“Regardless of immigration status.” Those four words were inserted into the lobbying position for the National Education Association at their annual conference earlier this month.
A local English teacher proposed the language as a way to clarify that all students in the U.S. should have equitable educational opportunities, no matter where they were born.
Jamie Stidger, an English teacher at Castle High School, talked to The Conversation about why the language is important.
"I just saw that this was kind of a gap, an oversight, that we needed to make it clear that we are fighting for all children in our public schools, regardless of their immigration status," Stidger said. "I'm an English teacher and also an activist at the government level, and every single word matters."
Stidger said some 6,500 delegates from around the country overwhelmingly approved the language during a floor vote.
"That language will remain in the legislative program forever, unless someone goes on the floor to try to change it and it passes the floor," Stidger told HPR. "So it will live on."
Stidger said her experiences teaching English as an additional language motivated her to put forward the amendment.
"I started teaching in 2000, and I was an ELL (English Language Learner) teacher for 18 years," she said. "An administrator, when I first started, hounded me relentlessly, that it was my job to check my ELL students' citizenship status and immigration status. And I refused to do it. I said, 'Absolutely not. I refuse to do this. This is not part of my job description.' And I was hounded for nothing short of two years. And finally, year three, said administrator said, 'Oh, you're right.'"
"So I knew back then, even, that there can be a tax on this population of our students. And as a public school teacher, I've always said I will teach every child in my classroom, and every child in my classroom has the right to the same equal opportunity to a quality education, and this current administration scares me that that may no longer be the case."
Stidger has also served on the Hawaiʻi State Teachers Association's Government Relations Committee for nearly two decades.
This story aired on The Conversation on July 17, 2025. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. Hannah Kaʻiulani Coburn adapted this story for the web.
