The New Jersey Education Association, the state's largest teachers' union, is not pleased: Acting Education Commissioner Rochelle Hendricks has ?respectfully? declined to address its members at the group's annual convention. The Star-Ledger reports that Hendricks's rejection letter specifically ?cited what she called the union's lack of interest in working with the governor on ?reforms that put results for our children first.'? But are those the words of the education commissioner or of her boss, the governor, Chris Christie? Edithe Fulton, a former NJEA president, said of Hendricks, ?She may have signed [the letter], but I honestly don't think she wrote it.? Either way, the union is upset. The NJEA has said that in the convention's 156-year history, Hendricks is the first education commissioner to turn down an invitation to speak. One supposes that?similar spats are yet to come.
?Liam Julian, Bernard Lee Schwartz Policy Fellow