On Friday, March 12th, two hundred NJPSA members, invited friends and special guests convened via Zoom for the NJPSA Annual Membership Meeting and Legislative Conference. This year’s theme was Moving Toward the Reopening of Schools and the inspiring, jam-packed agenda was comprised of:
- New Jersey Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill spoke passionately about her role in leadership on Capitol Hill, as a newly appointed Member of the House Education and Labor Committee, of her goal of returning our kids to in-person schooling, and shared some of the biggest priorities of the 117th Congress, including the recent passage of the American Rescue Plan. Congresswoman Sherrill also took questions from NJPSA members;
- New Jersey’s First Lady Tammy Murphy shared an inside glimpse into her work with the NJ DOE’s Standards Review Team to incorporate climate change education into the Learning Standards, making New Jersey the first state in the nation to incorporate climate change education across its K-12 learning standards;
- A discussion between the two Education Chairs in the New Jersey State Legislature, Senator Teresa Ruiz and Assemblywoman Pamela Lampitt, moderated by NJSpotlight’s John Mooney that provided an inside look at the role the state Legislature has played during the public health crisis, and how they have worked with the Administration and the NJ Department of Education to try to address an unprecedented year of education issues. The Senator and Assemblywoman also fielded questions from NJPSA members;
- NJDOE Assistant Commissioner of Academics and Performance Dr. Lisa Gleason presented the NJDOE vision for learning post-COVID-19 and the Department’s goal to Engage, Recover and Reimagine public education in the state. Dr. Gleason also fielded questions and took important feedback from NJPSA members;
- Dr. Ben Dworkin, founding Director of the Rowan Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship at Rowan University, provided an in-depth analysis and entertaining perspective of the state of the national and New Jersey political scenes, including the upcoming New Jersey Gubernatorial race.
The exciting and energizing half-day event culminated with a special recorded message for NJPSA members from United States Senator Cory Booker.
Please be on the lookout for recorded segments from all of our special guests in the upcoming weeks. In the meantime, please take a moment to help support the advocacy work that your NJPSA Government Relations team does by contributing to the NJPSA PAC http://njpsa.org/pac/. Your donation to the NJPSA PAC helps us to be able to advocate for you and to build relationships that help to make events like today’s amazing conference possible.