Bill hearings to begin

Next week will be a busy one for legislators, staffers, and lobbyists alike, as the bill filing deadline approaches and bill hearings begin. As of mid-day Thursday, none of the education-related committees had posted their meeting notices for next week, but we will provide information on the first set of bills scheduled for hearings as soon as those are available.

The TCTA lobby team monitors all committee hearings that include bills of interest, and we register positions in support of or opposition to those that may affect teachers, schools and students. We provide testimony on legislation of particular interest or concern, and try to work out acceptable revisions to problematic language whenever we can.

As we begin informing our members about the bills getting scheduled for hearings, we encourage you to contact your elected House and Senate members to provide feedback on these proposals as well as the major education issues on the table this session.

We continue to hear legislators who vote against teachers' interests use the excuse that they had not heard from their local educators. Make sure your representatives know that the teachers who can vote for or against them are asking for help with our legislative priorities for this session.

Click here to look up your legislators.