Districts across the country have entered into contracts with teachers’ unions that require discriminatory treatment based on race.
Teachers’ union contracts are laden with diversity, equity, and inclusion practices that prioritize race-based hiring practices, mandatory DEI trainings, and anti-racist development programs, a nationwide investigation found.
Watchdog group Defending Education found multiple examples of public school districts agreeing to union contracts full of DEI initiatives that likely fall afoul of President Trump’s directives ordering publicly funded educational institutions to cease racially discriminatory programs. The report, which uncovered progressive DEI policies via public records requests, shows just how dominant race- and gender-based practices have become in public education.
Denver Public Schools, for example, entered into a 2022-25 contract with National Education Association (NEA) affiliate Denver Classroom Teachers Association, that established among other things an “equity committee” to “explore a district-wide racial equity analysis tool.” The committee reflects “marginalized groups” and seeks to discover professional development opportunities for union members that “extend learning in the area of equity and inclusion and expand knowledge of their own racial and cultural identity.”
Under the contract, the Colorado district pledged to provide “implicit bias” training to all educators “regarding the importance of and strategies for increasing staff racial, ethnic and linguistic diversity.” Additionally, educators who complete specialized equity training earn credits for salary advancement, and new hires must complete the district’s “Equity Experience” before they begin their second school year,” according to the agreement.
“It’s no surprise that teachers unions are embedding diversity, equity, inclusion, and racial justice language into bargaining agreements,” Defending Education Researcher Rhyen Staley said. “What’s deeply concerning is how many school districts have willingly signed off on these DEI-based programs — many of which are highly immoral and possibly illegal.”
“The fact that these contracts devote more attention to advancing DEI and social justice than to teaching kids how to read and perform math reveals the unions’ misplaced priorities and erodes parents’ trust in the institution,” Staley added.
The Minneapolis Federation of Teachers, another NEA affiliate, entered into a similar contract with the Minneapolis Board of Education for the 2023-25 school year. In it, the district agrees to a host of DEI programs: the Black Men Teach program, which recruits black male educators in order to “remedy past, present, and continuing effects of discrimination in MPS hiring practices”; the Anti-Bias Anti-Racist Staff Development and Advisory Council, which aims to support “educators of color, in navigating and disrupting our District as a predominantly white institution”; and additional exclusive professional support, including a mentorship program, district services, and peer coaching, for marginalized educators.
Teachers associated with the district’s Black Men Teach program are also “exempt from contractual provisions for excessing and lay-off, to the extent allowable by law,” the Memorandum of Agreement between the district and union specifies. The contract also exempts teachers from layoffs if they are “members of populations underrepresented among licensed teachers,” and “alumni of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU), Tribal Colleges and Universities and/or Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) programs.”
Unions’ prioritization of DEI is widespread.
An Oregon school district’s union contract includes a Racial Equity Memorandum of Understanding that pledges to “ensure racial equity in our educational system, unapologetically address the needs of students of color who are furthest from educational justice, and to undo the legacy of systemic racism in our educational system.”
A Pennsylvania school district’s union contract establishes a “BIPOC Mentor Program” reserved exclusively for those who “self-identify as a member of the BIPOC Community.” A Washington school district’s union contract mandates that a “Racial Equity Analysis Tool” be used to recruit and hire.
Defending Education found similar contracts in multiple school districts in California, Illinois, Massachusetts, and more.
Teachers’ unions mentioned in Defending Education’s report are affiliates of the NEA and the American Federation of Teachers, two organizations that have led the fight against Trump’s anti-DEI agenda. The NEA called Trump’s effort to curb DEI a “political stunt” and accused the administration of “gutting” public schools.
Defending Education has also uncovered millions of dollars in taxpayer funds that public school districts have allocated to race-based programs. Schools in 40 different states, for example, have spent over $123 million in taxpayer dollars since 2021 on consultants that implement DEI practices. That number is not “exhaustive,” Defending Education noted, and thousands of districts that contract with DEI consultants were not listed in the report.
The Department of Education has even funneled more than $1 billion in grant funding for DEI to public school districts, since 2021, another Defending Education report revealed last year.