The cause of the strike was under-funding of the state's educational system at a time when attendance was rising sharply, combined with low pay and benefits for teachers.
No additional funding was forthcoming, however, and most local affiliates of the FEA settled their contracts and went back to work by the end of March.
And while Florida is growing rapidly in population and wealth, it is actually slipping in the share of state revenue devoted to education.
The Pork Chop Gang were more interested in a "rural-centric conservative ideology that maintained school segregation, while simultaneously disregarding districts outside of their electorate".
In the same year, Governor Hayden Burns, who held alleged ties to the Pork Chop Gang, called a legislative session focused on education, mainly with respects to funding issues.
The Florida Education Association (FEA) demanded more funding, including things such as more school resources and a competitive salary schedule.
The caucus was successful: The same year, the NEA Representative Assembly (RA) passed a resolution establishing an "Urban Project", adopting a policy of "professional negotiations" akin to collective bargaining, and requiring the NEA to provide staff, research and financial assistance to locals involved in "professional negotiations".
"Sanctions" could be employed against any school district which, in the opinion of the local association, had engaged in "unethical or arbitrary" policies or which had refused "sound professional practices".
Property taxes are the largest source of income, and may be levied by each local school district under a formula controlled by the state legislature.
Kirk had campaigned heavily on a promise to improve funding for education, but he also made a pledge not to raise taxes.
State legislative action had often been the only way for NEA locals to win better pay and working conditions prior to the enactment of the professional negotiations policy, so FEA was no newcomer to politics.
FEA asked for a minimum teacher salary of $5,000 a year and a more equitable means of funding schools than property taxes.
At the rally, FEA Secretary Phil Constans gave the following speech: “Lord knows I know how fed up, frustrated, and mad you are; how tired you are of seeing kids you teach cheated because you have to give them individual attention; how tired you are of crowded classrooms, limited materials, and old textbooks ...I know all these things and yet I am asking you to turn the other cheek ...
Following the rally, Governor Kirk appeared in a televised program titled "Education in Florida: Perspective for Tomorrow”.
In this program, Kirk outlined a plan for a thirty-person citizen committee whose objective was to look at the needs for education and make reform suggestions that would be heard at the following legislature.
Even though public employee strikes are illegal in Florida, teachers in Pinellas and Broward counties struck in September.
In a bipartisan effort, legislators raised taxes to expand state funding for school building and to pay for higher teacher salaries.
[11] In February 1968, FEA president Jane Arnold said the state association would support local teachers if they walked off the job.
In Pinellas County, the local education association stayed out for six weeks, and some small groups of teachers struck for as long as three months.
School districts hired substitute teachers as strikebreakers, and local businesses paid their employees to teach classes.
'"[9] Local education associations began to negotiate their own settlements, often agreeing to not challenge school districts for terminating the most militant teachers.
FEA members were radicalized by the strike and the statewide federation later won significant court and legislative victories which legalized and promoted the formation of teacher and education unions in the state.