Labor Accord Signals Shift in NEA View

Few locals appear ready to join AFL-CIO for now.

An agreement announced last week allowing local National Education Association unions to affiliate with the AFL-CIO signals that the NEA is willing to tighten ranks with the rest of the American labor movement in the face of formidable economic and political changes.

Once, leaders of the 2.8 million-member teachers’ union may have believed they had more to gain than lose from keeping publicly aloof from other unions, including the NEA’s longtime rival, the American Federation of Teachers. But that time has waned.

“The labor movement nationally has been thrown challenges, and one of its chief, enduring responses has been organizational consolidation,” said Daniel B. Cornfield, a labor...