Throughout our union’s history, AFT members have often been at the forefront of the labor movement in addressing racism and fighting for social justice—not only in our communities and our workplaces, but, when necessary, within the labor movement and the AFT itself. One of the very earliest AFT charters was issued to a union of black high school teachers in Washington, D.C., prior to the second ever AFT convention. And in the 1950s and 1960s, AFT members worked hand-in-hand with civil rights leaders to fight school segregation and Jim Crow, while the AFT banned segregated locals in 1953 and then expelled all local unions that insisted upon segregation. Now, following a series of high-profile deaths of young black men and women at the hands of police, AFT members have formed the AFT Racial Equity Task Force (RETF), which includes AFT-Wisconsin members Katie Zaman of AFT local 3220, the UW-Madison Teaching Assistants’ Association (TAA), and Cynthia Wynn of AFT local 4822, the Wisconsin State Public Defenders Association. The RETF met over the summer with the goal of drafting recommendations for our union to join the front lines of the fight against racism in the American educational, economic, and criminal justice systems.
Both Katie and Cynthia brought deep personal investment in these issues to the RETF. “As a public defender in Milwaukee County, I have witnessed the racial inequities of the criminal justice system on a daily basis,” said Cynthia, who is also an AFT-Wisconsin Vice President at Large. “I’m happy that the leadership of AFT has decided to take on this issue in a serious way, and I see the RETF as the start of a long-term process for AFT leaders and members to combat structural racism.” Katie, who is a member of the TAA’s diversity committee, a community anti-racist activist, and the AFT-Wisconsin Graduate Employees Vice President, similarly sees the work of the RETF as providing a starting point for AFT members to effect change in their communities. “Unions have the responsibility to be on the front lines of fighting racism,” she said. “This work is part of the shift toward social movement unionism—by focusing on the most important social needs in our communities, we can make our union a force for positive change in people’s lives.”
The RETF has issued a report to the AFT Executive Board, a final version of which will be released soon. After the release of the RETF report, Katie said, the real work will begin: “I am looking forward to sharing the task force’s recommendations with AFT-Wisconsin membership and working on implementing them. There will be clear ways for states and locals to begin moving towards anti-racist organizing right away.”