Mary Anne Hering, candidate for the Working Class Party of Michigan in 2024, spoke about the campaign on January 12, 2025.
A transcript of her speech is reproduced below.
The Working Class Party votes for the State Board of Education and for Wayne State University's Board of Governors from all over the state of Michigan show that there is a small, but important, minority of the population who are convinced this society does not provide a decent public education for children of the working class.
On our campaign trail, education has always been a hot ticket item. We always struck a chord whenever we asked people what they thought about the schools.
Working class families talked about all the money they have to come up with to outfit their kids with supplies and towards sports, every year. They said their kids are being left behind.
Teachers in working class districts talked about how much money comes out of their own pockets to make sure their students have even the basics. Or about the layoffs that have run rampant this year.
Special ed teachers talked about all the problems – whether lack of funding, or staff – to be able to provide the best care and education to challenged students.
Paraprofessionals, once known as teachers' aides, school bus drivers, custodians, and cafeteria workers used to be public school employees. Now their jobs are outsourced and they make less money, no benefits, and also with little or no job security. All of these jobs are essential. All of these people work directly with children. In the words of one paraprofessional: I am not only a teacher's aide, I'm a custodian. I'm a noon hour aide. I am the teacher – why? Because when a teacher is out, I'm the one there with the kids.
In working class districts extending from Detroit, all the way up to the Upper Peninsula, we have heard people say, there is not enough money for our schools; In the words of one school official in the Upper Peninsula, I'm tired of schools just being expected to do what we can with whatever we are given.
For all of our Working Class Party campaigns, we have been the voice of parents, teachers, school employees, and students, saying that there needs to be a tidal wave of funding for all public schools. In this year's campaign, we emphasized that all public education needs to be free – from preschool, all the way through the university.
Working Class Party has always said the money is there. But this capitalist system cheats our schools and other public services to spend money on war, to prop up corporations, to hand over money to for-profit charter schools. It will take an organized fight, of the working class, not only for our children and grandchildren to have the right to a quality public education, but to also fight to replace this whole unequal society with one where children truly come first.