One approach that will not help is merely maintaining one's NEA membership without becoming involved in changing the system. What angers me is that the union leaders lied to me and forced me to pay dues as a condition of keeping my job. What they were holding back was the fact that in Minnesota, if I had a legitimate religious objection to what the union was doing with my money, I could opt out and pay the same amount to charity instead. 79 Many NEA members do not realize that they can avoid supporting the NEA's ideological agenda by simply resigning from the union. No teacher has to be a member of a union.
Any teacher can resign from union membership.
There are four different categories of state law governing resignation procedures, depending on where one teaches. In these states collective bargaining is illegal. These states also have legislation prohibiting compulsory unionism or agency-fees. As a result, teachers in these states can simply resign union membership and not pay anything to the union. Teachers who wish to resign their union membership can do so without paying agency-fees to the union.