This week, DoDEA issued a memo acknowledging that the Murison training provided to certain special education educators in the Overseas bargaining unit is voluntary, not mandatory, as the educators had initially been told.

When the Murision training was first proposed by DoDEA, management told the association the training would be voluntary. However, when information on the training went out to the field, employees were told the training would be mandatory. FEA objected to this change but management would not lift the mandate, prompting FEA to file an Unfair Labor Practice.

An agent of management had claimed the union agreed to the program being mandatory, but we did not. Please be aware that FEA always speaks for itself; neither management nor its agents ever speak for us.

This past week, a revised notice was sent by DoDEA to the field reporting that participation in Murison is in fact voluntary for participants in either Phase I or Phase II of the program.