AFT Washington is a state federation of 40 locals representing thousands of education workers, including Head Start educators, charter school teachers, preK-12 classified workers in roles including bus drivers, nutrition workers, paraeducators, and more, K-12 teachers, and faculty & staff at 24 community and technical colleges, and faculty at five four-year colleges and universities.
The 2025 session is a budget session.
PreK-12
- School Related Personnel wage increase campaign: School-related personnel wages have lagged. AFT Washington is part of a coalition of unions, including WEA, SEIU 925, PSE, and Teamsters, that requests significant improvement in school-related personnel wages. In the 2025 session, we are seeking significant funding to provide improved wages to school-related personnel.
Higher Education
- Contingent Faculty Benefits Eligibility: State mandated benefits for contingent faculty are based on their instructional work only, but increasingly, contingent faculty contribute to the college community through non-instructional work, such as accreditation or Guided Pathways activities. We are seeking a legislative solution to include all compensated work done by contingent faculty as qualifying for eligibility for state-mandated benefits.
- Pay Equity Plan: In 2023, the legislature defined pay equity for contingent faculty as 85% of comparable tenured faculty compensation, and directed the SBCTC to develop a plan to implement this policy fully by 2027. The plan is due to the legislature by July of 2024. We will be advocating in the session for sustained, permanent funding to achieve the goal of pay equity, and keep contingent faculty pay at 85% as faculty salaries improve over time.
- Professional Staff Compensation: Professional staff compensation at the CTCs has historically lagged, due to the lack of an automatic mechanism for COLAs and a lack of specific funding for pro staff salaries allocated by the state. In addition, the majority of this workforce is not represented, which locks them out of some other mechanisms for improvement, such as local funds. We will advocate with the legislature for sustained investment in pro staff salaries.
- Gun Safety: The inadequacy of gun safety policies puts the education workforce and students at risk of experiencing gun violence. While the Alliance for Gun Responsibility’s legislative agenda is still in development, we will support policy proposals in the 2025 session.
Retirees
- PERS/TRS 1 COLA: Last year, the legislature awarded PERS/TRS 1 pension-holders, the oldest retirees in the state system, a one-time COLA to address the effects of inflation. We seek a permanent, ongoing COLA, and the funding to fulfill it, for these retirees.
Communities For Our Colleges
- Cost-Free College: This year, the coalition will be making a cost-free college proposal, with ancillary investments in increased college counseling staff and other wraparound services.
- Other Legislative Advocacy: We anticipate that there will be legislative proposals that support C4C’s policy goals that we will support as they are introduced.
Labor
AFT Washington is an active participant in the United Labor Lobby and we will work in solidarity with our union siblings to pass legislation that benefits our members and workers generally as we fight legislation with harmful impacts on working people.
Social Justice
We will advocate for or against bills of importance to our community partners, including the Racial Equity Team, Economic Opportunity Institute, Faith Action Network, PSARA, and others that create equity and social justice for Washingtonians.
Healthcare for All
We continue our participation on the steering committee of the Healthcare Is a Human Right coalition and will continue to support legislation that increases access to high quality healthcare and moves us toward universal healthcare for all.