1976 NCTE Annual Business Meeting in Chicago, Illinois
Background
In her 1976 annual report, NCTE President Charlotte Huck stated that “it has been seventeen years since the Council has had as its President a teacher from a conventional public school.”
In responding to the same concern, the NCTE Executive Committee established an ad hoc committee chaired by Robert Squires, outgoing chair of the Secondary Section. This committee is charged with the task of investigating what adjustments the Council would have to make in its policies to make it feasible for an elementary or secondary classroom teacher to assume the four-year commitment required of an NCTE President.
Because it is an issue concerning the representation of Council membership in leadership positions, and because the completion of the work of the ad hoc committee is not expected until next year, it behooves the Council to take action now to insure that when the report of the ad hoc committee is completed, more teachers from schools K–12 will already be in visible national positions. Be it therefore
Resolution
Resolved, that the 1977 Nominations Committees of the National Council of Teachers of English conscientiously seek the names of teachers from schools K–12 as possible candidates for nomination, and then to seriously consider these teachers for the 1977 elections.
This position statement may be printed, copied, and disseminated without permission from NCTE.