Lakia Wilson-Lumpkins

For more than 25 years, Detroit Federation of Teachers President Lakia Wilson-Lumpkins has been active in her local union. She started her career as a first-grade teacher at Spain Elementary and Middle School in 1997. Upon completion of a master’s degree in counseling, she obtained a counseling position at Spain and continued advocating and building relationships with students, families and staff while leveraging support from the community. She recalls the anxiety of walking the picket line in the strike of 1999 and the excitement of delivering the Spain schools’ ballots during the election of DFT officers. She has always provided support to the DFT at the building level as a building representative, alternate and member of the union committee.

In 2014, Wilson-Lumpkins was elected to her first term on the DFT executive board. Since then, she has served as both vice president and executive vice president of the DFT. For the 2023-2025 biennium, she was elected as the ninth president of DFT, which represents more than 3,000 educators and support staff.

In her family, education and unionism have a long history. Her mother was the first Black teacher at St. Anne Catholic School in Southwest Detroit and retired from Mount Clemens Public Schools after 24 years of teaching kindergarten and first grade. Her father retired after 40 years as a Chrysler employee. Her uncles were sleeping car porters, and she has three brothers who were members of the United Auto Workers union. Her sister teaches in Maryland, her goddaughter is a teacher in Tennessee, and other relatives teach as well. “The love of learning and teaching runs in the family,” she says.

This lifelong Detroiter is an outspoken advocate for social, educational and economic justice. Wilson-Lumpkins has been featured in the media, including on C-SPAN during the AFL-CIO’s Raising Wages Summit, in the AFT’s “Life Inside Detroit Public Schools,” on NBC’s “News Learn” and on HBO’s “Real Sports.”

Wilson-Lumpkins is an alumna of Mount Clemens High School. She graduated from Eastern Michigan University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in elementary science education, and from Oakland University with a Master of Arts degree in counseling. She holds principal certification from Lamar University and is working toward her doctoral degree in leadership at the American College of Education.

She shares her home with husband, Michael, and their 10-year-old son Noah.

January 2025