Committee
and Freedom House
as well as numerous other charities and foundations.
Feldman faced a number of significant challenges in her first two years in office. The first was to oversee a vote concerning a proposed merger with the National Education Association
(NEA). Merger had been proposed at various times since the 1960s but had gained ground in 1995. A "no-raid" pact was signed by the two unions in which they pledged to not raid one another's locals in an effort to cool off decades of bad blood. Terms of the merger were agreed to and approved by the AFT executive council in February 1998. But NEA delegates rejected the pact the following July, a majority of delegates voting in favor of the agreement but not by the required two-thirds majority needed to approve merger.
Despite the collapse of the merger, Feldman continued to advocate merger. She oversaw several state and local merger efforts, particularly in Minnesota
, Montana
and Florida
. The AFT and NEA also continued to work together on federal education policy, and renewed their no-raid pact regularly.
A second challenge was organizational. Feldman pushed for and won convention approval for the addition of an executive vice president for the AFT, the first new executive officer to be added to the union's governing structure in its history. Nat LaCour
, president of the United Teachers of New Orleans
, was elected to the position. But Feldman was unable to overcome all the union's organizational and political problems. In late July 1998, about 3,500 members of the AFT's health care division, almost all of them in Rhode Island
, disaffiliated due to a disagreement about the union's willingness to spend money organizing new members. The health care workers subsequently formed an independent union, the United Nurses and Allied Professionals
, and later raided several AFT health care locals in Rhode Island and Vermont
.
Over the next six years of Feldman's presidency, AFT attempted to expand its organizing capacity, build state-level capacity to service existing units and organize new ones, and work with the John Sweeney
administration at the AFL-CIO to reinvigorate the labor movement.
In many ways, Feldman saw her presidency as one in which the legacy of Al Shanker would be implemented despite his untimely death. Hers was a presidency which would reinvigorate rather alter the AFT, and make only incremental changes to AFT programs and policies. Along these lines, Feldman re-emphasized the AFT's commitment to educational issues, which had stumbled after a number of staff retirements and the failure of the union's "Lessons for Life: Reading, Results, Respect" campaign for stronger curriculum standards and better school discipline. But she also renewed the union's focus on organizing, which had languished in the last years of the Shanker presidency. During her tenure, the AFT grew by more than 160,000 new members (about 17 percent).
But even incremental change came slowly. Many on the AFT executive council felt they owed allegiance to Shanker, not Feldman, and they balked at even incremental changes in the union's spending priorities. While the union's educational research and organizing programs remained healthy, the union's servicing capabilities continued to decline during the first few years of her tenure. The union's research and collective bargaining staff remained small and stagnant despite strong membership growth, the union lacked comprehensive membership and collective bargaining databases, and financial oversight of local unions was inconsistent (a situation which led to embezzlement scandals in Miami, Florida
and Washington, D.C.
in 2002 and 2003).
1998 also saw Feldman undertake a systematic review of the AFT's organization and priorities. In 1992, the union had established a "Futures Committee" to engage in a similar review, and the new "Futures II" committee was charged with building on the report of the "Futures I" report. The committee's work began in mid-1998 and concluded in early 2000. The "Futures II" committee's final report, approved by AFT delegates in July 2000, advocated a four-point plan: 1) building a "culture of organizing" throughout the union, 2) enhancing the union's political advocacy efforts, 3) engaging in a series of publicity, legislative, funding and political campaigns to strengthen the institutions in which AFT members work, and 4) recommitting the AFT to fostering democratic education and human rights at home and abroad. Feldman moved quickly to ensure that the plan was implemented, establishing several new executive council committees (including, for the first time, and Organizing Committee) and task forces and seeking further constitutional and organizational changes to the union's political fund-raising efforts.
Feldman's relationship with the AFL-CIO was difficult to characterize. The AFT had opposed the election of John Sweeney as AFL-CIO president in 1995. While Feldman supported Sweeney's efforts to encourage new organizing and restructure the umbrella group, she was also sharply and publicly critical of the Sweeney administration's interference in the internal politics of the Teamsters
union. Feldman's position on the AFL-CIO executive council was strengthened when AFT secretary-treasurer Edward J. McElroy
was elected to that body in December 2001.
Feldman was diagnosed with breast cancer in October 2002. After treatment, she returned to full-time work with the union early the next year.
In 2003, Feldman proposed a major educational policy initiative, known as "Kindergarten-Plus." The program would extend kindergarten to children as young as three years of age, expand the kindergarten school day, and reduce kindergarten class sizes. The goal was to better prepare children for entry into the first grade and help overcome some of the debilitating effects poverty had on young children. Although well-received, only one state (New Mexico
) had enacted a Kindergarten-Plus program two years later.
In the fall of 2003, Feldman was again diagnosed with cancer. She announced in March 2004 that she would retire as president of the AFT at its regular biennial convention in July. Ed McElroy, secretary-treasurer of the AFT since 1992, was elected the next president of the union.
Sandra Feldman died on September 18, 2005 at the age 65. She was survived by her second husband, Arthur Barnes (an insurance executive), two stepchildren, two grandchildren, and her brother and sister.
American Federation of Teachers
The American Federation of Teachers is an American labor union founded in 1916 that represents teachers, paraprofessionals and school-related personnel; local, state and federal employees; higher education faculty and staff, and nurses and other healthcare professionals...
(AFT) from 1997 to 2004.
Early life
Born Sandra Abramowitz in Coney IslandConey Island
Coney Island is a peninsula and beach on the Atlantic Ocean in southern Brooklyn, New York, United States. The site was formerly an outer barrier island, but became partially connected to the mainland by landfill....
in Brooklyn, New York in October 1939, her father was a milkman who played violin until work made his fingers too thick and calloused to play music. Her mother worked part time in a bakery, but was often ill. The Abramowitz family was extremely poor; at first, Sandra and her two siblings grew up in a tenement, although the family eventually moved into public housing as their finances worsened.
Feldman attended James Madison High School in the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
public school system. She entered Brooklyn College
Brooklyn College
Brooklyn College is a senior college of the City University of New York, located in Brooklyn, New York, United States.Established in 1930 by the New York City Board of Higher Education, the College had its beginnings as the Downtown Brooklyn branches of Hunter College and the City College of New...
(which at the time offered free tuition), where she studied English literature.
She became active in socialist politics and the civil rights movement. When she was 17 years old, she met civil rights activist Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin was an American leader in social movements for civil rights, socialism, pacifism and non-violence, and gay rights.In the pacifist Fellowship of Reconciliation , Rustin practiced nonviolence...
, who became her mentor and close friend. During her early years in the civil rights movement, Feldman worked to integrate Howard Johnson's
Howard Johnson's
Howard Johnson's is a chain of hotels and restaurants, located primarily throughout the United States and Canada. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Howard Johnson's was the largest restaurant chain in the United States, with over 1,000 restaurants...
restaurants in Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
. She soon became employment committee chairwoman of the Congress of Racial Equality
Congress of Racial Equality
The Congress of Racial Equality or CORE was a U.S. civil rights organization that originally played a pivotal role for African-Americans in the Civil Rights Movement...
in Harlem
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands...
. She also participated in several Freedom Rides, and was arrested twice.
In 1958, while working for the Brooklyn College literary magazine, she met and married Paul Feldman. Paul Feldman later became editor of the socialist magazine "New America" and a member of the Socialist Party
Socialist Party of America
The Socialist Party of America was a multi-tendency democratic-socialist political party in the United States, formed in 1901 by a merger between the three-year-old Social Democratic Party of America and disaffected elements of the Socialist Labor Party which had split from the main organization...
's national executive committee. The couple divorced in 1975. They had no children. In 1980, she married Arthur H. Barnes, former president of the New York Urban Coalition, who was the father of two children.
Teaching career
Upon graduation in 1962, Feldman worked for six months as a substitute third grade teacher in a public school in East HarlemSpanish Harlem
East Harlem, also known as Spanish Harlem and El Barrio, is a section of Harlem in the northeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. East Harlem is one of the largest predominantly Latino communities in New York City. It includes the area formerly known as Italian Harlem, in which...
. But she realized she did not have adequate training and entered graduate school in 1963.
From 1963 to 1966, Feldman worked to obtain a master's degree
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
in literature at New York University
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
. She continued to be active in the civil rights movement, participating in the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom
March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom
The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom was the largest political rally for human rights in United States history and called for civil and economic rights for African Americans. It took place in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday, August 28, 1963. Martin Luther King, Jr...
in 1963.
While in graduate school, Feldman worked as a fourth grade teacher at Public School 34 on the New York City's Lower East Side. She immediately joined the AFT (which had only one other member at the school). When New York City teachers won collective bargaining rights in 1960, she organized the entire school staff within a year. During this time, Feldman became an associate of Albert Shanker
Albert Shanker
Albert Shanker was President of the United Federation of Teachers from 1964 to 1984 as well as President of the American Federation of Teachers from 1974 to 1997.-Early life:...
, then an organizer for the United Federation of Teachers
United Federation of Teachers
The United Federation of Teachers is the labor union that represents most educators in New York City public schools. , there were about 118,000 in-service educators and 17,000 paraprofessionals in the union, as well as about 54,000 retired members...
.
Union career
In 1966, on the recommendation of Rustin, Shanker—now executive director of the UFT—hired Feldman as a full-time field representative. Over the next nine years, Feldman became the union's executive director and oversaw its staff. She was elected its secretary (the second-most powerful position in the local) in 1983.After just two years on the UFT staff, Feldman played a crucial role in the Ocean Hill-Brownsville strike. The city of New York had designated the Ocean Hill-Brownsville area of Brooklyn as one of three decentralized school districts in an effort to give the minority community more say in school affairs. Many observers argued that the decentralization experiment was a canard: Little educational advancement for the poverty-stricken students of Ocean Hill-Brownsville could be achieved without additional resources, yet the city provided none.
The crisis began when the Ocean Hill-Brownsville governing board fired 13 teachers for allegedly sabotaging the decentralization experiment. Shanker demanded that specific charges be filed and the teachers given a chance to defend themselves in due process proceedings.
A protracted fight erupted between those in the community who supported the Ocean Hill-Brownsville board and those supported the UFT. A series of illegal strikes occurred between September 9 and November 17, 1968. Many supporters of the local school board resorted to racial invective. Shanker was branded a racist, and many African-Americans accused the UFT of being 'Jewish-dominated'.
Feldman was often at the center of the strike. She had been involved in early negotiations over additional funding for the independent school, and Ocean Hill-Brownsville principal Rhody McCoy alleged that Feldman had not objected to the disciplinary actions at the time they were made. In many respects, Feldman was the UFT's point-person on the ground in Ocean Hill-Brownsville. But she was in a difficult personal position. She was writing newspaper op-eds and giving statements attacking the New York Civil Liberties Union, militant black teachers opposed to the UFT's strikes, and minority parents' groups—people she had worked closely with just a few years before. Feldman was deeply conflicted by her role in the strikes, and hurt by accusations of racial insensitivity.
The UFT emerged from the crisis more powerful than ever, and Feldman's hard work, good political judgment and calm demeanor won her widespread praise within the union.
Shanker was elected president of the AFT in 1974, but retained his post as president of the UFT. In 1986, with UFT members concerned that Shanker was unable to attend to his responsibilities as president of both the AFT and UFT, Shanker retired as UFT president. Feldman was elected president in his stead.
Tenure at UFT
Feldman was known for being a quiet but very effective leader of the UFT. She fought school system chancellors and mayors both, winning significantly higher wages and benefits as well as improved working conditions for her members. She lobbied so fiercely for Bernard Gifford as New York City schools chancellor that Robert F. Wagner, Jr.Robert F. Wagner, Jr. (Deputy Mayor)
Robert Ferdinand Wagner III , also known as Robert Ferdinand Wagner III, was a noted New York City civic leader who served as the Deputy Mayor of the City of New York, and President of the New York City Board of Education. He is often confused with his father of the same name, Robert F...
, President of the New York City Board of Education, threatened to resign unless Feldman backed off and he was given a free hand.
She was instrumental in helping David Dinkins
David Dinkins
David Norman Dinkins is a former politician from New York City. He was the Mayor of New York City from 1990 through 1993; he was the first and is, to date, the only African American to hold that office.-Early life:...
win election as mayor of New York in 1989 by using union members and resources to build a winning electoral coalition of black and white voters. But once mayor, Dinkins stalled on signing a new contract with the teachers' union. Feldman rarely criticized Dinkins publicly for his actions, but she kept the UFT out of Dinkins' 1993 re-election. Dinkins lost in a tight race to Rudy Giuliani
Rudy Giuliani
Rudolph William Louis "Rudy" Giuliani KBE is an American lawyer, businessman, and politician from New York. He served as Mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001....
.
While president of the UFT, Feldman was also elected vice president of New York State AFL-CIO and vice president of the New York State United Teachers
New York State United Teachers
New York State United Teachers is a 600,000-member New York state teachers union, affiliated since 2006 with the American Federation of Teachers , the AFL-CIO, and the National Education Association...
(the AFT state affiliate in New York).
Tenure at AFT
Feldman had been elected an AFT vice president in 1974, serving on the national union's executive council and the executive council's executive committee. She was also chair of the AFT's Educational Issues Program and Policy Council, a constutitonally-mandated body which advised the AFT executive council on teacher issues.Shanker died in February 1997 from brain and lung cancer. The AFT executive council appointed Feldman president in May of that year. She ran for and won election as the AFT's president in July 1998, becoming the union's first female president since 1930. At the UFT, Feldman's long-time counsel Randi Weingarten
Randi Weingarten
'Randi Weingarten is an American labor leader, attorney, and educator, the current president of the American Federation of Teachers , a member of the AFL-CIO, and former president of the United Federation of Teachers. New York magazine called her one of the most influential people in education in...
was elected president.
In May 1997, Feldman was elected to the AFL-CIO
AFL-CIO
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, commonly AFL–CIO, is a national trade union center, the largest federation of unions in the United States, made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 11 million workers...
executive council and appointed to the executive council's executive committee. During her tenure at the head of the AFT, Feldman also served as a vice president of Education International
Education International
Education International is a global union federation of teachers' trade unions. Currently, it has 401 member organizations in 172 countries and territories, representing over 30 million education personnel from pre-school to university...
and was a board member of the International Rescue Committee
International Rescue Committee
The International Rescue Committee is a leading nonsectarian, nongovernmental international relief and development organization based in the United States, with operations in over 40 countries...
and Freedom House
Freedom House
Freedom House is an international non-governmental organization based in Washington, D.C. that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom and human rights...
as well as numerous other charities and foundations.
Feldman faced a number of significant challenges in her first two years in office. The first was to oversee a vote concerning a proposed merger with the National Education Association
National Education Association
The National Education Association is the largest professional organization and largest labor union in the United States, representing public school teachers and other support personnel, faculty and staffers at colleges and universities, retired educators, and college students preparing to become...
(NEA). Merger had been proposed at various times since the 1960s but had gained ground in 1995. A "no-raid" pact was signed by the two unions in which they pledged to not raid one another's locals in an effort to cool off decades of bad blood. Terms of the merger were agreed to and approved by the AFT executive council in February 1998. But NEA delegates rejected the pact the following July, a majority of delegates voting in favor of the agreement but not by the required two-thirds majority needed to approve merger.
Despite the collapse of the merger, Feldman continued to advocate merger. She oversaw several state and local merger efforts, particularly in Minnesota
Education Minnesota
Education Minnesota is an American trade union representing preK-12 teachers, school support staff and higher education faculty in Minnesota. It is affiliated with both the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers , and is affiliated with the AFL-CIO.The union's...
, Montana
MEA-MFT
MEA-MFT is a labor union in the state of Montana in the United States. Its 17,000 members make it the largest union in the state.MEA-MFT is primarily an education union, with most of its members being teachers, paraprofessionals and other school-related personnel...
and Florida
Florida Education Association
The Florida Education Association is a statewide federation of teacher and education workers' labor unions in the state of Florida in the United States. Its 137,000 members make it the largest union in the state...
. The AFT and NEA also continued to work together on federal education policy, and renewed their no-raid pact regularly.
A second challenge was organizational. Feldman pushed for and won convention approval for the addition of an executive vice president for the AFT, the first new executive officer to be added to the union's governing structure in its history. Nat LaCour
Nat LaCour
Nat LaCour is an American labor union leader and teacher. As of 2007, he is the secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Teachers , and a member of the AFL-CIO executive council....
, president of the United Teachers of New Orleans
United Teachers of New Orleans
The United Teachers of New Orleans is a labor union representing teachers and other educational workers in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States...
, was elected to the position. But Feldman was unable to overcome all the union's organizational and political problems. In late July 1998, about 3,500 members of the AFT's health care division, almost all of them in Rhode Island
Rhode Island
The state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, more commonly referred to as Rhode Island , is a state in the New England region of the United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area...
, disaffiliated due to a disagreement about the union's willingness to spend money organizing new members. The health care workers subsequently formed an independent union, the United Nurses and Allied Professionals
United Nurses and Allied Professionals
The United Nurses and Allied Professionals is a labor union in the United States which represents approximately 5,500 registered nurses, technologists, therapists, support staff, and other health care workers employed in Rhode Island, Vermont, and Connecticut.-Formation:The origins of the date...
, and later raided several AFT health care locals in Rhode Island and Vermont
Vermont
Vermont is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state ranks 43rd in land area, , and 45th in total area. Its population according to the 2010 census, 630,337, is the second smallest in the country, larger only than Wyoming. It is the only New England...
.
Over the next six years of Feldman's presidency, AFT attempted to expand its organizing capacity, build state-level capacity to service existing units and organize new ones, and work with the John Sweeney
John Sweeney (labor leader)
John Joseph Sweeney was the president of the AFL-CIO from 1995 to 2009.-Early years:Born in The Bronx, New York, Sweeney is the son of Joseph and Agnes , both Irish immigrants. The family moved to Yonkers in 1944, where Sweeney attended St. Barnabas Elementary School and graduated from Cardinal...
administration at the AFL-CIO to reinvigorate the labor movement.
In many ways, Feldman saw her presidency as one in which the legacy of Al Shanker would be implemented despite his untimely death. Hers was a presidency which would reinvigorate rather alter the AFT, and make only incremental changes to AFT programs and policies. Along these lines, Feldman re-emphasized the AFT's commitment to educational issues, which had stumbled after a number of staff retirements and the failure of the union's "Lessons for Life: Reading, Results, Respect" campaign for stronger curriculum standards and better school discipline. But she also renewed the union's focus on organizing, which had languished in the last years of the Shanker presidency. During her tenure, the AFT grew by more than 160,000 new members (about 17 percent).
But even incremental change came slowly. Many on the AFT executive council felt they owed allegiance to Shanker, not Feldman, and they balked at even incremental changes in the union's spending priorities. While the union's educational research and organizing programs remained healthy, the union's servicing capabilities continued to decline during the first few years of her tenure. The union's research and collective bargaining staff remained small and stagnant despite strong membership growth, the union lacked comprehensive membership and collective bargaining databases, and financial oversight of local unions was inconsistent (a situation which led to embezzlement scandals in Miami, Florida
Miami, Florida
Miami is a city located on the Atlantic coast in southeastern Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, the most populous county in Florida and the eighth-most populous county in the United States with a population of 2,500,625...
and Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
in 2002 and 2003).
1998 also saw Feldman undertake a systematic review of the AFT's organization and priorities. In 1992, the union had established a "Futures Committee" to engage in a similar review, and the new "Futures II" committee was charged with building on the report of the "Futures I" report. The committee's work began in mid-1998 and concluded in early 2000. The "Futures II" committee's final report, approved by AFT delegates in July 2000, advocated a four-point plan: 1) building a "culture of organizing" throughout the union, 2) enhancing the union's political advocacy efforts, 3) engaging in a series of publicity, legislative, funding and political campaigns to strengthen the institutions in which AFT members work, and 4) recommitting the AFT to fostering democratic education and human rights at home and abroad. Feldman moved quickly to ensure that the plan was implemented, establishing several new executive council committees (including, for the first time, and Organizing Committee) and task forces and seeking further constitutional and organizational changes to the union's political fund-raising efforts.
Feldman's relationship with the AFL-CIO was difficult to characterize. The AFT had opposed the election of John Sweeney as AFL-CIO president in 1995. While Feldman supported Sweeney's efforts to encourage new organizing and restructure the umbrella group, she was also sharply and publicly critical of the Sweeney administration's interference in the internal politics of the Teamsters
Teamsters
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters is a labor union in the United States and Canada. Formed in 1903 by the merger of several local and regional locals of teamsters, the union now represents a diverse membership of blue-collar and professional workers in both the public and private sectors....
union. Feldman's position on the AFL-CIO executive council was strengthened when AFT secretary-treasurer Edward J. McElroy
Edward J. McElroy
Edward J. McElroy, Jr. is an American teacher and labor union leader. He was president of the American Federation of Teachers from 2004 to 2008, and an AFL-CIO vice president from 2001 to 2008.-Early life and union career:...
was elected to that body in December 2001.
Feldman was diagnosed with breast cancer in October 2002. After treatment, she returned to full-time work with the union early the next year.
In 2003, Feldman proposed a major educational policy initiative, known as "Kindergarten-Plus." The program would extend kindergarten to children as young as three years of age, expand the kindergarten school day, and reduce kindergarten class sizes. The goal was to better prepare children for entry into the first grade and help overcome some of the debilitating effects poverty had on young children. Although well-received, only one state (New Mexico
New Mexico
New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...
) had enacted a Kindergarten-Plus program two years later.
In the fall of 2003, Feldman was again diagnosed with cancer. She announced in March 2004 that she would retire as president of the AFT at its regular biennial convention in July. Ed McElroy, secretary-treasurer of the AFT since 1992, was elected the next president of the union.
Sandra Feldman died on September 18, 2005 at the age 65. She was survived by her second husband, Arthur Barnes (an insurance executive), two stepchildren, two grandchildren, and her brother and sister.
External links
- Former AFT President Sandra Feldman Dies at Age 65
- Rona Holub, Biography of Sandra Feldman, Jewish Women Encyclopedia