The ESProfessionals:
An Action Guide to Help in Your Professional Development

Professional Development IS Union Work

Across America, education support professionals -- secretaries, paraeducators, custodians, maintenance employees, bus drivers, food service workers, nurses, security employees, and more -- are joining NEA in record numbers and taking collective action to improve their jobs and their schools.

ESPs are now the fastest-growing membership category of NEA. During the 2000-01 school year, 21 percent of new NEA members were ESPs. More than 22,000 support professionals joined NEA that year, producing a 6.8 percent increase in ESP membership over the year before.

Why? Because more often than not, NEA members and affiliates are the ones driving better working conditions including opportunities for professional development.

"ESPs are very serious about their jobs and the children they serve," says Sandra Rice, a UniServ director and ESP liaison in North Carolina, where state ESP membership grew by more than 20 percent last year. "And they are willing to step up to the plate."

According to Rice, support professionals are more eager to get involved in NEA because their diverse jobs are often low-paying, and tough economic times are making it harder than ever for ESPs to support their families.

"I started as an ESP," says Rice, "and I've found that the first problem is trying to define us. Each ESP unit is unique. We're bus drivers, food service workers, and media employees. It's not easy to figure out that this diverse group of workers can have a common voice."

But seeking quality professional development, and using the Association to better our careers, gives us that voice.

To next section: "Skills for all ESP"